Number Plates News

Swedish Plates Show The Way

07 July 2010

The Swedish Transport Agency, the body responsible for overseeing the issue of the country's vehicle registrations, applies a refreshingly simple and meaningful code to part of its plates. The final, right-hand digit refers to the expiry month of the statutory vehicle inspection, the Swedish equivalent of our 'MOT'. (No, we don't know what happens with October, November or December.)

It is a shame that the UK authorities cannot come up with such a novel and useful plan. All we can do is assign the year and place of registration to the characters. An interesting diversion but, ultimately, of no practical value whatsoever.

The Swedes can, like us, break away from the tedious regulation plates if they wish, by opting for a personalised version. Interestingly, a custom plate serves only as an alias, whilst the original registration must be displayed on a window.

Almost any combination of between two and six letters and numbers can be obtained, subject to availability. But there are, naturally, some guidelines covering what can be represented. For example, a request for a plate containing the letters 'SS' was recently, and probably quite reasonably, rejected because of the unsavoury association.

It costs only around £600 to register your personal plate, but if you were thinking of securing a product or company name, you would need to get written consent. This avoids the possibility of individuals haggling with corporations over ownership, a problem which beleaguered the issue of web domain names during the birth of the internet.