Romanian reg number on Irish plates

Uncle Pierre

Hi all. Curious about something I saw yesterday evening. Not sure if this is the best place to ask about it, but here goes anyway.

Noticed while stopped at lights that the car in front of me had a Romanian registration number - RO under the circle of stars where we'd have IRL, and a registration then made up of two letters, three digits, and then three more letters.

However, the surround of the rear plate (where you typically see the name of the dealers where the car was bought) had the name and a .ie web address of a dealership which a quick Google shows me is in South Dublin.

I've a lot of questions, but basically they boil down to:
1 - How could this happen?
2 - How legal is it?
3 - What are the supposed benefits for the owner?

Thanks!

Toyotafanboi

The plate surround is just a piece of plastic. Maybe they got a set of plate surrounds from that dealer to mount the plates. Maybe that dealer did supply the car and it's registered in Romania.

spaceHopper

Maybe the car was in an accident here and was repaired

Maybe they are Romanian gangsters looking to confuse us paddy's

redcup342

Uncle Pierre wrote: »

Hi all. Curious about something I saw yesterday evening. Not sure if this is the best place to ask about it, but here goes anyway.

Noticed while stopped at lights that the car in front of me had a Romanian registration number - RO under the circle of stars where we'd have IRL, and a registration then made up of two letters, three digits, and then three more letters.

However, the surround of the rear plate (where you typically see the name of the dealers where the car was bought) had the name and a .ie web address of a dealership which a quick Google shows me is in South Dublin.

I've a lot of questions, but basically they boil down to:
1 - How could this happen?
2 - How legal is it?
3 - What are the supposed benefits for the owner?

Thanks!

Maybe hes Irish living in Romania and is back visiting his family ?

What exactly would make you think this is weird or illegal ?

Uncle Pierre

redcup342 wrote: »

Maybe hes Irish living in Romania and is back visiting his family ?

What exactly would make you think this is weird or illegal ?

Some plausible suggestions above (thanks folks!) and first part of your reply is plausible too. Alternatively, owner could be a Romanian who used to live here and bought a car here, then moved home and brought the car with them and re-registered it there, and is now back here to visit or maybe just after moving back here again.

On the second part of your reply....not necessarily "weird" (if you apply a strict dictionary definition of the word), but definitely unusual. Most cars with a reg plate surround showing the name of an Irish dealership don't have Romanian number plates.

Car looked pretty new (and maybe I should have said that earlier), so my first thoughts were to wonder if somebody, probably originally from Romania, had bought a new car here but then registered it back in Romania instead of registering it here. And that's the bit that I'm wondering about how legal or otherwise it might be, if somebody did do that?

I hope you called the guards.

I once seen a Volvo in a Ford garage so these things happen.

redcup342

Uncle Pierre wrote: »

Some plausible suggestions above (thanks folks!) and first part of your reply is plausible too. Alternatively, owner could be a Romanian who used to live here and bought a car here, then moved home and brought the car with them and re-registered it there, and is now back here to visit or maybe just after moving back here again.

On the second part of your reply....not necessarily "weird" (if you apply a strict dictionary definition of the word), but definitely unusual. Most cars with a reg plate surround showing the name of an Irish dealership don't have Romanian number plates.

Car looked pretty new (and maybe I should have said that earlier), so my first thoughts were to wonder if somebody, probably originally from Romania, had bought a new car here but then registered it back in Romania instead of registering it here. And that's the bit that I'm wondering about how legal or otherwise it might be, if somebody did do that?

I mean if it was a RHD he probably bought it in Ireland and if it's a LHD he probably bought it in Romania (or Germany, they prefer to buy there as the roads are sh*t in Romania)

I mean you can't just buy an Irish car and put it on Romanian plates immediately anyway, you need to export and import it (registration papers etc)

Uncle Pierre

Two people sitting in front, so couldn't tell which was the driver side and which was passenger.

Was just wondering about the whole thing anyway, since it struck me as unusual. But not necessarily weird.

Isambard

waiting to be re-registered I'd guess and just fitted a plate surround because they could. The surround is irrelevant to the registration process.

un5byh7sqpd2x0

Uncle Pierre wrote: »

Two people sitting in front, so couldn't tell which was the driver side and which was passenger.

The one with the steering wheel ;-)

corks finest

Uncle Pierre wrote: »

Hi all. Curious about something I saw yesterday evening. Not sure if this is the best place to ask about it, but here goes anyway.

Noticed while stopped at lights that the car in front of me had a Romanian registration number - RO under the circle of stars where we'd have IRL, and a registration then made up of two letters, three digits, and then three more letters.

