Olazz, sorry to hear of your problems. I think that the issues arose as you were trying to be honest and play by the rules, unfortunately when you do that you can end up creating a problem.
By temporarily exporting the vehicle out of the EU you put yourself into a very small percentage of people that actually do this, and no longer conform to the DVLA's pigeon hole definitions. As you know if the vehicle remains mot'd, taxed and insured then the DVLA don't care, your problems appear to have come about due to you being honest with your insurance company about the vehicles location. Unfortunately once you've informed the insurance company of this, they will refuse to insure the vehicle any further, as you no longer fit into any of their categories either! Your best option, if you wanted to keep the vehicle road legal in the UK would have been to 'forget' to notify the insurance company of the vehicles location.
As has been mentioned, and discussed at length on the HUBB, the best option is to SORN the vehicle and then you will fit into one of the DVLA's categories, they will be happy and you could keep the vehicle insured if you so wished.
It is sad and disappointing that the DVLA wouldn't open up a dialogue with you to sort this without going to court. It is also worrying that the court couldn't take a common sense approach to the matter, I suppose that they might have thought that the DVLA, being the 'experts' in their field, would have already tried to resolve this problem before resorting to court. Unfortunately you fell into the taxed but uninsured category and they didn't care why.
The SORN declaration form being the form to use to inform the DVLA of your problem is very strange and a new one on me, probably seems logical from a legal stand point! To the average car owner the SORN declaration is a notification of an intended action, not a way to communicate and resolve a problem.
With regard to insurance companies, they are quite happy to take your money as long as you fit their criteria. I wasn't surprised recently when an insurer contacted me to inform me that they intended to automatically renew my insurance for me, on a car that I sold a month ago. Now I hadn't told the insurance company as A) there was only a month left to run, and therefore no money would be gained by me cancelling the policy and B) the new buyer insured the vehicle with the same company. Now what I was interested to see was if the insurance company would twig that they were insuring the same vehicle twice and contact me to see what was going on, but no they didn't. They would quite happily take the money from me and the new owner to insure the same vehicle, I thought that their systems would be more intelligent than this.
I'm now waiting to receive the change of ownership confirmation letter from the DVLA, as I received their tax renewal letter last week for the sold vehicle. According to the small print they print them off six weeks in advance, so it would have been coming to me regardless. If I haven't received confirmation after four weeks I shall have to start phoning them, you can't email them (as far as I can see) and as Olazz has shown they don't read their mail!
Olazz, did you contact your carnet supplier (I'm guessing it was Paul Gowen at the RAC) for advise as to the best course of action? He must be very well versed with the best way to tackle the systems hurdles.
With regards to the DVLA I think that the best way is to SORN a vehicle that is out of the EU, you can still keep it insured if you 'forget' to inform the insurance company (it's not like you can claim on the policy), this will mean you have a current insurance document for your travels to prove that the vehicle is insured in the country of origin. When returning the vehicle to the UK you can re insure, re tax and then drive legally (as long as the mot is still valid, if not, insure it and book a nearby mot).
Olazz, thanks for posting your experience as it helps to advise others of the best way to handle this issue with the relevant official bodies.
Keep enjoying your African travels, that's the main thing.
