Took a private plate off to get back to the original plate, but it's gone back to my last private plate. How does that work?

I've just removed my car's private plate online so the car would be back to the original plate. But it's now on a private plate I put on two years ago. Does this mean if you had, say, three private plates over the years - you would have to work your way through them at £80 a pop to get back to the original plate?

Asked on 21 July 2020 by Dean

Answered by Georgia Petrie
DVLA told us: "If someone chooses to remove a personalised registration number from a vehicle it will revert to the registration number that was on the vehicle before the personalised number was on the vehicle. So if a vehicle had a personalised number put onto it when it was already displaying a different personalised number – this is the number it will revert to. If the keeper wanted the vehicle to display an age related registration number (not a personalised one) they would need to send an application to do so to us with a letter explaining what has happened. However if they want to keep this number to put onto a vehicle of their choice then they can apply to retain the number and pay the £80 fee. I should advise that where paper applications are posted to DVLA there will be delays in processing them because we have a reduced number of staff in our building to comply with social distancing requirements. Further advice on coronavirus (including the applications we are currently processing) is published on www.gov.uk/guidance/dvla-coronavirus-covid-19-upda...t;
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