However, the surround of the rear plate (where you typically see the name of the dealers where the car was bought) had the name and a .ie web address of a dealership which a quick Google shows me is in South Dublin.

I've a lot of questions, but basically they boil down to:
1 - How could this happen?
2 - How legal is it?
3 - What are the supposed benefits for the owner?

Thanks!

Nu inteleg

Uncle Pierre

Half sorry I started this thread at all now....

mikeecho

Uncle Pierre wrote: »

Half sorry I started this thread at all now....

So am I.

You basically saw a foreign reg'd car with an irish number plate surround.

Pkiernan

Its vrt and motor tax evasion. Simple as that.

tossy

Feckin foreigners coming over here taking our plate surrounds.

Uncle Pierre

Pkiernan wrote: »

Its vrt and motor tax evasion. Simple as that.

Right. At least somebody here is half entertaining the notion that it might, just might, be along the lines of what I first thought, before other possible explanations were put forward.........that somebody bought a car from a dealer here, and then decided to put Romanian plates on it instead of Irish ones.

IF this is the case, and IF somebody did this, I'm guessing that wouldn't exactly be in keeping with the law?

For what it's worth, had never heard myself of somebody having to change their number plate surround, but I can see now how it might happen all right. For example, if back of the car gets a bit smashed in a collision, and the original number plate holder gets broken.

Uncle Pierre

Uncle Pierre wrote: »

For what it's worth, had never heard myself of somebody having to change their number plate surround, but I can see now how it might happen all right. For example, if back of the car gets a bit smashed in a collision, and the original number plate holder gets broken.

I've done it on every car I've ever owned.
I wont drive around with a garage sticker/surround !

Dravokivich

Its just a frame wrapped around the plate. It doesn't hold the plate to the car.

niley

Uncle Pierre wrote: »

Right. At least somebody here is half entertaining the notion that it might, just might, be along the lines of what I first thought, before other possible explanations were put forward.........that somebody bought a car from a dealer here, and then decided to put Romanian plates on it instead of Irish ones.

Would you be thinking (and publicly questioning) the same thing if it had been a UK registration plate with an Irish dealers surround?

Uncle Pierre

niley wrote: »

Would you be thinking (and publicly questioning) the same thing if it had been a UK registration plate with an Irish dealers surround?

100% yes. Please don't try make this into some sort of racist thing that it's not.

I happened to notice the name of the dealers on the surround, and the .ie web address. As previously stated, the car looked very new, and I therefore assumed that it had recently been bought from that dealership. As also previously stated, I'd never before heard of anybody changing the rear reg plate surrounds on a car.

I therefore wondered how a car that looked like it had been bought just recently from an Irish dealer could have foreign number plates, rather than Irish ones.

UK, Romanian, French, even Martian, wouldn't have mattered. The salient point was just that they were non-Irish.

Thanks again to those who have put forward plausible possible explanations. No thanks to those who merely put forward sideways accusations of stupidity, or a direct accusation of racism.

niley

Uncle Pierre wrote: »

100% yes. Please don't try make this into some sort of racist thing that it's not.

I happened to notice the name of the dealers on the surround, and the .ie web address. As previously stated, the car looked very new, and I therefore assumed that it had recently been bought from that dealership. As also previously stated, I'd never before heard of anybody changing the rear reg plate surrounds on a car.

I therefore wondered how a car that looked like it had been bought just recently from an Irish dealer could have foreign number plates, rather than Irish ones.

UK, Romanian, French, even Martian, wouldn't have mattered. The salient point was just that they were non-Irish.

Thanks again to those who have put forward plausible possible explanations. No thanks to those who merely put forward sideways accusations of stupidity, or a direct accusation of racism.

It would be quite inept for anyone to claim your question was in any way racist, given that the majority of the Irish and Romanian populations share the same race.

Pkiernan

niley wrote: »

Would you be thinking (and publicly questioning) the same thing if it had been a UK registration plate with an Irish dealers surround?

Nice virtue signalling!

Pkiernan

The car in question was obviously a lovely
Romanian man's who decided to drive here from Romania to go on holidays pre Covid and has been forced to stay.

While here, his number plate surround must have fallen off somehow, and he has been forced to replace it with one from an honest Irish dealership.

There couldn't be any other explanation.

Cheensbo

This thread needs to be nuked all the way to current affairs.

Uncle Pierre

From the first line of my original post:

Uncle Pierre wrote: »

Curious about something I saw yesterday evening. Not sure if this is the best place to ask about it

Am even less sure now!

redcup342

Uncle Pierre wrote: »

100% yes. Please don't try make this into some sort of racist thing that it's not.

