Private plates

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Andy W

Active Member
Joined
Jun 27, 2003
Messages
401
Location
Stoke on Trent
Car
ML 270 cdi
I am still looking for a reasonable priced private plate but what I do find is a lot of the sites are advertising the same plates at different prices. Now a lot of these plates are not on the DVLA site so my thinking is there must be a national data base or register of all non DVLA plates for sale. Does any one in the motor trade know of this or point me in the direction of non rip off silly money plates.
 
Theres a company I have dealt with before near Poole called Five Star who sell the dateless reg numbers at sensible money. Also try E bay as I've just bought one there at sensible money (3 numbers 3 letters for £500), also bought one for the wife from DVLA *** (her names Rita) for only £250.

Theres loads of sites like you say that will try and bump the price up and as you say advertise the DVLA ones with an increased premium (rip off merchants), you really need to shop around for the one you want.

Good luck in your quest....

Nath
 
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There's no central database as such, if you ask a compnay to value your plate they then know how to contact you. Even if you don't put it up for sale with them they may well contact you in the future. If you do put it up for sale with them you will find it for sale with other companies too - pretty incestuous business.

A lot of the time these dealers are offering DVLA plates which you could buy yourself but they're charging VAT, transfer fees etc on top of the DVLA price.

I sold a plate via a compnay a year or so ago. Last month I was called by 2 different companies saying they had a buyer for my plate and did I have it for sale still.

There are some tasty bargains to be had at DVLA still, particularly if you use a bit of imagination.

Another good place to look is www.speedyreg.co.uk, they sell a lot of Irish plates which is great if you want a plate with "I" or a "Z" in it, they have dateless regs starting from £99. If your name was Peter Ian Wilkinson for example, you could get PIW 1799 for £199.00.

Cheers
OG
 
I found it was much cheaper to change your Own Name by deed poll, to match a Number Plate.


regards
W249 JKV (Mr)
 
Mr D Pole:D
 
A lot of the plates on the web sites are not for sale. If you buy a plate they do not remove it from sale unless you ring all the dealers and ask them to remove it from thier database
A site called Emark is the best one to find plates that are actually for sale
 
Originally posted by joe
I found it was much cheaper to change your Own Name by deed poll, to match a Number Plate.


regards
W249 JKV (Mr)
:D :D :D :D
 
I bought a 3xletter 3xnumber (dateless) plate a couple of years ago for £300 (NFF726) - the price was low because they are not particularly common initials. I had seen the same plate advertised with other companies for prices upto £1200 (obviously they were adding their commission).

I would throughly recommend anyone looking just for a dateless plate to checkout the DVLA site, these plates sell cheaply at their auctions and seem to be good value.

My current plate isn't dateless but is a good value investment (I have been offered comfortably more than I paid for it by a guy with a very similar name!).

I can also suggest you check the newreg site, their "Was it issued" seach is good, and gets you some decent basic facts about your chances of finding your ideal plate (eg was PAV726 ever issued?).

Do your research and it is still possible to buy a good plate that will keep or rise in value - if you buy second best then it will always be valued as such (K1NKY or K2NKY ?!).

It is worth knowing the law on reg plates (and not alot of cops do, so you could be well armed....) with the advent of ANPR (Automatic Number Plate Readers) to locate stolen cars and cars used by criminals, there will be even more of a push for "standard" plates.

"K1NKY" (ie all equal spaces) IS legal, no matter what the cop tells you it does NOT have to be "K1 NKY". But you really have to know the detail of the legislation (Regs) - "K2NKY" would be illegal, it has to be "K2 NKY".

(I get paid to know this stuff... - sorry)

If you have 2 cars, it might be worth looking at a neat pair (missus) eg one Northern Irish plate and one mainland, for example "MXI 234" and "MX 1234", which can both be displayed as "MX l234" (and that WILL confuse the cops!).

:bannana: (Bit of a sad bannana, I know, I need to get out more)
 
My plate is T800 OST but I have displayed it as T 800OST - I assume its illegal spacing-wise but for some reason the BiB's round here aren't interested and I've never been pulled for it (yet :D) Can you, or any other resident upholders of the law tell me what the damage is if I ever got done?

