New Designs Revealed For Car Number Plates

The first lot of the new dual code plates (special numbers) will be released in an open auction to be held on December 9, the Roads and Transport Authority (RTA) said in a statement.

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The first round of auction will feature 10 single, dual, triple, quadruple and quintuple digit plates of the Code AA namely: 7, 10, 12, 100, 333, 786, 1000, 8888, 77777 and 55555.

The dual code plates will be released only through open auctions, the statement said.

Those interested in the (regular) plate bearing the Dubai brand in black colour can have their vehicle plates replaced at cost of Dhs35 for short plates and Dhs50 for long plates. Those opting for the coloured Dubai brand plate will need to pay a fee of Dhs400, it added.

“The new design of vehicle number plates is clear and easy to read from a distance,” said Mattar Al Tayer, director-general and chairman of the RTA.

“It is composed of three elements: The word Dubai (brand), number and code. The RTA would start replacing the existing plates of light vehicles by the newly designed plates as of February 2018.

“The replacement will be gradual and in lots according to a time chart to be announced in future,” he added.

The RTA regularly holds auctions for special VIP number plates. In October, the authority said it raised Dh24.8m in its 96th edition of the licence plate auction, which saw 80 distinct plates go under the hammer.

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A previous auction in May saw Dh2.9m raised from the auction of a single number plate.

In October last year, a Dubai-based Indian businessman also bought the D5 number plate for Dh33m in what was described as the biggest auction in the RTA’s history.

“The new initiative underlines RTA’s keenness to satisfy the needs of customers aspiring to own distinctive number plates, especially as the stock of single-code distinctive plates is about to be exhausted,” said Al Tayer.

The Department of Transport Management (DoTM) has restarted the scheme to replace hand-painted vehicle licence plates with embossed ones after putting it on hold for two months.

Owners of four- and three-wheelers will be able to get the new plates from Monday. According to the department, the licence plates will show the province number instead of letters denoting the zone where the vehicle was registered.

Last August, the department started installing the digital registration plates on automobiles belonging to the government and diplomatic missions. But the distribution process shut down after the parliamentary Development Committee ordered the government to put the province numbers instead of the name of the zone on them.

“The number plates will now show the province number instead of the name of the zone,” said Tok Raj Pandey, spokesperson for the DoTM, adding that the installation process would start from Province 3.

Vehicle owners can obtain the new licence plates by filling out a form online by going to the department’s official webpage.

“However, they will have to make a trip to the department’s office in Ekantakuna, Lalitpur to make payment,” Pandey said.

“We have launched the distribution process on a trial basis.

The new licence plates will be made mandatory for all vehicles soon.”

The licence plate for a heavy four-wheeler costs Rs3,600. Car licence plates cost Rs3,200, and auto rickshaw and other three-wheeler licence plates cost Rs2,900. The price of a two-wheeler licence plate is Rs2,500.

Pandey said registration plates bearing the province number would be replaced with plates showing the name of the province after the government determines the names of all seven provinces. “Vehicle owners will have to pay an extra charge to get new number plates showing the name of the province.”

According to the DoTM, a microchip is installed in the embossed number plates which will allow authorities to trace the whereabouts of automobiles. This is expected to be of particular help during emergencies.

Towards this end, the department will install Radio Frequency Identification Centres at the five main entrances into the Kathmandu Valley and major cities elsewhere in the country.

The department has awarded the contract to manufacture the number plates to Tiger IT, a joint venture of US and Bangladesh IT companies.

The plan to launch embossed number plates was included in the Three-Year Interim Plan 2007-10, but it lay in limbo due to delays in conducting proper studies.

The Commission for the Investigation of Abuse of Authority (CIAA) had also intervened in the project following a complaint regarding irregularities in 2010.

The project stalled for almost a decade before a private firm was hired to import the necessary equipment.

So what are the top selling number plates in the UK? The DVLA has been selling private plates to UK motorists since 1989. During this time, there have been a number of records set, but most of the top 10 have been bought in the past 15 years. Here’s what currently makes the list:

25 0 – A Ferrari dealer bought this for £518k in 2014. It is now on a £10 million Ferrari 250 SWB.
F 1 – A businessman, Afzal Khan, bought this for £440k in 2008 and put it on his McLaren-Mercedes SLR.
S 1 – This was bought in 2008 for £404k by an anonymous buyer.
1 D – Businessman Nabil Bishara bought this plate in 2009 (before One Direction was formed, so it is not a reference to the band) for £352k.
M 1 – Businessman Mike McCoomb bought this number plate in 2006 for £331k, apparently for his son, who was 10 at the time.
VIP 1 – Chelsea owner and businessman Roman Abramovich bought this plate for £285k in 2006.
51 NGH – This number plate, which looks like the surname Singh, was sold in 2006 for £254k.
1 RH – Businessman Robert Haverson bought this in 2006 for £247k.
K1 NGS – This reg plate, which looks like the word “kings”, was bought anonymously in 1993 for £231k.
1 0 – This very simple but striking number plate was bought anonymously in 2009 for £170k.

These are large amounts of money, but they are all small compared to the top-selling number plates found in other parts of the world. Abu Dhabi, in the UAE, has the record for the most expensive number plate ever sold. That number plate was a simple “1”. It was bought in 2008 by businessman Saeed Abdul Ghaffar Khouri for £7.25 million.

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