Hi all,

I'm looking at buying a private plate soon and wanted to know exactly the process once you have the papers and what costs are involved thought out?

Thanks

I found the DVLA website worked well, choose your plate from the thousands available & pay a one off fee & once the certificate of entitlement arrives, complete the relevant documents & return & get the plates made up & notify your insurer

Keep your old plates as if you sell the car the DVLA normally simply re- register the car as it originally was licensed

The whole process took about 7 days

This was 2 years ago & the process could be even simpler by now

Edited September 20, 201510 yr by MONDEO TXS 2.2

It used to be £80 to change your plates, then another £80 to put back again - provided you wanted to keep your new cherished plate for a new vehicle.

The cost of a plate from the DVLA includes the £80 transfer fee

Thanks all what's the retention fee all about I've read?

dvlaregistrations.direct.gov.uk/ has all the answers :)

The retention fee of £80 is applicable if you want to maintain ownership of a registration number but not use it on a vehicle & is valid for 10 years & renewable at no cost

Great thanks!

DVLA introducing new digital assignment system so you should soon be able to transfer reg. numbers online. Currently takes about a week to transfer a number.

As per MondeoTXS 2.2, DVLA is best place for buying your plate, other websites tend to make their money by overcharging to have your number plates made up, they can be obtained a lot cheaper from various sellers on eBay.

Transfer or apply a cherished plate takes about 3 minutes online and is very simple, £80 one off fee . You get the cert number via email and then via post if you retain it.

I've got one off eBay from a specific seller of cars so hopefully be ok, if I buy now through eBay am I covered for scams??

I don't think the buy it now option on eBay guarantees any additional securities.

The retention fee of £80 is applicable if you want to maintain ownership of a registration number but not use it on a vehicle & is valid for 10 years & renewable at no cost

Not according to my wife's experience with the DVLA. She had it on retention and the cost was £105, she didn't put it on her new car for a year and was told she had to either put it on the new car or pay another £105 for a further 1 YEAR retention or lose it. This was 6 months ago.

The terms have changed - DVLA website states £80 to retain from 9th March 2015

Thanks all

Some of the edits in this thread :D

As far as I can see there's only been one edit & that was by me, to ensure factual accuracy.

Lol, don't be too precious. It seems a few claimed a single fee of £163.80 and backed down quietly to a fee of £80 as someone else suggested.

Precious ?

Never.

I only post factually accurate info on subjects such as this & if that means a little extra research & editing, then so be it, as the OP is in search of facts not fiction or out of date info.

No posts in this thread mentioning £163.80 ?

Not now, no ;)

"The cost of a plate from the DVLA includes the £163;80 transfer fee"

"Transfer or apply a cherished plate takes about 3 minutes online and is very simple, £163;80 one off fee . You get the cert number via email and then via post if you retain it."

Obviously now deleted by whoever misguidedly posted it :)

I was given a private plate by my parents for my 21st. Applied it to my old car, on buying the new one I removed it by paying 80 quid and the original plate was restored and was sent a cert in post. On receiving new v5 applied it using v5 number and cert number. All online! and only 80 quid payable to DVLA

So once I have the papers I can do it all online and get the new V5 in the post?

yep, online but it is in business hours I think for some reason? You cant do it on a Sunday

When I transferred my private reg/plate from the Clio, to the Fiesta - I had to pay £80. Needless to say I was hardly impressed! lol