Personalised Number Plate Information

NUMBER PLATES:

The RTA announced on Wednesday that customers can now check out both available and unavailable numbers as well as those that are likely to be available in the future.

Sultan Al Marzouqi, director of Vehicle Licensing at the RTA’s Licensing Agency, said: “This service does not only allow customers to enquire and buy the current codes, but also future codes (Up to Z). Customers can log onto RTA’s website (www.rta.ae) by clicking ‘Inquiring about Distinctive Number Plates’ to know about the available numbers and buy them online.”

He added that the system has been developed and programmed to provide information about available and unavailable numbers along with their prices.

The system also enables enquiring about numbers in four different ways: by code, by number of digits, by entering the numbers required, or by the price.

The RTA also offers distinguished number plates through online auction as well as through live auctions, drawing huge interests from enthusiasts with some plates going for millions of dirhams.

Last year, the single-digit plate D5 was auctioned for Dh33 million, the highest priced number in Dubai.

A TOTAL of 58 number plates are due to go under the hammer at Highlands College next week as part of an auction organised by the Infrastructure Department.

During the last two events, the auction raised more than £421,750 with the money going towards buying equipment for Driver and Vehicle Standards – the department’s authority which oversee the registration of the Island’s vehicles.

In 2013 one anonymous individual paid £71,000 for the plate JSY 1.

Infrastructure Minister Eddie Noel said that he was expecting one number plate to receive particular interest from bidders this year.

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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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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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Recently, Rishi Kapoor bought himself a new set of wheels - a shiny new luxury SUV - and took it out for a spin yesterday. Mumbai Mirror couldn't help but notice the common thing between Kapoor's cars, old and new - the number plate digits of all cars in this Kapoor household total up to '8'.

A source close to the family told the tabloid that the Kapoor trio - Rishi, Neetu and Ranbir - have always considered the number '8' very lucky for the family. When Ranbir purchased his first jeep back in the late 2000s, the number plate was a one digit, '8'. Later, two cars that followed, one a fiery red sports car and another sedan, too featured a single digit plate.

On the other hand, Neetu, whose driven a blue SUV for the last couple of years, also has a number plate that adds up to 8. "It's also because it coincides with Neetu's birthday, July 8, and everyone in the family makes sure that the registration number totals up to it," the source added pointing out that even Ranbir's football jerseys always have the same number.

The Kapoor clan's affinity for numerology comes as no surprise, since it's always been about digits with Bollywood stars. Amitabh Bachchan, whose birthday falls on October 11, considers his lucky number to be 2 and many of his dozen cars feature the single digit on their plate, three of which have been photographed at multiple events.

Similar for Shah Rukh Khan, who has a triple five (555) on all his number plates. Shahid Kapoor also makes sure to flaunt his lucky number 700 on his plates and even added a custom plate to his Harley Davidson, with the three digit figure on it. Saif Ali Khan sticks to the number 7, since his birthday falls on August 16 and Sanjay Dutt always has a 4545 plate.

Also in the News:

HALIFAX—A Nova Scotia man fighting to have his last name — Grabher — reinstated on a licence plate says police have now forced him to remove an inactive Alberta plate from the front of his car.

Lorne Grabher said he received a call from police Monday after a complaint was lodged against the personalized Alberta licence plate he had on the front of his car.

Nova Scotia requires only one valid plate, at the rear, and drivers in the province often place inactive or novelty plates on the front of their vehicles.

Grabher says police told him he would face a stiff penalty for driving with a fraudulent plate if he did not remove the Alberta plate, which had his last name on it in capitalized letters.

The 69-year-old man said he feels he’s being unfairly targeted.

“I’ve been red-flagged,” he said from his Dartmouth home, noting the large number of vehicles in the province that have inactive out-of-province plates on the front.

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In 1963, numbers were running out once again, and an attempt was made to create a national scheme to alleviate the problem. The three letter, up to three number system was kept, but a letter suffix was added, which changed every year. In this scheme, numbers were drawn from the range AAA 1A to YYY 999A for the first year, then AAA 1B to YYY 999B for the second year, and so on. Some areas did not adopt the year letter for the first two years, sticking to their own schemes, but in 1965 adding the year letter was made compulsory. As well as yielding many more available numbers, it was a handy way for vehicle buyers to know the age of the vehicle immediately. At first the year letter changed on 1 January every year, but car retailers started to notice that buyers would tend to wait until the New Year for the new letter to be issued, so that they could get a newer" car. This led to major peaks and troughs in sales over the year, and to help flatten this out somewhat the industry lobbied

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