And what makes K1NKY ok but K2NKY not ok?!?
 
Yes, you're right. Your plate should be "T800 OST", but if it is just mis-spaced (but otherwise legiable) I figure they have better things to be doing.

K1NKY can be spaced with 13mm gaps between each character, K2 NKY has to have 13mm between all except the number and the group of characters (which needs to be 38mm).

These measurements are for the older style of charcters (which would have been current at time of issue).

With the current, narrow characters the distances are 11mm and 33mm respectively.

The fine for an illegiable plate? Depends on local policy. And whether the cop is a keen new recruit.

Could be as little as a warning, a £40 fixed penalty ticket (take it if offered!), £60 and 3 points or a summons to court (max fine £1000 I think). DVLA can (and will) withdraw plates.

:bannana:
 
I would throughly recommend anyone looking just for a dateless plate to checkout the DVLA site, these plates sell cheaply at their auctions and seem to be good value.
I've just checked out the DVLA site with regards to their auctions DVLA CUSTOM MARKS
It seems very interesting, especially if your after a 3x3 plate etc maybe with numbers first.
This way your not getting ripped off
Check out some of the prices previously acheived at past auctions Previous Auction Prices Most are under £500

Myself personely would have a look at that route ;)
 
"?FF ???" "?SU ???" "?SK ???" 3x3 plates were issued to re-registered vehicles which could prove they were pre-1964, and a good proportion of those were "transferable" (so they can be sold). There are a good number of, for example "MFF 567" "PSU 789" and "GSK 234" plates about and these are likely to be the best dateless starters (look at around £400 - £500) unless you really want an irish plate (likely to be of limited value unless exceptional - "OIL 666").

E-bay occasionally has a good value plate, but I suggest either a DVLA auction or take a look at the small firms that advertise in the Sunday Times (tell them what you want and your price limit and many will get back to you with plates to your spec).
 
I bought SWA 110W at the start of the year from regtransfers.co.uk for a LOT of money but it was a pretty good investment as I have already been offered more than I paid for it twice (each one over £1500 more!)

Not sellin' it though as it's my name, and has an alternative meaning that certainly provokes conversation!
 
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The fine for an illegiable plate? Depends on local policy. And whether the cop is a keen new recruit.

Could be as little as a warning, a £40 fixed penalty ticket (take it if offered!), £60 and 3 points or a summons to court (max fine £1000 I think). DVLA can (and will) withdraw plates.

:bannana: [/B]


Whoops !! then I had better watch my FJ 1691 (FJI 691).
 
A traffic cop who lives near me says they're not really bothered about spacing and wouldn't bother to stop someone if they weren't commiting another offence, but are clamping down on fancy typefaces and instances where someone is altering a character to make it look like a different one, like putting a dot between two 1s to make it look like an H or putting a 1 and a 3 so close they look like a B

Andy
 
Originally posted by Ian B Walker
Whoops !! then I had better watch my FJ 1691 (FJI 691).
As unlikely as it sounds, spacing "FJI 691" as "FJ I691" IS actually legal!!!! Although I bet if you got stopped, 90% of cops wouldn't know it (or care - lets face it!!) and if you rolled over and took it, if you went to court it wouldn't be spotted that it was legal either.

In the event you do need to know why, I can point you to the regs...

lol:devil: :bannana:
 
...I bought my plate from the dvla in a custom auction - MBC 230K ie MB C230K . No-one else bid for it so I got it for the cheapest possible price. One gripe only really, was that I registered my interest in the number but they did not put it in the next auction. I was really mad, and had to phone them again. Gave them the 3rd degree and they finally put it up for sale. Spent a lovely weekend going up country with the better half to bid for it. One thing about the auctions though, the catalogue gave estimated times for each page of numbers, but at the auction I went to they were well behind schedule.
Rgds
Les
 
DO YOU REALLY WANT ALL THESE NUMBERS ON A WEB_SITE TO BE CLONED?????? :crazy: :crazy: :crazy:
 
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Flip said:
In the event you do need to know why, I can point you to the regs...

lol:devil: :bannana:

I have a plate with an A1 ??? so I'm interested to know why I can have the A1 pushed up to 13mm against the next letter but not if it were a 2?

Thanks
 

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