> The car registrations started in Britain as three letters, three numbers. eg ABC 123. The numbers and the first letter were random. The last two letters were geographically assigned, although this wasn't picked up by the general public to a great extent. Later on, a letter was added to the end to show the year of issue, ie ABC 123D. This started in about 1961. The letters I,O,Q,U,Z were not used as they were either too similar to numbers or were the international letters for other countries with similar plates. In 1983 they got to the end of the alphabet and turned it all around. ie. A123 BCD. This went on till late 2001 when they ran out again. The last few letters were squeezed into 6 month intervals to make way for the new system. It is now in the format AB12 CDE. The first two letters are location specific and most people know about this now. The numbers correspond to the year and the last three letters are random. The numbers are different according to which 6 month period the plate is issued in. If in the first half of the year, it is simply the last two digits, eg 02. If in the second half it is the last two digits plus 50, eg 52. To complicate matters the first period runs from March 1st to september 1st and the other from September 1st onwards. So a registration issued in February 2003 will still be a 52.

That's very interesting. In New Zealand, the plates are two letters followed by four numbers. I was surprised to find out that in the USA you get new plates every year -- here they go with the car for its lifetime. Annual re-registration of your car is policed by a sticker on the inside of the windshield.

A plate is issued in alphabetical and numerical order to the car when it is assembled or imported (we don't manufacture any cars in this country), so one of the possible license-plate games we can play here is spotting the newest or the oldest car. I'm not sure how far through the alphabet brand-new cars have reached, but my car (a 1987 model) is in the early Ns.

I think when they get to the end, they will start over again, using the numbers which have become defunct as older cars die off. You very seldom see cars from the front end of the alphabet still on the road.

Personalised plates can have any combination of numbers and/or letters.