How Risky Is To Use A Fake Number Plate In the UK?

 

Given the widespread accessibility of fake plates online, the UK's number plate system is laterally susceptible to abuse, and the number of traffic stops for missing or shady plates achieved a five-year high in 2018, Auto Express can solely reveal. In 2 distinct studies, experts asked police how many number plate violations they had issued tickets for between 2014 and 2018. We then instructed 3 sets of registration plates from online suppliers, each of which was supplied without question and that would be inappropriate to showcase on the road. You should browse best number plate sticky pads to find the correct sticky pad for your number plate.

How to Move a License Plate from One Car to Another

According to authoritative information taken by Auto Express through Freedom of Information requests, police authorised 9,170 tickets for registration plate violations in the UK last year, the largest number in the last 5 years. Between 2014 and 2018, police have made 41,385 stops, with officers releasing 11% more tickets the year before compared to 2017 for registration plates which did not meet regulatory requirements or plates that were completely missing from cars. Over the last 5 years, the Metropolitan Police in London approved the most tickets or rectification notifications for dodgy plates (4,411), with Northern Ireland police authorising the second highest number of tickets (4,005).

What Is The Consequence?

Car drivers could be approved a Traffic Offence Reports (TOR) or a Vehicle Defect Rectification Scheme (VDRS) notice (avoiding a punishment if the fault is resolved within 14 days) for a variety of registration plate violations, such as missing or obscured plates and plates which do not comply with restrictions. Of the 35 police departments which responded to our request, 23 supplied offence codes, uncovering that roughly 70% of registration plate stops are for driving or maintaining a car "when the enrolment mark does not comply with regulations." Licence plates that do not adhere to the rules may have incorrectly placed characters, be created using an unofficial font, or have colour-capped screws placed in their characters to alter how the plate reads.

What Do The Officials Have To Say?

According to the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency (DVLA), all number plate providers in the United Kingdom "must be enrolled with DVLA and must perform checks before providing registration plates." "It is a criminal offence not to demand the relevant paperwork from the client [or] keep a document of the transaction, or to replenish a non-compliant number plate," the organisation added. Nevertheless, at least two of the providers from whom we purchased plates are based in Jersey, where the law could not be broken since it is a distinct jurisdiction from the UK.

"Our officers perform intelligence-led enforcement efforts to confront a broad range of violations, to explore and, where required, hold accountable suppliers - such as those who trade unlawfully using the internet," the DVLA explained. The institution also stated that drivers who modify the looks of their licence plates face a £1,000 fine and the confiscation of their customised enrolments.

"ANPR [fully automated number plate acknowledgement] information is progressively facilitating police to recognise cars functioning on cloned plates using techniques such as journey time assessment," according to the National Police Chiefs Council (NPCC). This contributes to our investigation." According to the organisation, "local forces continue to provide crime mitigation guidance... depending on the specific misbehaviour seen in their local area."

Theft of Fuel

Using a forged licence plate is most likely the simple and easy method for drivers to steal gasoline from gas stations. They would then simply drive away after filling up their tanks with gasoline. They would then easily change back to their original registration plates once they are sufficiently distant from them. For such incidents, station owners would then generally file police reports utilising camera footage. Nevertheless, because the criminals are using counterfeit licence plates, police will be unable to track them down. To make it harder to discover them, the perpetrators generally disguise themselves with sunglasses or hoodies.

Final Words

A small but increasing number of drivers utilise stolen licence plates to conceal traffic violations. They intend to utilize the stolen licence plates for unauthorised street racing and driving above the posted speed (sometimes to deliver contraband goods). After a while, the original number plate owners may be confronted with numerous summonses and financial penalties.