Vehicle registration plates of Seratof

Vehicle registration plates of Seratof, more formally known as System of Vehicle Identification, is the national system of within Seratof. All vehicles must display the registration plates on the front and back of the vehicle. The current system was formalized into law in 1972 shortly after the rise of the Seratofian People's Party. All registration plates in Seratof are issued by the Regional Transport Office located within each municipality. Every Seratofian registration plate also displays the engine displacement as well as the build of the car. The mandatory inspection sticker has been discontinued since 2006 and is no longer found in newer plates.

Format
There are several formats issued within the SVI. The most common format is issued to private vehicles. Other formats issued within the SVI include government plates, emergency plates, diplomatic corps plates, as well as vintage plates. Although varying, the base format consists of three parts: the flag of Seratof with capital S beneath it, the vehicle displacement and class as well as the specific formats granted to each subsystem.

Private vehicles
Private plates are by far the most common plates in Seratof issued to private civilians and corporations alike. They possess a white background embossed with black text with the Alte-DIN 1441 font. Regional land transport offices provide civilians with both front and rear plates. They are made of sheet metal and embossed with metallic paint.

Private vehicles follow the format X 0000 YZ where X denotes the place of registration, 0000 is four numbers, Y is the subdistrict code and Z is a letter. Overall, the format could be simplified to two parts: the location identifier (shown by the letters X and Y) as well as the series of the vehicle (denoted by 0000 Z). The codes for the place of registration do not always match with the current boundaries of provinces. The borders of the old provinces were changed while the SVI grants each old province its own code. As a result, it is not uncommon to see regional codes overlap multiple provinces and it is also common to see multiple regional codes existing within the same province. Each municipality has their own subdistrict identifier within the general location identifier. For example, the Einidar municipality located within the Eršja region (denoted by A) has the subdistrict codes of A-G, meaning that a plate with 'X' being A and 'Y' being any letter being A to G is registered within the Einidar municipality. Only plain letters (i.e letters without diacritics) are allowed to be inputted in license plates, providing for only 26 letters for the combination. The letters O, Q, and I are permitted.

The SVI for private vehicles is issued in an incremental order. Starting from X 0001 YA and progressing towards X 9999 YA. Whenever the limit for combinations within the number part of the system has been exhausted, the next plate issued will return to 0001 but with the next municipality code. For example, if within the Einidar municipality A 9999 AA has been issued, the next plate issued would be A 0001 BA and not A 0001 AB. Subsequently, if the series has run out of municipality codes for this case, the third letter is then changed. Coming back to the example of Einidar, when plate A 9999 GA has been issued, the next series in the system would then be A 0001 AB. The system continues until the series runs out of combinations. Every code usually has reserve municipality codes in preparation of a runout problem within each regional code. Currently, the municipality codes are distributed based on population, with more populated municipalities harboring more codes. Currently, no such regional code has exhausted all of its municipality subdistrict codes, however various projections have set Azxara to run out of combinations by the year 2022. Future plans for the system have not yet been disclosed to the public yet.

As previously mentioned, the regional codes assigned to vehicles are based on the old provinces which existed before 2007. As such, there are many instances of a single municipality within a province to have a completely different code from the rest of the province, for example, the Kjírstijan municipality in the Ákdjar province possesses the regional code AB while the rest of the province was assigned the code AB. Another result of regional codes still being applied to old provinces is that some provinces are split between two or sometimes even three codes while sometimes a single code can span multiple provinces. The Varga province, for example, contains two codes: E and N while the entire Montana and Turigan provinces fall under a single code: BH. Therefore, it is not always possible to conclude which province a plate is from solely from the first letter of its registration. The Ompracu province, for example, is divided within 3 codes with an almost equal amount of population split between the three.

The assignment of the letters for the codes themselves are rather arbitrary. The capital Azxara was assigned the code 'T' while neighboring provinces were assigned the codes A, P, and K. When looked at a map, the letters seem randomly assigned with no rhyme or reason behind the coding. The letters do not represent the province names nor is it applied and assigned in an orderly manner. While Seratof uses both one and two-letter regional codes, the letters J, Q, U, W, X, Y are not used as regional codes at all. All two-letter prefixes are located outside of Seratof Country. Most of northern Heltia possesses the B prefix before codes, such as BA, BB, BD. Vehicle codes from Venima attach a D before a letter, providing two codes for the entire Venimaland: DA and DB. The islands region only contain one code: EA.

Early on in 1987, the code P was created from parts of the Eršja land transport office (A) and the Ailuman land transport office (K). The code P is one of the smallest regional codes in existence in terms of land area and municipality count with just two municipalities falling under the new code, however, is one of the most dense and populated codes within Seratof as it completely encircles Azxara and is the regional code for the general suburbs of Azxara. Generally speaking, the codes P and T comprise the bulk of the Azxara metropolitan area.

A vehicle's registration stays with the car regardless of owner. The specific regional code assigned to the car is reflective of the owner's place of residence upon the purchase of the car. Therefore, it is not always accurate to denote the residence of car based solely on its vehicle registration plates. It is not required for drivers to change their plates upon buying or moving cars across different regional codes in some provinces. Such a phenomenon is most commonly seen in the abundance of plates originating in Seratof Country in the poorer inland regions of the country. It is common for people in Azxara, for example, to sell their cars to dealers who will resell them in either Heltia, Venima, or Sobruza where the demand for second hand cars is higher. Some places or municipalities might even be dominated by the prefix 'T' (Azxara) while being hundreds of kilometers away. These plates are therefore still registered under the Azxara land transport office, who collects vehicle taxes from these cars. Many regional governments have protested this stance as it brings money out of the region or district while these vehicles continue to enjoy infrastructure in the regions mainly provided by the taxes of in-province vehicles and taxpayers.

