Standing in a supermarket car park looking at two adjacent cars I realised that they both had the same number letter format but one was French and the other was Italian.
Anyone know if it is possible to have a French car and an Italian car with the same registration apart from the various bits in the blue bands?
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All the new French number plates are still in the 'A' series. I think they've got to about AH at the moment.
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Mike, would you mind explaining please how they work, these new French nnumber plates?
Confused the daylights out of me on holiday last year.
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Thanks PU, but that artcle doesn't explain the meaning of the elements of the new number plates.
Since there is no departement reference any more, what is the meaning of the letters and numbers? Are they totally random? Is there an age indicator in there somewhere? If so, what is the system - which part is the age indicator and how does it work?
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Department code is now in the right hand blue band.
I guess the numbering gives a date indication in the same way as the old ones did.
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>>>>Department code is now in the right hand blue band.<<<<
Not necessarily - it is an option for customer choice.
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AFAIK none of the letters or numbers are locally significant. The whole of France started with AA last year, followed by three numbers, which AFAIK are issued in numerical order and two 'random' letters at the end. The whole thing is administered centrally - you only get a provisional registration document from the local Prefecture now while you wait for the official one that arrives in a few days from somewhere near Paris.
The departement number on the blue bit at the end is, indeed, optional. I've got it on the front of ours, with a motor club badge in the space on the back plate. If you go to a chain like Leclerc Auto for your plates they will automatically use ones with a departement number unless you ask otherwise.
I think it's a great shame that it's no longer simple to tell where a car is from and roughly when it was last registered to someone but I guess the system is more straightforward now. At least you only have to pay the registration fee once, rather than every time you change departements. As the Beast cost 688 euros with a 50 per cent age discount this is significant, at least for me...
Last edited by: Mike Hannon on Thu 20 May 10 at 11:29
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Thanks, Mike. So when does AA become AB, AC etc? When they run out of numbers and random letter combinations, or on a fixed date as with the UK reg numbers?
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Just when they run out, as far as I can see. Our car, registered over here last October, starts with AD and I saw an AH the other day.
It's said that you can't have a personal plate under this system - they said that about the previous system but as far as I could see it was possible if money changed hands - but there's a young guy round the corner from me who runs a 'hotted up' (as we used to say...) old Citroen AX, with a new style number plate with AX at the end. I haven't yet managed to ask him how he did it.
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I thought that one of the principal reasons for the new plates was to do away completely with the departmental suffix that denoted where the car came from? Kind of defeats the purpose when people promptly squeeze in this info on the end of the plate anyway..?!!!
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Yup, you're right - the whole thing seems inexplicable to me, but this is France. They learn logic at school but it isn't logic as we know it, Jim.
I guess maybe the revenue now goes straight to the government rather than the local councils.
I noticed an AN this morning. I suppose if it takes a year to get through each alphabet letter the system will go on long enough for it to eventually become someone else's problem.
Last edited by: Mike Hannon on Fri 21 May 10 at 12:15
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New French Number Plates - Mike Hannon
