Personalised Number Plate Information

NUMBER PLATES:

Sharjah: Fierce bidding at a Sharjah Police licence plate online auction raked in Dh3.4 million for a single plate numbered “15”, said Sharjah Police.

In total, Dh9.8 million was raised from the auction of 100 unique number plates.

Organised by Sharjah Police in collaboration with Emirates Auction from March 27 till April 1, the auction attracted the attention of bidders from across the UAE and beyond.

The online auction witnessed intense bidding on 100 unique number plates, including a pair of two-digit plates: 15 and 66, nine three-digit plates: 120, 121, 200, 202, 221, 313, 660, 801, 888, and 44 four-digit plates, featuring unique combinations such as: 2222 and 5000, in addition to 45 five-digit plates.
The highest bid on two-digit number went to plate number 15, which recorded Dh3,4 million, while plate number 66 recorded Dh1,2 million. The highest price for three-digit numbers went to plate number 888, which recorded Dh700,000.

The four-digit plate number 2222 was sold for Dh600,000 and the highest paid for a five-digit plate (66666) was Dh559,000.

Plate number 200 sold for Dh382,000, while the lowest bid went to plate number 89100 which sold for Dh6,000
The auction was viewed by 500,102 people via Emirate Auction’s mobile app and website.

---

We are currently updating our customer gallery page.

If you have purchased a number plate from us, we would love a picture of your vehicle displaying the reg plate.

You can email to Web@regplates.com, or post to the usual address.

Thanks!

---

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.

---

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.

---

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.

---

The first series of number plates were issued in 1903 and ran until 1932, using the series A 1 to YY 9999. The letter or pair of letters indicated the local authority in whose area the vehicle was registered, for example A - London, B - Lancashire, C - West Riding of Yorkshire. In England and Wales the letter codes were initially allocated in order of population size (by the 1901 census) whilst Scotland and Ireland had their own sequences incorporating the letters S" and "I" respectively, which were allocated alphabetically: IA = Antrim, IB = Armagh, etc. When a licensing authority reached 9999, it was allocated another two letter mark, but there was no pattern to these subsequent allocations as they were allocated on a first come first served basis. There are three interesting anomalies where a zero has been issued - The Lord Provost of Edinburgh has S 0 and his Glasgow counterpart has G 0 while the official car of the Lord Provost of Aberdeen has RG 0. In addition the Lord Mayor

---