Something that you may not know a great deal about is the number plate industry. One side of it is fairly straight forward. To purchase a new registration for you vehicle, you can contact or go directly to the DVLA to make the purchase, pay the registration fee and swap your current registration for the updated one. Alternatively, you can go to a third party dealer. They have finance options in place which allows them to offer higher priced registration with lower monthly payments over an extended period of time, again the registration fee and DVLA change over applies in the same way after your purchase. 

A slight grey area hangs over the other side of the number plate business though, a lot of people don’t know the business that they are dealing with, or have had no experience in buying this kind of product before. 

You may need a replacement number plate for a whole host of reasons. One being that when you purchase a registration from the DVLA or some third party sellers, you do not actually receive the tangible plates, instead you will received all of the proof of ownership documentation that you need to get plates. You may have been involved in an incident that has lead to you needed to replace your current plates, or perhaps you would just like to update them and give your car a new look.

To be able to properly display replacement number plates, they have to be manufactured by a legal number plate supplier like nearby supplier Number 1 Plates, and be made to DVLA regulation and British Standards. There are many protocols a supplier must undertake when designing, printing and making your plates, but you must also jump through some hoops during the order process. To be able to buy plates, you must supply the following:

Identity documents

You can use the following to confirm your name and address:

  • driving licence
  • utility, Council Tax or rates bill from the last 6 months
  • bank or building society statement from the last 6 months
  • national identity card

The following will confirm your name only:

  • passport – does not have to be issued in the UK
  • bank or building society debit or credit card
  • police warrant card
  • armed forces identity card

Proving you can use the registration number

You must bring one of the following to show you’re allowed to display the registration number:

  • vehicle registration certificate (V5C or V5CNI)
  • green ‘new keeper’ slip from the V5C or V5CNI
  • certificate of entitlement (V750 or V750NI) to the number
  • retention document (V778)
  • a renewal reminder for vehicle tax or SORN (V11 or V11NI)
  • temporary registration certificate (V379 or V379NI)
  • a number plate authorisation certificate (V948) with an official stamp from the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency (DVLA)
  • an electronic number plate authorisation certificate (eV948 or eV948/2)
  • a letter of authorisation from a fleet operator (including lease or hire company) quoting the document reference number from the registration certificate
  • if your fleet is in the new V5C on demand scheme (also called ‘V5C suppression’), a PDF of the vehicle’s details from the view vehicle record service
  • UK trailer registration certificate (VTRC)

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