Customized reg?

dubtom

I was pleasantly surprised yesterday when I registered my car and was given the option of a ZV reg. It actually struck me as a bit UnIrish that a Goverment body would allow registration numbers that don't stick to the standard, 72 D etc. I was wondering if any of the car clubs or organisations had ever approached them about the introduction of customized plates for classics. It wouldn't be too much of a push for them to organise with the amount of classics in Ireland, several thousand perhaps, and it could prove a money spinner.If they gave a simple offer of an 3 number 3 letter reg, pick your own, Im sure their would be takers. They would certainly make more that the 50 euro a pop they charge now. I'd fancy MUS 351.
(the 351 is for the cubic inch of my engine)

Dades

Hey I'd be all for that.

You start the lobbying dubtom and I'll sign your petition.

I like having the old year (72 D ) on the reg as I think the first thing people wonder is how old the car is.
But a custom reg would be a cool option. Hmmm what to get...

Abelloid

I reckon there is a huge market for this, how many ZV's are out there?
I had the option on importing my beetle and chose a year plate simply because it had less digits,
yet "what year?" is always the first question people ask :rolleyes:

Silvera

I wrote to the relevant Minister some years ago about the possible introduction of private/personalised plates.

One possible option I suggested was to issue the thousands of unused old-style (pre-1987) registrations for use as private plates (plus the reissue of old-style regs from scrapped vehicles).

To sum up their reply - "we have no interest in this".

Silvera

When I was on Oz and NZ last year there were lots of personalized plates to be seen - it's big business down there, as it is in the UK and the U.S.

(Reg plates are issued by the govt in Oz/NZ/U.S.)

There were regular ads on the radio in NZ for personalized plates, see - www.numberplates.co.nz

See NZ no '1' plates for sale here - http://plates.flexiweb.co.nz/

dubtom

Silvera wrote:

I wrote to the relevant Minister some years ago about the possible introduction of private/personalised plates.

One possible option I suggested was to issue the thousands of unused old-style (pre-1987) registrations for use as private plates (plus the reissue of old-style regs from scrapped vehicles).

To sum up their reply - "we have no interest in this".

That surprises me, Our Goverment are usually quite good at squeezing that extra buck from us. I suppose the volume wouldn't be big enough to justify the program change needed to implement it. Ah well...

PaulK_CCI

I can imagine why the ministery wouldn't be interested, because in fact they have some sort of system in place where you can 'reserve' a number for approx 250 or 300 euro's (I think). This is for new cars, where you can reserve numbers like 911 or 525 etc etc, so that when you buy a new Porsche or Bmw in 2006, your reg would be 06 - D - 911 .

The only limitation to this is that the number MUST be awarded in sequence. You cannot therefore be issued the number 200.000 until it actually comes up in the sequence, so you'd have to wait until 199.999 cars are sold in your particular county.

Theoretically this system is in place for Classic Car registrations also, but the issuing in sequence is what makes it almost impossible to apply. The amount of classic cars being registered is relatively quite small, so it's very difficult to determine when a particular sequence is coming up, and therefore the timing of getting a partular number issued to you would be virtually impossible to predict.

The only way you could 'play' with the system is to get your car registered with a year/county registration, for example 69-WW-1234, and then find out on what number the ZV numbers are at this moment in time, determine what number you would like (for example it's now on ZV 52346 and you would like to have ZV 52 504 for your peugeot 504), reserve that number and wait until it comes up in the sequence (in my example you will have to wait until another 158 classics are registered), and because you are allowed to reregister your Year/County registration at any time with a ZV style registration, you can have it reregistered with your reserved registration number. By the way, this doesn't work the other way around!!!

Capt'n Midnight

dubtom wrote:

I was pleasantly surprised yesterday when I registered my car and was given the option of a ZV reg.

Was it by any chance previously registered in this country and they were only giving you back it's original registration ?

Abelloid

I'm not sure about the ZV registration being sequential, is it by county?
I was offered ZV 29*** in August last year, but then when I was talking
to a bus owner from Clare about their reg it was issued around the same time and was only ZV 17***

Silvera

JustinOval wrote:

I'm not sure about the ZV registration being sequential, is it by county?
I was offered ZV 29*** in August last year, but then when I was talking
to a bus owner from Clare about their reg it was issued around the same time and was only ZV 17***

Each county is allocated a batch of ZV numbers which are then issued sequentially.

For example -

Clare = ZV 17201 - ZV 19700
Cavan = ZV 19701 - ZV 22200
Carlow = ZV 22201 - ZV 24700

etc etc etc

Re: 'Cherished' registrations issued to new cars -

If the govt started to issue personalised plates, they could easily charge €300 (or more!) and owners of new or used cars could buy their own reg plate.

I'd reckon the revenue raised from sales of personalised plates would put current 'Cherished' plate sales revenue in the shade.

dubtom

Capt'n Midnight wrote:

Was it by any chance previously registered in this country and they were only giving you back it's original registration ?

No, it's from the US and then UK.
The number I was given is in the 7 thousands. So is ZV the letters for all years.
Actually I was searching this site last night for a picture I was convinced I had seen of a car with a high ZV reg, the county allocations would explain it. It confused me there for a while.

MercMad

Firstly it took a lot of lobbying before they introduced the "ZV" option in the first place. The reason the chose that format is because all Republic cars have to have a "Z" or an "I" in their number. They couldn't obvioulsy re-issue a previously used number and their system was manual so they couldn't track a lot of cars to see
A. Where they were currently located
B. If they had been scrapped

......as you can imagine, in Ireland in years gone by there was a high number of cars being regularly used that hadn't been taxed for years !

Therefore introducing a new (ZV) set of digits sorted out the problems. They still conformed in both appearance and correctness yet they could computerise them and keep all the info.

They will never re-issue old numbers. You would have to hand back the old style log book or have a certificate oif destruction. Besides there are not that interested !

Having a new "Custom" reg would cause them headaches and these guys are just not bothered, ther vision is short term !

Silvera

dubtom wrote:

So is ZV the letters for all years.

Yes.
ZV were the last letters allocated to Dublin in 1986, but were 'saved by the bell' with the introduction of the new 1987 system. Hence when the IVVCC lobbied for 'old style reg numbers' for imported vehicles, the Dept of Environment introduced ZV 'Vintage Registrations' in 1992.

The original batches consisted of 'ZV' - plus up to four numbers, issued to each county
However, when these batches were becoming exhausted, 'ZV' plus five numerals were issued to each county (c. 2003).

Many purists don't like the look of the new 'five numeral' plates, as original Irish plates never had more than four numerals.

County Wicklow ZV reg......

Silvera

BTW, has anybody here come across a garage/motor factors who can make up red reflective rear plates (as used in Ireland from 1969-1986) ?

Silvera

dubtom wrote:

The number I was given is in the 7 thousands.

Dublin = ZV 7201 - ZV 17200
(Dublin got the last of the 4-numeral ZV regs, along with new 5-numeral ZV regs .....plus a lot more numbers than any other county :rolleyes: )

dubtom

Anyone know where I would get a similar reg plate made with my new numbers.

Abelloid

States Plates. They don't have a website or anything, just ring and leave your address,
they will send you a form with all the options/states/colours which can be faxed back, takes a few weeks but is definitely worth the wait.

States Plates 00 44 1526 344460

Silvera

Contact Frampton Plates in the UK ........

www.pl8s.co.uk/page3.html