Too rude for the road: DVLA hot list of banned numberplates

The Register has obtained a list of the rudest words you'll never see on car number plates: the official list of banned registration marks from the Drivers and Vehicles Licensing Authority (DVLA). We almost don't want to sully the pure reputation of our website by publishing all the combinations of letters and numbers on our …

[darklord]

urmmmmm

How can 12 be an "r" most are just pointless anyway. still therll be appearing on a corsa and peugeots 208 near you soon.

[CD001]

12 = R

[toxicdragon]

12=12 R=R

[Mips]

As in

A12SNL. Actually out in the wild.

Have you seen MO02COW? Sadly no longer on a Smart car decorated as a Holstein cow. Reminded me of Gateway 2000. Oh happy daze.

[Anonymous Coward]

Yet more nanny state bullshit. Who cares what a number plate can be construed as saying?

Since When would PE12 ADO be offensive? Maybe to someone who can't fucking spell. P4 EDO would surely hit the mark a little squarer, no?

[Steve Renouf]

Perhaps there are more Yanks than we think in the UK...?

Or is it that the younger brits are getting just as shit at spelling?!?

It's spelled PAEDOphile FFS!

[Kirstian K]

Others

I randomly drove past a really old beat up car the other day, and the registration plate was:

L51CKO which i thought was great (el Sicko)

[Anonymous Coward]

Seen in South Africa

171NCH

[Zog The Undeniable]

BA57 ARD

Idea for the sysadmin with a grudge.

Personally I'd like J1 HAD on an old white "Beirut gunship" Mercedes E-class. You'd never get cut up.

[Anonymous Coward]

Plate seen parked outside local synagogue - J15 HAD - can you spell bomb scare?

[Phil S]

I always fancied getting the old style ones reading P155 OFF or P15 SED.

Guess they're out too?

[Anonymous Coward]

There's a car, local to me, with P15 DOF.

[Anonymous Coward]

P15 DOF

Think I've seen the same one - do you live in Swindon? Pretty sure I've seen it on a battered up old banger in Moredon.

[Cosmo]

Someone who lives close to me has the registration P11 SUF

[skila]

Dream numbers...

As a child I dreamed of having P155 OFF and 801 LOX...

I was lucky enough to have a car with P122 CFF, that;s the closest I ever got! Plate was non-transferrable though :(

[defiler]

P155 OFF

I tried to register this for my old Yamaha - DVLA had it on the banned list way back then.

[Anonymous Coward]

BA54ARD

Is still valid and on the road ;)

[Anonymous Coward]

They missed at least one....

I saw H8 ALA the other day, no guessing what he was thinking.

[Greg J Preece]

Wait, "Koran" and "Torah" are offensive? How does that work? If you ask a Jew what the name of their holy book is, are they gonna go nuts and punch you?

[Anonymous Coward 15]

Especially if you say Jehovah!

[Dr. Mouse]

We're not stoning anyone...

... Even if they do say "Jehovah"!

[Anonymous Coward]

Bet you could get H411BUT though.

[Sorry that handle is already taken.]

Oh dear

Reading that last sentence, for a moment I thought they'd banned TA12 DIS.

[Simon Neill]

hmm.

In that case I want

TA12 DIS.

And my car spraying blue.

[MJI]

I wonder?

If Smith or Moffat will get that one

[Marcus Haas]

Back in the 90s, I saw a silver BMW 3 series with the registration J1 HAD, wonder if that's still in circulation.

[Anonymous Coward]

Nope

Not currently on a vehicle.

[scrubber]

When I were a kid

I always wanted P155OFF

Now I am more grown up I think I want TA12DIS

[Parax]

What idiot would buy PE12 VRT anyway?

Jonny Smith, @Carpervert TV presenter & journalist, Perhaps..

[Paul_Murphy]

Actually

In some ways it could be useful - if convicted paedophiles had to drive around with the plates that plates like that it might save an innocent.

