DVLA Auction October 2022

DVLA suspended its live venue auctions two and a half years ago due to the Covid-19 pandemic. Although the agency's sales have continued online throughout the pandemic, the live auction held from Wednesday 19th October to Friday 21st October at the Oxford Belfry Hotel was the first of its kind since the suspension began. You can also read more about our coverage of the September 2022 Auction.

Our team felt a certain amount of trepidation on the way to the venue. Once back in the auction room, however, they soon got back into the swing of things and it was good to see some familiar faces that they hadn't seen for nearly three years.

Happy Halloween

Appropriately, for Halloween month, the sale included a smattering of numbers that fit that creepy theme. DEV 11L sold for an all-in total of £37,573; 1 HAG for £33,464; 3 WEB for £20,881; GHD 5T for £13,048 and GOA 4T for £19,982. Of course, these may well have been purchased for entirely non-Halloween reasons: 3 WEB as initials or for an internet theme and GOA 4T to represent the acronym Greatest Of All Time, rather than for any reference to Dennis Wheatley's The Devil Rides Out or Éliphas Lévi's occult, Sabbatic Goat. GHD 5T, mentioned above, was notable for commanding a pretty high price for an imperfect rendering of "Ghost".

Private number plate DEV 1L

Nebulous number plates

There were a number of registrations that didn't fit obviously into any theme or category but which still had clear appeal. Arguably the best number in the auction was 8 CH. As well as achieving the highest price, at £56,100, this number represented something of a rarity. Many of these short-format numbers were sold in the 1990s and it has become increasingly unusual to see one released into the sale.

Private number plate 8 CH

1 WVV seemed a tad expensive to us when it was snapped up by a determined bidder for £38,086. It could be intended to serve as a WW combination, as two letter Vs are an established substitute for a W. Two more plates that did better than we would usually expect were 9 XG and 9 YW (£37,059 and £34,748 respectively). Numbers like this, containing less in-demand letters such as Y, occur late in the auction and don't often achieve such high prices.

Another oddity was OO11 OOO. Unless this one has some obscure significance in binary code or something, we can only assume that the appeal lies in its pleasing near-symmetry. Whatever the reason, someone thought it was worth £17,542.

Name number plates

Of course, name number plates are always a favourite feature in the auctions. This time we saw a range of clarity in the representations: some were obvious, while others were a little more is-it-or-isn't-it. Here are a few: DA22 ENS (Darrens), £7,399; H41 NNA (Hanna), £5,344; AT51 NGH (AT Singh), £5,601; K31 ETH (Keith), £3,290; S911 OTA (Sahota), £11,636; SOP 71E (Sophie), £12,021; DAN 6X (Dang, Dan), £11,636; KAN 1G (Kang, Kani), £12,920. There were many more.

We also spotted a nice football number plate tucked away in the listing; W327 HAM (West Ham) made someone's day at £4,317. Rivals Spurs also made an appearance, with SPU 7S scoring £19,340 - a substantially higher price for what is, arguably, not as good a representation.

Private number plate SPU 7S

The next DVLA auction is scheduled for Wednesday 23rd November to Tuesday 29th November 2022 and will be an online auction. The January 2023 auction is also expected to be online, while another live venue event is planned for February 2023.

Here is our usual table of the top performers from this most recent DVLA auction:

Plate	Price
8 CH	£72,112
1 WVV	£38,086
DEV 11L	£37,573
9 XG	£37,059
9 YW	£34,748
1 HAG	£33,464
WHF 1	£28,328
46 OO	£25,760
1 OWH	£25,375
1 VSH	£23,192
3 WEB	£20,881
RRZ 1	£20,624
XDC 1	£20,496
GOA 4T	£19,982
7 HSS	£19,982
14 SAD	£19,982
233 SH	£19,597
93 JWM	£19,340
SPU 7S	£19,340
247 SAM	£18,313