Personalised Number Plate Information

NUMBER PLATES:

Dubai’s Roads and Transport Authority (RTA) has raised Dhs27.75m by selling 80 car number plates at an auction on Saturday.

The RTA’s 95th licencing open plates auction saw four licence plates receiving the highest bid amounts, Dubai Media Office said in a statement.

Number plate R13 fetched the highest bid of Dhs2.92m, while number plate H33 was sold for Dhs2.82m. The third highest bid was received for licence number O69 at Dhs1.68m, while S66666 was sold for Dhs680,000.

The auction saw “fierce competition between bidders hailing from the all community segments”, a statement said.

Ahmed Bahrozyan, CEO of RTA’s Licensing Agency, said: “The Dhs27.751m revenue raised from the 95th Open Auction reflects the remarkable popularity of such commercial activity organised by RTA.

“The number auctions organised by the RTA are characterised by transparency and enthusiasm. They measure up to the aspirations of customers who seek exclusivity in this regard. Such auctions suffice the needs and aspirations of number plate enthusiasts,” he added.

The auction of exclusive number plates garners strong interest in the UAE.

In October last year, a Dubai-based Indian businessman bought the D5 number plate for Dhs33m in what was described as the biggest auction in the Roads and Transport Authority’s history.

Balwinder Sahani, owner of property management firm RSG International, beat competition from other VIPs to secure the plate after paying Dhs25m for the number O9 last year.

However, in November, an Emirati businessman who bought the car plate Number 1 for Dhs31m at an auction in Abu Dhabi was charged with fraud after his cheque bounced.

The Abu Dhabi Public Prosecution charged the man with fraud and sentenced him to seven days in custody.

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Acrylic Number Plates

Acrylic number plates sigify the registration mark of a vehicle.

They can be made of different materials, but more commonly seen are metals and acrylics. But as to how the standard specifications on the use, make and display guidelines of number plates are, it would vary with every city and country. There are some who would prefer to have their number plates more personalized. As long as how it is obtained abides with the regulations, such is possible. In fact, motorists of today are starting to appreciate better the value of vanity plates.

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If Sydneysiders thought property prices had hit peak ridiculous, licence number plate collectors have gone one better with the original NSW No.4 plate up for sale for between $1.2 million and $1.4 million.

The asking price tops the $1.18 million median house price in Sydney, and doesn't even include the Rolls-Royce that it was attached to until early last year when it was owned by Aussie John Symond.

The founder and executive chairman of Aussie Home Loans bought it in 2010 from property developer Ivan Holland, who had secured it in an art swap from businessman and art collector John Schaeffer.

Aussie John was approached to sell the 1910-registered plate early last year, but with a $1.2 million price tag the buyer from Asia declined.

Mr Symond has confirmed he sold the plates 18 months ago to a mystery buyer in South Sydney.

Numberplate aficionado Shane Moore said the plate is widely rumoured to have been sold by Mr Symond for about $1 million.

"Single-digit plates rarely trade so quickly," said Mr Moore, who runs the numberplates.com.au website.

"They are usually held within the one family for decades. As an asset class they've appreciated in value in recent years, but they're also a volatile asset. If things go badly, investors will sell off the plates."

Registered in 1910, the No.4 licence plate is the most expensive item set to go under the hammer on August 28 at the 2017 Shannons Sydney Winter Classic Auction.

It tops the asking prices for 26 cars on offer, including a 1924 Rolls-Royce for $120,000, a 1964 Porsche for $125,000 and a Mustang Fastback for $120,000.

Single-digit, heritage licence plates have long been a highly prized collectible among the ultra-wealthy. In 2008, the No.6 NSW number plate sold for $800,000. It topped the previous high of $683,000 paid in 2003 by an Asian businessman for No.2.

The No.1 plate is owned by the family of the late founding chairman of Australian National Airways, Sir Frederick Stewart, who had owned it since the 1930s.

The No.8 plate was regarded as the most valuable because it is regarded as auspicious in traditional Chinese culture. It last traded in 2010 for $500,000.

In Victoria, single-digit number plates are also investment-grade assets. The number 1 VIC plate is owned by former Foster's Group chief Peter Bartels.

In 2013 British businessman Afzal Kahn knocked back £8.5 million for his "F1" numberplate, having bought it for a record £440,000 in 2008, according to The Telegraph in London.

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The three-letter scheme preserved the area letter codes as the second pair of letters in the set of three, and the single letter area codes were deleted (since prefixing a single letter code would create a duplicate of a two-letter code). In some areas, the available numbers with this scheme started to run out in the 1950s, and in those areas, a reversed sequence was introduced, i.e. 1 AAA to 999 YYY. The ever-increasing popularity of the car can be gauged by noting that these sequences ran out within ten years, and by the beginning of the 1960s, a further change was made in very popular areas, introducing 4-number sequences with the one and two letter area codes, but in the reverse direction to the early scheme (i.e. 1 A to 9999 YY). Often number plates were on hinges, as petrol tank caps were located under the number plates on some cars.

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In fact, when the DVLA issues a car’s registration plate, they actually follow a very distinct system.

While it may look like a random combination, a number plate can actually tell you how old the car is and where it was registered.

A new format for registrations was introduced in September 2001, meaning all cars registered after that date would have their number plate made up of three parts.

How to tell where the car is from

The first section of a number plate is the local memory tag – the first two letters of the plate.

This identifies where the vehicle was registered, and is itself broken down into two parts.

The first letter stands for the local area, for example E denotes Essex, while L stands for London.

The plate’s second letter then identifies at which DVLA office in that area the registration took place – multiple letters can signify the same DVLA office.

How anyone can tell how old your car is just by looking at it

The two numbers in the middle of your plate identify how old the car is.

The DVLA issues two lots of number plate combinations each year on March and September 1st.

All plates issued between the 1 March and the end of August will use the same two numbers as the year they are registered.

For example, a car registered in May 2017 would have “17”.

Vehicles registered between September 1 and the end of February the following year, use a similar pattern of higher numbers.

When the format changed in 2001, this group of vehicles were identified differently by starting the labelling from “51” rather than “01”.

Therefore this second lot of numbers will always be 50 plus the year the car was registered – so after 2010, the number starts with a 6.

For example, a vehicle registered in December 2009 will show “59” on its plate but December 2011 will be “61”.

Is any of the plate random?

The final three letters of the number plate tend to be a random combination that make the registration unique.

But it’s not uncommon for cars with neighbouring letter sequences to be from the same manufacturer, due to batch allocation of new registrations to dealers by the DVLA.

The letters “Q” and “I” are excluded from the random sequence, along with any phrases that are deemed offensive.

Using the current scheme, there will be a sufficient combinations to last until the end of February 2051.

What about registrations before September 2001?

From 1983 onward, licence plates used a leading single letter to represent the year of first registration.

The letter “A” was used in 1983, progressing through the alphabet, finishing with “Y” at the end of August 2001.

The rest of the characters on the plate were random.

Prior to 1983, the same system was used, but with the year letter at the end of the plate rather than the beginning.

A PETITION against a police chief's decision to sell the first number plate issued to the county has gathered over 850 signatures.

Retired police constable Alan Matthews started the online petition after he found out that the 'AB 1' licence plate was up for auction.

Police enthusiasts have lambasted the decision to sell the plate, which has traditionally been used on the staff cars of Worcestershire's Chief Constables.

West Mercia Police and Crime Commissioner (PCC) John Campion claims the sale will enable him to invest in frontline policing.

Mr Matthews, aged 69, who worked for West Mercia Police from 1985 to 1994, said: "It's a piece of police heritage that shouldn't be sold off.

"It was the original number that the chief had. I just think that there's other ways the PCC could save money.

"I'm getting quire ratty about it. When you have been in the police you see how much waste there is.

"It's a sad thing that people in the UK have so much history but don't think much of it."

Jon Cherry, the director of regplates.com, thinks the plate will sell for between £225,000 and £275,000.

He said: "We have sold similar plates recently at this level and the market for high quality original issue number 1 plates is very strong.

"The buyers of these are intent on having only the best and only this plate will suffice!"

Mr Campion said his priority is use the assets at his disposal to make West Mercia a safe place.

"The prospect of a chief constable or any public servant using a private number plate belongs in a time gone by, both for security reasons and public expectation," he said.

"Therefore a considered decision has been made to market ‘AB 1’ and any sale proceeds will be reinvested towards frontline policing in West Mercia."

He acknowledged the history behind the plate but said it had not been used for around six years.

A spokesman for Mr Campion said he was not selling anything else apart from the number plate.

Vehicle registration was introduced in 1903 and it is believed 'AB 1' was first issued to Worcestershire's Chief Constable Herbert Sutherland Walker in 1908.

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In 1989 a lot of these stored old models were registered in advance of legislation that required all new vehicles registered on or after 1 January 1990 to have catalytic converters fitted. This included vehicles held in storage and out of production for several years, in some cases five years or more. By the late 1990s, the range of available numbers was once again starting to run out, exacerbated by a move to biannual changes in registration letters (March and September) in 1999 to smooth out the bulge in registrations every August, so a new scheme needed to be adopted. It was decided to research a system that would be easier for crash or vehicle related crime witnesses to remember and clearer to read, yet still fit within a normal standard plate size.

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