On the other hand as soon as people are judged by their car plate it's slippery slope.

I personally think that vanity plates should be banned, and plates certainly not transferable - the vehicle gets it's plate and it stays with the vehicle until it's scrapped.

Unless of course we go for a system that relies on people getting a plate (or plates) that are registered to them (i.e. you need to pay road tax and insurance before you get a plate) before they can drive a vehicle.

Unless it's stolen you know that a car with a plate is insured.

ttfn

[Anonymous Coward]

I remember...

...EA51 LAY causing some consternation to a lass in the news.

[Ryan 7]

Thought the last one was TA12 DIS

I guess Dr Who is OK after all?

[Throatwobbler Mangrove]

hold on

"Yardy, Jamaican slang for someone from a gang or a prison mate"

No. Yardie is Jamaican slang for someone from a government yard (housing scheme) or from Jamaica ("the yard"). It's British slang for a Jamaican gangster.

[Anonymous Coward]

Whoever tried the 'peado' one

is asking for eggs or worse. WHY?!

[Steve Renouf]

because they can't fu**ing SPELL!!!

spaces

[br0die]

I'm sure they didn't choose it willingly, it just happened.

[spiny norman]

OK, I get it

12 = R 11 = LL. You might still have to explain 61 to me, I'm not in the Twitter generation.

I'm hoping the revenue DVLC gets from egotistical je12ks, who have to have their names on their number plates, pays the salary of whoever works this stuff out.

[Will's]

6 = G

[Mike Bell]

Bah! Prudes!

I saw a car mincing around our town (inasmuch as a car can be said to mince) and it was sporting the number plate "SIR NO".

Well, it made me laugh. I just hope it wasn't a wayward headmaster driving that vehicle. Anyway, I felt no inclination to write in to the Daily Mail. We are supposed to be eccentric Brits, after all.

[Richard Pennington 1]

NO 51R NO is on the roads in the area of Camberley, Surrey.

[Alan 6]

There's a woman in Rochdale with these two number plates

P 130OBS

P3 13OOB

All I can say after seeing the woman is "Mutton dressed as lamb"

[Anonymous Coward]

This sucks...

I'm surprised at the number of plates I've seen that start BJ08

What were they thinking...?

[Dazed and Confused]

They didn't used to be up tight

They allowed

PEN1S

I remember an interview on the telly with some one from licensing about how they'd decided they weren't going to allow

STR1P

though

[philbo]

@Dazed & Confused

They're probably not going to allow STR1P, as the guy who already has T3ASE will probably want to park next to it on his drive.

[Cazzo Enorme]

PEN15 exists as well - I saw it a number of years ago, and appropriately enough on a red Porsche 911. In Hampstead, North London, some dickhead has MAF1A on a black 7 series BMW. When my Sicilian wife saw it at the petrol station in Belsize Park she took the time to walk up to the driver and call him something extremely offensive in Sicilian dialect. I don't think he understood the words, being most probably Russian, but judging by the shock on his face the way she said them must have imparted the meaning.

[Anonymous Coward]

Cazzo Enorme's wife

Oh, that was your missus! That was scary, I thought she's gonna scratch my eyes out.

A BMW 7 driver

[HipposRule]

Famously

Fiona Richmond (youngsters may need to search on that) had a Scimitar (ditto) registered as FU2.

[Anonymous Coward]

No sense of humour these registration folk.

Why wouldn't a 12 represent a capital 'r' ?

[NorthernSands]

Mmm...

I always wanted P155 OFF. I guess that's in the list somewhere. :-(

[elhoffo]

TA12 DIS will be up for auction at some point soon then?

[micheal]

They let

PEN 1S through, Steve Parrish had it on his Merc convertible for a few years

[Simon Neill]

..

I also saw

"PEN 18" made me do a doubletake.

[Anonymous Coward]

PEN1S on the Merc...........