I happened to notice the name of the dealers on the surround, and the .ie web address. As previously stated, the car looked very new, and I therefore assumed that it had recently been bought from that dealership. As also previously stated, I'd never before heard of anybody changing the rear reg plate surrounds on a car.

I therefore wondered how a car that looked like it had been bought just recently from an Irish dealer could have foreign number plates, rather than Irish ones.

UK, Romanian, French, even Martian, wouldn't have mattered. The salient point was just that they were non-Irish.

Thanks again to those who have put forward plausible possible explanations. No thanks to those who merely put forward sideways accusations of stupidity, or a direct accusation of racism.

I land in Dublin Airport and I've often gotten a rental car with NI plates.

I've taken rental cars from Dusseldorf airport and gotten cars with Slovakian license plates and the cars came from a Dealer in Stuttgart.

The cars could be bought from anywhere, how do you know he or she was "non-Irish" ?

Plenty of Irish are living abroad and had to re-register their cars because local law required it, they are quite entitled to travel back to Ireland and drive around if they want to.

There's nothing weird about it whatsoever.

mikeecho

Dravokivich wrote: »

Its just a frame wrapped around the plate. It doesn't hold the plate to the car.

Some of those frames are screwed into the bumper, and the plate either slots in, or is placed in and the outter frame section hinges open and closed.

Ie.. https://www.amazon.co.uk/Number-Holders-Frames-Licence-Surrounds/dp/B01I6YV172

That way there are no screws thru the plate itself.

Montage of Feck

See plenty of irish regs on fake UK and D plates, so seeing a Romanian reg on a Romanian plate isn't something to get excited about.

Uncle Pierre

redcup342 wrote: »

Plenty of Irish are living abroad and had to re-register their cars because local law required it, they are quite entitled to travel back to Ireland and drive around if they want to.

There's nothing weird about it whatsoever.

Yes, and that's one of those perfectly plausible explanations which I didn't think of at first, and which I've already said thanks for, so thanks again.

And as also previously stated, maybe not weird, but definitely unusual. I'd wager that more than 99% of cars whose plates are housed in a surround that shows the name of an Irish dealer have got an Irish registration number.

So maybe not illegal, underhand, dishonest, or anything else like that. But still unusual.

Pkiernan

Uncle Pierre wrote: »

Yes, and that's one of those perfectly plausible explanations which I didn't think of at first, and which I've already said thanks for, so thanks again.

And as also previously stated, maybe not weird, but definitely unusual. I'd wager that more than 99% of cars whose plates are housed in a surround that shows the name of an Irish dealer have got an Irish registration number.

So maybe not illegal, underhand, dishonest, or anything else like that. But still unusual.

Its definitely illegal.

Never mind the faux outrage from our enlightened woke fellow posters!

i57dwun4yb1pt8

Dravokivich wrote: »

Its just a frame wrapped around the plate. It doesn't hold the plate to the car.

if its a skoda its part of the over all structure , you have to remove the engine to take it off .

Isambard

just saw a pic of a RO car on fb with the poster pointing pout it's dealer sticker from Australia. It's an epidemic

tcawley29

Those Romanians...Stealing our number plate surrounds and our women

Isambard

tcawley29 wrote: »

Those Romanians...Stealing our number plate surrounds and our women

yeah and camping on our roundabouts....

I don't suppose they were both tucking into an 'aul breast of swan while pulled up at the lights there OP?

un5byh7sqpd2x0

Isambard wrote: »

yeah and camping on our roundabouts....

That would be Roma. Not from Romania, but rather India.

Kiwi John

Not cars but there seem to be quite a few trucks on PL,RO and BG plates that are clearly used on local work getting about, how can they be getting away with that.

Isambard

Ramona Hundreds Fluid wrote: »

That would be Roma. Not from Romania, but rather India.

you don't say....

Esel

Title needs amending to

Romanian reg plate with Irish plate holder

mikeecho

Kiwi John wrote: »

Not cars but there seem to be quite a few trucks on PL,RO and BG plates that are clearly used on local work getting about, how can they be getting away with that.

A few irish transport companies have relocated their office (brass plate office) to Romania to avail of cheaper commercial insurance and motor taxes, and rates of pay if they get Romania drivers to operate here.

Romania is an EU member.


It's completely legal, but only beneficial to larger operations.

Uncle Pierre

Esel wrote: »

Title needs amending to

Romanian reg plate with Irish plate holder

That's true. But bear in mind I started the thread (and so put up the thread title) when I thought it was a case of somebody buying a new car from a dealer here, and then getting plates made with a Romanian number instead of an Irish number. I now realise there are other possible explanations too.