Vehicles registered as new from 1 September 2001 will have registrations which include:

 A two letter regional identifier
 A two figure age identifier
 Three random letters

Eg. AB12 SMR

Two letter regional identifier.
The first two letters of the registration will show the region where the vehicle is first registered. This will help with the recall of registrations and the identification of vehicles.The first letter represents the region, and the second relates to a DVLA Local Office.
Using the above example, "AB" shows a vehicle was first registered in Anglia (A) at the DVLA's Peterborough office (B).

Two figure age identifier.
The age identifier will change every six months in March and September. In the above example, "12" represents the the 6 month period from April 2012 to August 2012.

Three random letters.
The three random letters will provide a random element to make each registration unique.

Combinations that may be considered offensive as well as the Letters "I" and "Q" will be excluded from this element of the registration.