Yes, I saw it on a Merc on the M1 once - driving like a right D1CKH3AD and when we got to Heathrow, he was in the car park of the hotel we were going to.

[Anonymous Coward]

PE12 VRT

Presumably the Bishop of Bath and Wells would be interested? He's a colossal one, I hear ... (*)

(*) - Allegedly. And fictionally.

[Ian Stephenson]

so B1 TCH and B457 ARD are acceptable?

[Anonymous Coward]

B1TCH...

... can be seen regularly on the streets of Worcester.

Drives like one, too.

[mad_dr]

I was carved up at a roundabout this morning by a woman in a Mercedes with a 2-digit numberplate. At the time I thought that maybe she should have opted for C1JNT but perhaps her request was rejected by the DVLA...

[Dan 63]

so what does a "pea do"?

[AndrewG]

My favourite from the Australian list was someone driving around with a plate of 6UL-DV8 although I allways wanted TA12D1S

[Zog The Undeniable]

The funniest one I've ever seen in real life

On a beige Ford Ka near Banbury, the somewhat mis-spaced M12 POO.

Yes, someone named their brown car "MR POO".

[ChrisC]

Saw a plumbers van driving through north London with the reg PO07 RAP - although oddly enough the space was shifted one character to the left, can't think why they'd have wanted to do that...

[Mike Smith]

I suppose A55 OLE is on the list. I wanted to buy it for my last boss.

Pity I'm not black. I'd luuurrve RA55 MAN.

[Anonymous Coward]

I wanted

VAX11C

Only a certain subclass of techies would understand though.

Or maybe

RSX11M

for dinosaurs

[Is it me?]

how about

PDP 11

PDP 8

PLM 80 (Intel's 8080 version of PL1)

PLM 86

[TeeCee]

I saw RPG III once. It was on a Ferrari, so I assume it was the third car owned by some rich twat[1] with the initials RPG.

Either that or I was seriously underpaid at the time....

[1] Or possibly the hundred and eleventh car owned by some astonishingly rich twat.

[PeterM42]

Sad..... Very Sad.......

.............When techies want computer numbers.

How about 0101 011?

[Anonymous Coward]

I used to see a car occasionally...

with the registration TTY 1. I'm hoping the owner was an old-school techie....

[Stuart Moore]

Fag?

A friend used to work for a company whose initials were FAG. All of the company cars (his included) had numberplates with FAG on it (he lovingly referred to his as the Fagmobile). So clearly not all combinations with FAG are banned. I think these were just from the normal licenseplate issue rather than custom plates though...

[Anonymous Coward]

FAG

They had the legal bearings to use the plates... though there was some greasing involved.

Yes, I'm leaving... coat.

[Anonymous Coward]

Does the Trade Descriptions Act apply to these plates? If so, the woman who drives B4ABE is in real trouble...

[Arnold Lieberman]

My favourite

I always seem to be driving in the opposite direction to MR60 MEZ (Mr. Gomez). Don't know who he is, but he drives a very nice car.

[goodjudge]

This would be an appropriate post to ask which Reg reader wants to own up to owning L 111 NUX, which I saw a few weeks ago.

[Anonymous Coward]

L1 NUX is frequently seen in the south wales area, last photographed by a colleague on a fairly unremarkable honda civic

[PsychicMonkey]

I'm surprised

it wasn't on a prius...

[Dances With Sheep]

Dyslexia ?

I have a rare form of Dyslexia where all private number plates appear as " fuckwit ".

Does anybody else have the same?

[ElReg!comments!Pierre]

Not the same system here obviously, but yes, they do all read "dickhead" or some equivalent in my eye.

Except for the one I saw the other day: 386 TWM

Now THAT's a statement. Also, here (licensed) ham radio operators get their own category of plates (which reads one's call sign). How cool is that?

[Mr Nobody 1]

Yawwnnnnnnn

Sorry - dropped off there for a second.

