Officers have been running joint operations with debt collectors who use unmarked vans fitted with automatic number plate recognition (ANPR) cameras to check whether passing vehicles have any unpaid council parking tickets.

A Metropolitan police operation has helped to catch nearly 250 drivers in one London borough alone- despite concerns about the legality of such actions.

The Bailiffs’ equipment allows them to cross-reference vehicle licensing records with council databases of outstanding parking fines. When they discover a match, the debt collectors alert police at a road block a few hundred yards further on.

The motorist is stopped without suspecting they have committed an offence. Police do their normal vehicle checks and then pass the driver onto another team of bailiffs who demand payment by credit card for the unpaid parking charges. In some cases if the driver refuses, or is unable to pay, the vehicle may be impounded.

The practice has come to light following a series of Freedom of Information Act requests to local authorities by a former bailiff for Philips Collection Services.

Westminster city council is one of Philip’s clients and last week it admitted that debt collectors and MET officers do staff road blocks in the West End of London about once a fortnight and have collected £41,000 from 237 unpaid tickets.

The MET has also worked alongside parking debt collectors in Barnet, north London, and Hackney, east London. When ANPR technology was first deployed more than 20 years ago, it was meant to be used by police to combat terrorism and serious crime. But police forces have massively expanded its use since 2007.

Greater Manchester police took part in “multi-agency” operations to help collect parking debts in 2008 but abruptly stopped when members of the public complained about their personal details being shared between the council, bailiffs and police.

Lee Rowley, a Conservative councilor at Westminster responsible for parking, defended bailiffs’ use of ANPR and joint operations with police. He said the tactics were used mainly to enforce fines for more serious offences, such as disabled badge fraud and illegal minicab driving.

“Law-abiding motorists have nothing to be concerned about” he said.  The MET denied that its involvement in such operations was “inappropriate”.

JIG number plates will be very popular among the budding musicians, and Irish dancers. The Jig is a form of lively folk dance, as well as the accompanying dance tune, originating in England in the sixteenth century and today most associated with Irish dance music and Scottish country dance music. Jigs were originally in 2/4 time, but have been adapted to a variety of time signatures, by which they are often classified into groups, including light jigs, slip jigs, single jigs, and treble jigs.

What better way to promote your lively folk dance, but with a JIG registrations.

To register your interest in JIG registrations please call us on 0845 346 4343.

To obtain a Cherished registration, you will have to pay extra money to be able to choose the registration you would like on your vehicle. Increasingly over the past few years more and more companies are adding Cherished Registration to their fleet of vehicle to promote their businesses.

The internet is the most popular way of searching for Cherished Registrations. If you are sure of the combination you would like you can just type the registration into the search option and view on a number plate. However if you are unsure to exactly what registration you would like you could use the clever search facility on www.speedyreg.co.uk, where you can type in your name and it will provide you with a list of possibilities.  For example if you type in the name KAREN, it will give you KAZ options as KAZ can be short for Karen.  

Cherished registrations are a good way to personalise your car’s registration number. Buying one is not complicated. In fact, it is very easy, as long as you have a number and letter combination in mind and if you have the money to pay for it, you can easily buy your car a cherished registration number.

The Traffic Department will also be monitoring the amount of motorists who drive without registrations. They currently have a computer system that alerts them when a driver has reached all the points on the license, they are using a system similar to the ANPR system in United Kingdom.   

The Traffic Department has also issued new by-laws on the 28^th August. Under the new by-laws, third party insurance premiums for vehicles have increased along with renewal fees for Driving Licenses.  They have also made it mandatory for six driving schools operating in the country to have at least 15 hours of theory and 35 hours of practical curriculum.

Booklets in English and Arabic on traffic laws are being made available soon to all motorists in the country.

A  = ALPHA

B = BRAVO

C = CHARLIE

D = DELTA

E = ECHO

F = FOXTROT

G  = GOLF

H = HOTEL

I = INDIGO

J = JULIET

K = KILO

L = LIMA

M = MIKE

N = NOVEMBER

O = OSCAR

P = PAPA

Q = QUEBEC

R = ROMEO

S = SIERRA

T = TANGO

U = UNIFORM

V = VICTOR

W = WHISKEY

X = X-RAY

Y = YANKEE

Z = ZULU

Even with the phonetic there may still be confusion, as sometimes is someone ringing up looking for a quotation and is saying SIL, we would confirm the registration a S for Sierra and on a few occasions we’ve received the following reply “No its not on a Sierra, it on a….”

