By Rob Hull
Updated: 00:36 AEDT, 15 October 2024
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The Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency is raking in £260million a year from selling and transferring personalised number plates to vehicle owners, This is Money can reveal.
Revenue from this lucrative revenue stream has tripled in a decade as demand for private plates grows in popularity.
But where does this money go?
According to revenue records shared by the DVLA, it has earned some £2.09billion from drivers buying and transferring private plates in a decade
In 2012-13, the DVLA made £100.2million from a combination of personalised registration sales and auctions, cherished plate transfers and assignment fees.
Most recent data obtained via a Freedom of Information request issued to the agency by transport policy and research organisation RAC Foundation shows it earned £260.1million in 2022-23.
Some £150.5million of this was from plate sales, which accounted for 58 per cent of the DVLA's personalised registration revenues that year.
A further £72.4million (28 per cent) came from cherished transfer administration charges, when motorists remove their private plate from one vehicle and assign it to another or want to add it to a car have put a personalised registration on retention.
The remaining £37.2million (14 per cent) comes from assignment fees, the DLVA told RAC Foundation.
While the figures show private number plate sales and management is a profitable cash cow for the Government, revenues have declined more recently.
Earnings from private plate sales and handling peaked in 2021-22, with the agency taking a whopping £302.9million in total that financial year.
This was driven predominantly by a spike in plate sales, which came to £181million over the 12-month period, which accounted for 60 per cent of revenues.
According to revenue records shared by the DVLA, it has earned some £2.09billion from drivers buying and transferring private plates in a decade.
The DVLA says it has millions of personalised registrations available for drivers to buy online or via its auctions.
It currently has around 60 million private plate combinations available on its searchable database, with prices starting from £250 each, which includes VAT and an £80 assignment fee.
The agency also hosts several online private registration plate auctions each year.
This tends to include those identified as most popular, usually spelling out names and words using the latest age-identifying prefixes – currently the '74' plate age mark available from 1 September.
These auctions also include the most desirable combinations of letters and numbers as well as short character registrations, which are considered most lucrative of all.
Investment
Investors go where the returns are good, and the performance of private number plates is pulling investors away from traditional investments.
With higher returns than wine, watches, jewellery and classic cars and art, it's not surprising that personalised plates are creating bidding wars.
One specialist said a plate can double in value in 12 months.
Buyers turn over plates very quickly, and unlike investments like cars or art there's no storage costs. You can even drive your car with your plate on without it losing any value!
Covering up a car's age
While you can't customise and display a plate that makes your car look newer than it is, you can put private plate on that conceals the age of your car.
You don't have to drive around with an age-identifiable DVLA plate.
Power symbols
There's inner confidence and then there's needing to prove it.
Drivers with private plates resembling status such as success, money, or influence such as 'BO55' use short words or acronyms to project the image of themselves they want out there.
Sentimentality
Some people have a locket with a photo in, others a tattoo. But for some drivers, a private plate is the best means to remember and commemorate special dates, events or references to loved ones.
And because these evoke personal memories, many believe it is worth paying a lot of money for the personalised number plate combinations they really want.
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