[Anonymous Coward]

Seen on a Bentley with a disabled badge in the window - HA51 LEG

[/dev/me]

Would G12W UP be a valid license plate?

...that's what she said

[Anonymous Coward]

My favourites...

I've seen bot B19 FUD and W33 FUD in the Glasgow area, both on Golfs funnily enough. If you don't know what a FUD is, I ain't telling.

[Anonymous Coward]

When the plate is worth more than the car

Round here I've seen M5 5LUT

Not on a BMW M5. On an ancient Vauxhall Cavalier.

[John Dickson]

I'm sure I saw 4 KEW once, long time ago

[Ben C]

I knew the guy who had 4 KOF and 4 COF.

[Ken Hagan]

I remember seeing 4 COF and wondering how he (I assumed it was a he) had got it past the suits. To have managed it twice is pretty impressive.

[gerryg]

P 12 ADO? Does that mean P 12 EDO is available?

Perhaps the paediatrician somewhere (Bournemouth?) was attacked by a mob because they'd checked with DVLA (DLVA?) and decided said person couldn't spell.

[Spot the Cat]

Used to be a Volvo round here wearing SPL 1F. That's right, a Volvo.

[Stefing]

Mmmm, spunk

A car in my neighbourhood has a PROTEIN (or near enough) plate - sneaky!

In Sweden there are, of course, far fewer restrictions, a friend has ANDY B but BOLLOX is also out there I believe.

[David Barrett]

PO02 Y0U

<-- Some one has this and I want it.

[Gordon861]

Saw an DB9 on the M25 with AU55OME which I thought was good.

[FredScummer]

Cherished Plates

The nutter from Slade originally had registration plate YOB1 - and I know that plate must live somewhere around the Berkshire area where I've seen it a couple of times, last time about 3 weeks ago on the Ascot road.

I saw L1NUX being sported on a BMW round there a while back too. That must've been the Microsoft UK head honcho then.

A local favourite a few years back was D3lBOY (Del Boy). Might still be around, but the rozzers must have had a word because the letters had previously been physically arranged to make sure the meaning was spelt out, more recently they've been changed to fit in with government policy. Which is just plain daft in my book - if someone saw "DEL BOY" accelerating away from a crime scene they'd remember that plate much more easily than "D31 BOY".

[Anonymous Coward]

It's as much about ANPR recognising as it is about punters remembering.

If you can't be ANPR'd because you've adjusted your number plate, plod can't easily check whether you're taxed, MOTed, insured, etc, and/or whether your vehicle is "of interest to the police and security services".

If you can't be ANPR'd because you've adjusted your number plate they can of course in theory have a word with you about that. But how many people ever receive "words of advice" on that subject?

[Anonymous Coward]

ANPR

I still want someone to stick an e-ink screen on their number plate so they can change it halfway between a set of average speed cameras.

[Stratman]

Anybody who thinks they're being smart or cool by paying over the odds for a random selection of letters should be made to drive around for a few months with the registration KN08 END on their car, just to get used to it.

[Lockwood]

I have seen:

On a sports car in Portsmouth: X 9 1NCH

On an old camper van: GOT 6 1N

On a fairly decent looking car (certainly not an old T reg!): AMD 1T

I wanted SS 55 SSS or II 11 III

[Nick Davey]

Personally

I always wanted FUB 4R

[Hokum15]

This is ok?

Local car has BA57ARD which always raises a chuckle.

[Anonymous Coward]

Outside Next Gen in Hatfield.

PSS LCK.

[Stevie]

8ah!

What the hell is a "vaginob"?

[Anonymous Coward]

Hermaphrodite?

[Ken Hagan]

The spare, for when "a" is unavailable?

[My backside]

Through the rear-view mirror

It only works when seen through the rear-view mirror, but my favorite it is 3MTA3.

[Warren]

Seen OO04 COX on the roads in Hampshire, driven by a young lady, who I wondered if she chose it on purpose?

[sabba]

Until recently...

...some dunkett drove around a nameless northern town in a Ferrari with the reg plate H1 1 LAY. I haven't see it for a while so hopefully he has been removed from the gene pool.

[Anonymous Coward]

Yep

A white 2001 360 Spider

[Cornholio]

They generally just annoy me

If it's not obvious, they generally just make me cross. However, I remember a local one when I was a lad:

BAL 521T

The owner had thoughtfully put a sticker in his window to help those who needed it:

BALS 2 IT

[Ted Treen]

GSOH

Years ago, I saw can old MKII Granada (low on its wheels) being driven around Brum by a very rotund gentleman; the vehicle sporting FAT 61T...

[Anonymous Coward]

Was there a question?

There used to be a matched pair of Bentley Continentals parked in Chelsea with the registrations "2 BE" and "NOT 2B".

Also saw "ELG 4R" on a Range Rover on the M40 just the other day.

[Alex Rose]

They are still there...

...at least the plates are, last time I went past they were on a Bentley and an Aston.

[John Brown (no body)]

offensive words?

Saw a blue Subaru the other day with F11CKA

I thought maybe the driver liked horses but reading here indicates that it might be something else.

The A was spaced out and I guess the texting generation and the vanity bitches see the 11 as a U

[Anonymous Coward]

F11CKA = "ficker" = "thicker"

as in, two short planks.

[miknik]

The clever ones are the best

I knew a guy who had K9 0RBS with the text underneath reading "The Dogs Bollocks", it always made me smile.

[rpics]

I confess

I have a 4wd that I use for getting lost in the bush - the plate says WTFAMI

The 'W' can be Where or What or Who?

[tony trolle]

BTW bollocks

Sex Pistols at Nottingham's Magistrates Court in 1977, proved "bollocks" was not obscene.

[The Dark Lord]

Nannying

Up here in Edinburgh, the entire class "SN07" was not issued because someone in the DVLA thought "snot" was offensive.

[A J Stiles]

I once saw

"D141TAL" -- with an "open" 4 very carefully stylised to look a little bit like a capital G.

Actually, I used to see it quite a lot. This was around the time that registration was current. I'm showing my age now. (Where's the pipe and slippers icon when you need one?)

[Giles Jones]

Never seen the point of such registrations. If you want everyone to know you're a "B00B" (a reg plate I've seen) then put a sticker in the back window.

Given how few traffic police there are around you could probably just put a fake plate on with whatever you like. I've seen enough plates with illegal fonts and altered characters to think that nothing is being done about them. I can only assume these people don't have an MOT or swap the plate over (why bother, do you not have anything better to do?).

[MJI]

I knew of a few

Back in A reg times, a local BMW dealer grabbed a lot of plates.

I remember such ones as A323BMW on a ... BMW 323i I think they managed most of the models.

Seen A1 LBW - used to be a sponsor car for a cricketer, last saw with a white bloke & suit on a Cavalier, rather than black bloke in cricket whites on a base level 3 series.

Also seen MY 750 on a BMW 750.

[Mostor Astrakan]

You English are rude...

I think I should mention that where you brits require four letters to refer to man- or ladyparts, the Dutch require only three. Have I seen them proudly adorning cars? Why yes, yes I have.

[takuhii]

Sorry I don't get the VA61 NOB one... VAG NOB? Might have been funnier as VA61 NAA

[Atilla the Hun (No relation)]

Plate spinning

I confirm the Bentleys in Chelsea, still look out for them on my occasional jaunts into the Smoke.

Some considerable number of years ago I nearly fell off my motorbike when passing FU2 on the Hammersmith Flyover - believed to be owned at the time by a Fiona Richmond?

[bigben]

J1 HAD or J11 HAD....

....used to be on a pimped Transit in the student areas of Manchester circa 1997

My mate has C1LNT spaced to look like possibly the rudest of all swear words, never figured out why.

Ben

[Lamont Cranston]

I've seen

B13 ELM, which struck me as offensive.