The JIL combination is particularly popular as it spells the popular girls name Jil. When the local office was issuing these registrations back in 1993, they were very cheaply priced with prices starting under £100, a far cry from today’s prices. A four digit JIL for example JIL 3478 is priced at £450, which proves not only can you have your name on your vehicle, but they are also a sound investment. With the current economic crisis’s more people are turning to Number Plates to invest their money I, instead property.

The JIL combinations starting with 5 are more expensive, as appear to name the vehicle as Jil’s for example JIL 55. LIL combinations are not issued in the GB mainland they are only issued in Northern Ireland. They are commonly known as Irish Registrations. Irish registrations are dateless and therefore can be transferred onto any age of vehicle which is on major advantage for motorists wanting to hide the age of their vehicle. 

To search for your perfect JIL registration please click on JIL Irish Number plates

GAZ number plates have become very popular as GAZ is usually the nickname or abbreviation of the following names Gary and Gareth.  Due to the demand in GAZ registrations they are becoming scarce and therefore increasing in value. Four digit GAZ registrations for example GAZ 2161 priced at £480.

GAZ cherished registrations also became popular in the eighties with football fans showing their support for GAZZA!! The ultimate fan number plate for Gazza supporters would be GAZ 21 which is available priced at £5500.

GAZ registrations followed by digits are known as Irish Registrations. Irish Registrations are dateless registrations and therefore can be transferred onto any age of vehicle.

To search for your perfect GAZ registration please click on GAZ Number plates

Another change is that it now states “This will not produce a Registration Certificate” on the V5C/2 section. However this is incorrect as this will produce a V5C, if completed and forwarded to Coleraine DVA along with a V34 form.

The Scrapped box has now been removed.  You can no longer use the V5C(NI) to tell the DVA you have scrapped your vehicle. You should take the vehicle to an Authorised Treatment Facility (ATF) and they should issue a Certificate of Destruction (CoD). If you are breaking the vehicle yourself, you have to keep the vehicle on SORN until you bring the shell to an Authorised Treatment Facility.

Click below link to View the New V5CNI:  V5CNI inside OR V5CNI Front

In the United Kingdom, the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency (DVLA) issue number plates. They will not approve personalised registrations if they contain words, which are offensive in any widely used language.  

There are four main types of Personalised Number Plates available:

• Dateless Registrations, e.g. 20 PXX
• Prefix Registrations, e.g. T121 BMW
• Current Style Registrations, e.g. DO57 COW
• Irish Registrations, e.g. JHZ 1

Some plates only acquire significance because of particular owners. For example, “COM 1C” was formerly owned by the comedian Jimmy Tarbuck, magician Paul Daniels had “MAG1C”, the 1967 plate “BEL 12E” is owned by the Belize High Commission, and “CHN 1″ is owned by the Chinese embassy.

VIP 1″ was advertised “as one of the most important and impressive number plates ever issued”. It is a registration issued in the Republic of Ireland for the visit of Pope John Paul II in 1984. The plate was used on his “Popemobile”.

Personalised Number Plates have become increasingly popular for motorists who want to stand out from their fellow road users.

The ‘scrap’ box has also been removed because all cars, light vans and three-wheeled motor vehicles- excluding motor tricycles, must be taken to an Authorised Treatment Facility, who should issue a Certificate of Destruction (CoD).  Vehicles other than those already mentioned, should still be taken to an ATF to ensure they are destroyed to environmental standards.  Anyone keeping the vehicle but breaking it up for parts, etc, should make a Statutory off Road Notification (SORN) to let DVLA know that the vehicle is being kept unlicensed and off the road. 

Anyone with the existing blue version need not do anything as both types of document are still valid. 

DVLA’s ‘Buyer Beware’ message advises that the V5C is only one of the things that buyers of used vehicles need to check.  By making buyers aware of the risks, our aim is to help them to protect themselves and reduce the risk of getting caught out by criminals. 

The New V5C will look like: