help needed with buying a new private plate

[madasamuppet]

hopefully someone can help me with this. I bought hubby a private plate years ago which is on our current car. I have seen a new plate Iwould like to get him for his xmas and wondered how to go about putting another private plate on. would be buying from dvla so will have already paid the £80 assignment fee when buy new one. is it just a case of putting on new plate and then getting a form back from dvla to say we still own the old plate and can either sell or put on another car. hope this makes sense thanking you in advance

[patdavies]

You need to pay DVLA in order to retain the current VRM (ie. place it onto a retention certificate)

[crem]

patdavies is correct.

 

When you place the current private plate on retention (you get a form v778 retention certificate) you will be given the option of paying 25 / 50 / or 75 pounds as well as the 80pounds assignment fee to retain it for 1, 2 or 3 years.

 

Whichever you choose, you can renew the v778 within one month of it expiring by paying a further 25 pound per year of retention. The £80 you paid is still valid for when you re-use it eventually. If you choose to give up your right to use it the £80 is refundable.

 

Beware though, if you fail to renew the v778 prior to it expiring you will loose your right to keep the number.

[madasamuppet]

okay, so if i buy a new plate do i have to send of new plate forms to get new plate on car and tax disc changed and the dvla send a form for retention of old plate or do i have to send off to get retention first and then put new one on/ it just confuses me thanks for the help

[crem]

when you buy the new plate, it will be supplied as a v778 form anyway. This is simply your right to use it on a car where you are the RK, or the person you nominated on the application is the RK of a vehicle.

 

I would recommend you organise teh change over of plates at teh local DVLA office if you have one locally enough to you. In the one visit you will submit your request to put the new plate on teh car and at teh same time submit your form to retain the current plate on the retention v778 form.

 

If all your paperwork is in order (you may have to show them things like insurance and MOT for the car) then quite often you come away from the office with a new tax disk in your hand and their written authority to have a set of platesmade and put on the car.

[madasamuppet]

need more help please, have looked for any paperwork relating to the original private plate we have on the car and can't find any, can i get in touch with the dvla to send out replacement paper work, thanks for any help

[crem]

You don't need any paperwork relating to the original private plate. It is already on the car (presumably) and therefore the only "paperwork" you need relating to this is the current V5 showing this number. When you take all your paperwork into the local DVLA office (including this V5) they will keep what they need to replace, eg MOT certificate and that V5 showing the "old" private plate then arrange for a new V5 to be issued showing the "new" private plate and issue v778 for the "old" plate for you to retain.

[madasamuppet]

have decided to sell private plate first and put money towards new plate but as you said before the private plate is on caar and just need v5 but we don't have any paperwork for the original reg that was on car when first registered so how can i get old reg put on and private plate put on retention. sorry to be a pain

[patdavies]

have decided to sell private plate first and put money towards new plate but as you said before the private plate is on caar and just need v5 but we don't have any paperwork for the original reg that was on car when first registered so how can i get old reg put on and private plate put on retention. sorry to be a pain

 

Who cares what the original VRM was?

 

Use the DVLA form (V317) and apply for retention of your current cherished VRM. It is up to the DVLA to issue a new VRM/V5 for the replacement. They tend to use the original, but can otherwise use any unissued VRM from the correct age range.

[madasamuppet]

thanks for all your help

[crem]

as patdavies says, it isn't really your problem what the original plate number was. (what if you had bought the car with the private plate already on, you would never have known it existed)

 

However, whenever I have removed a private plate, the DVLA have always re-issued the original plate number to me to put back on the car. I like it this way coz I always keep the old plates in the garage to put back on so it saves me the 20 or 30 quid for getting plates remade later.

[kwaks]

For the reasons given by crem above, you might be better buying the new plate before selling the current one, otherwise you are looking at 2 visits to the DVLA (and visiting the offices is infinately easier than trying to do it by post) and potentially the cost of making up plates for a number which will be on the vehicle for a short time.

 

Buy the new plate then sell the old one from retention. Seems a lot less fuss.