Vehicle registration mutation (the act of changing the vehicle's registration number to the area of residence) is mandatory in some provinces such as Varga and North Varga. These provinces require all vehicle owner currently residing in the province to have their vehicle's registration number to be changed in order for the provincial government to attain taxes on the vehicles. When such a process occurs, the vehicles are usually assigned the latest series of registration plates currently issued in the municipality of residence. In certain cases, some municipalities have reserved a certain portion of their overall assigned scheme for these vehicles, making it easier for officials and the database to recognize "mutated" vehicles into the province.

Until recently in 2006, all vehicles are required to have a safety inspection sticker placed between the regional code (the first letter) and the number sequence. These safety inspection stickers are usually instantly granted by the regional transport office provided the said car being registered has passed the safety inspection at a national level with the bureau of land transport safety. These stickers are color-coded depending on the year of issue. There are 6 base colors which rotate every year. Using this method, it was easier to determine the age of a car depending on the color of the safety inspection sticker. These stickers, once given, do not have to be renewed unless a change or a flaw is detected at the national level. Until its disappearance in 2006, there have only been 2 cases where a safety inspection sticker needed to be replaced with a new one at a national level.

Below is the list of regional codes and subdistrict codes for each municipality.

Drivers in Seratof may pay an extra amount of money when registering their vehicle for a vanity plate. However, they are not allowed to change the scheme of the overall plate, which would mean that drivers only have control over 4 numbers and 2 letters. These vanity plates must not coincide with the municipality a vehicle is registered in, although still being tied to the regional code a vehicle is registered in. As such, writing certain phrases or words becomes much more difficult, and many vanity plates simply show special numbers or combinations of letters, such as birthdays, anniversaries, initials, or other important dates. Vanity plates too only allow the base 26 letters of the alphabet as well as the numbers 0-9.

Currently, there are no inherent forbidden combinations of letters and numbers in Seratof, although specific combinations could be retracted if a complaint is filed by the owner. It is common to see plates bearing commonly taboo numbers and letter combinations. A driver could request for the combination to be change on the grounds of moral decency, in which the combination would be taken from circulation and the driver be issued a new combination. The combination is therefore deemed unmoral and is no longer issued to future cars. Every regional transport office has the power to decide for itself, and combinations which may be retracted in a region might still be issued in other regions. A driver still must have to prove to the regional transport office that the combination issued is unmoral or disturbing, otherwise the wish for retraction would be dismissed. Some drivers whose plates have failed to be retracted opt for vanity plates for their vehicles in order to get rid of the combination issued. In such cases, the previous combination would not be seen as unmoral or disturbing, and future cars may be issued with such combination.

Government vehicles
Government vehicle registration plates are issued to government agencies, institutions, or bodies, and can not be owned privately. These vehicles are usually bought using the provincial, regional, or national budget, and consequently are mainly used on official visits and purposes. These vehicles in general pay lower taxes than private vehicles. The appearance of government vehicle registration vehicles are quite different from the private registration vehicles although retaining the flag and the vehicle displacement as well as the vehicle class. The plate has a dark red-orange background defaced with white lettering, also with the Alte DIN font. Similar to the private vehicle registration plates, government vehicle registration plates are also issued by the regional transport office. Government vehicles also display year of registration for ease of identifying and cataloging within the general system.

Government plates follow the format of X YY 000, where X denotes the region in which the vehicle is registered in, YY denotes the agency, institution, or body associated with the vehicle, and 000 is an incremental serial starting from 001. The code for the government agency is usually an abbreviation of the body represented. For example, the Einidar municipality government would be issued the code of EM (Einidara Mäšgjeldher, "Municipality of Einidar"). A government vehicle registered under the Einidar municipality would then have the prefix of A EM indicating that the registration comes from the Eršja region ('A') and registered under the Einidar municipality government (EM). Note that regional transport offices have the power to decide the respective codes for each government body, however, common schemes exist for some major government institutions present in virtually all provinces such as the department of education (assigned LM in all provinces) and representatives of the central bank of Seratof (assigned SB in all provinces).

The month and year of registration of government vehicles are also embossed in the plate itself between the regional code and the government body code and the numerical series. The month of registration printed in NOT!Roman numerals comes on top of the year separated by a black line, whereas the year is written in standard Arabic numerals. The background of the date identifier of the plate is colored yellow. Dates of registration do not serve a practical purpose for the plate itself, rather for the cataloging and the identifying of government plates for purposes such as taxation, archives, and just general identifying. The dates contained within each plate do not count as part of the format.

Government plate combinations can theoretically run out, with each code (and by extension each government body) only possessing 999 combinations. While it is rare that a governmental agency would have 999 vehicles operational at any given point, some jurisdictions have begun giving out "backup" combinations towards some governmental bodies that possess a lot of vehicles registered under the state (i.e department of parks, forestry and gardens), allowing for a single government body to own more than 999 vehicles at the same time. Currently however, there isn't a single agency, institution or body within Seratof that has exhausted all its possible combinations.