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What’s in a number? Car number TAN 1 was worth RM200,000

Monday Starters - By Soo Ewe Jin

INTERESTING stories have emerged from Terengganu in recent weeks. The divorce rate is high, it is claimed, because of body odour, boring pyjamas and humdrum sex.

There are some 2,000 Mat Rempit gang members in the state, including 300 secondary school boys, and the gangs have interesting names like Apache, Seven to One and Dracula.

And in the spirit of 1Malaysia, the state plans to introduce a “1Toilet” policy in a move to liberalise education, where teachers – and even principals – will soon have to share toilets with their students.

But it was the story about vehicle number plates that caught my attention.

According to the report, the most expensive number plate in the country is for a vehicle registered in Terengganu but owned by a businessman in Johor Baru. The number TAN 1 went for a princely sum of RM200,090.

My colleague Hong Boon How, who covers the motoring beat, tells me I can get a brand-new BMW 118i, a Mercedes-Benz A170, four Perodua Myvis or five Proton Sagas for that sum of money.

Malaysians are fixated with numbers and many people would pay a fortune to get a number of their choice. But is the JPJ getting the best possible returns through this tender process? I don’t think so.

Under the current system, the minimum price for a Premier Value Number is only RM2,000; an Interesting Number RM800; and a Popular Number RM200. (You can check the website at jpj.gov.my for a full listing of these numbers.)

These rates should be raised and the JPJ should go to town with the publicity when people pay a huge sum for a number. I think the agency should take out an advertisement and thank Mr Tan and then challenge Malaysians to break his record.

And they have to think ahead. For example, the BMW numbers are not that far off when you consider the current series out of Selangor is BKN. In Penang, the PJK series has just taken off so PKR is not far away either, if you get my drift.

Let’s look at what their British counterpart, the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency, is doing.

A mystery buyer recently paid a staggering £87,853 for the right to fit the 5 O (O, not zero) plate on his car at the agency’s autumn auction of personalised registrations.

The bid takes the total amount spent on the O-series - 1 O, 2 0, 3 O and 4 O - to a whopping £566,344, with all the money raised going to the Treasury.

They certainly mean business over there and according to the agency’s marketing manager Damian Lawson, “We have been blown away by the level of interest in an O-registration. The decision to release them to the public has certainly proved worthwhile in terms of the revenue raised for the nation.”

Lawson went on to say that it is remarkable how Britain’s motorists have taken to personalised numbers.

“Whole families buy them, not just for the adults, but for their children as well; businesses of all types and sizes use them to promote their brands and products and a growing number of our customers seem to be buying them for their investment value,” he said.

I believe the reasons why Malaysians select certain numbers will be even more interesting, and what is good for one community may be taboo to another. Which means you can make money from almost every number put up for tender.

For 2008, the most expensive plates in the Britain were the numbers F1 and S1 sold for £440,000 and £397,500 respectively.

The £440k tag smashed the British record by over £100,000. The previous record holder was M 1 which sold for £331,000 in 2006.

I hope the JPJ will start brainstorming soon on this matter. It will not only be good for the nation’s coffers but also for their KPI.

● Deputy executive editor Soo Ewe Jin feels responsible credit card holders can be spared the RM50 tax if good revenue can be generated by government agencies through more creative channels.