I've also seen 404 LOL, but couldn't decide whether to laugh or cry, at that.

[itzman]

my all time favorite

was a dolled up busty blond driving a top-of-the range convertible merc..as it roared past me I noted the number plate

CUP 38 D

I always wanted W1TCH but the going rate was £50k...

[Chris Miller]

Seen on M3

FAG60T

Out and proud?

[Reliquary]

Wow; someone obviously missed the memo at the DVLA for all the cars in South Oxon with the licence plates starting BJ08... examples seen include BJ08 BAA, BJ08 GRL, BJ08 BAR etc, etc.

[Anonymous Coward]

Pathetic

Yet more make-work for the armies of otherwise unemployable civil servants.

[Steve the Cynic]

In the early days of XX##XXX....

I once saw a lorry operated by a firm called Cosi-Bed, with the plate CO51 BED.

[Mips]

Also out in the wild

Seen as W32GAY. On a pink Lexus Soarer (yes I know there is no such thing except it is popular in the pink community).

[chops]

I applied to the DVLA for W4NKR when W registrations were released in the UK (1999?), but received a polite rejection letter.

[Anonymous Coward]

One I saw for sale on eBay years ago...

was S1HTE. They must have missed that one...

[graham crocker]

Get A Doctor!

Some examples seem incredibly obscure - Sorry I mean VA6E.

[Anonymous Coward]

I've saw N1ERD recently on the M25

[Alan Scott]

Got a pic of a local drainage firm van whose reg was WH05 HAT. Thought that was quite a good one.

[Anonymous Coward]

TA12DISTA12DISTA12DISTA12DISTA12DISTA12DISTA12DISTA12DIS

For all you ones going on and on about 'ME WANT TA12DIS!!!!111ONELOLZ'

This is NOT an allowed plate format in the GB system. 'I' is reserved for NI plates, and will not be seen on the ABnn CDE format plates. ('Z' is, however, now allowed).

The closest you might get might me 'TA12 DSS' or similar.

Once saw L18NUX for £250, considered it. L1NUX was going for £25k.

[annodomini2]

They missed one

On an 11 plate Skoda Fabia

WA 11 KER

And yes it had a black screw dot between the 11.

[Richard Scratcher]

A few years ago I saw a BMW with the plate: M1 NGE.

I would support a ban though and even help compile a list of naughty words - if the money was right (I can't afford too much at the moment).

I was giving my Mother a lift one day and we stopped at the lights behind a big 4x4 with a camouflage paint job and monster truck tyres. "Oh look!", she said. "That car's got a number plate that says big gun." It actually read B16 CUN but I decided not to correct her.

[Steve Evans]

Shoooorly...

Surely any gang member that wishes to advertise his membership via his numberplate should be encouraged?

[Julian 3]

Class number plate I spotted last week was Y2 CUM and SUC 808Y (suck bobby) is another one ive seen!

[Anonymous Coward]

Rotten sods...

Wouldn't let me have C11NTS, I tried to explain I'm called Clint but they still wouldn't wear it, I mean, it's not as if you could read it any other way....

[Anonymous Coward]

F4CK0FF.

[No, I will not fix your computer]

I want a personalised numberplate

Can't afford one so, instead, I'm going to change my name to RWV 94X

[Secret geek]

Seen yesterday...

D11K ED

Nuff said I think.

[SoggyRock]

no censor here!

in the enlightened Isle of Man we must be far too innocent, ranging from MAN 1C to MAN 1A, a perennial classic - 8008 MAN, and of course the reverse for the brave. For the down at heel it's gotta be - MAN 61E. I'm sure H1 MAN is out there somewhere, but my personal favourite is one Vicars ride which in these apparent times of strife remains unmolested - MAN 4 60D, every journey has the potential to bring a smile with the creative slanting and spacing, until they are brought back into line by the boys in blue.

Fittingly, being a motorsport heaven we've also got F457 MAN