Romanian car number plates

Encyclopedia : R : RO : ROM : Romanian car number plates

The standard Romanian License plate consist of a blue vertical strip (the European strip) on the left side of the plate containing the Flag of Romania and the country code of Romania (RO), always followed on a white surface, using black font, by the county code and a combination of two digits and three letters. The digits and letters are usually assigned at random, unless a customization fee is paid. The plates are issued for each car and for each owner, and they must be returned when the car is either sold or scrapped, although the new buyer is entitled to ask to use the old number plate, if wanting to do so. Letter combinations that may form obscene text in Romanian have been removed. Also the three-letter code cannot start with "I" or "O", as they can be mistaken with "1" or "0".

There are four other types of licence plates in use in Romania:

The Yellow background Plate, used by the municipal public transport vehicles.
The Red Plate, consisting of the European strip, followed by the county code and three to seven numbers. All the writing outside of the European-strip on this plate are in red font - these plates are valid for 30 days, and are usually issued by car dealers as temporary registration for their new cars (unlike some countries, the new owner must do the car registration, and this can take, due bureaucracy, up to seven days).
The Black Plate, same as the red plate, except for the black number, and a right-sided red strip, containing the end date of the plate's validity (YY/MM format). This kind of plate is used for cars that fall under a leasing agreement, with the plate's validity ending when the contract expires.
The Diplomatic Plate contains the European strip, followed in blue by the text CD (Corp Diplomatic), or TC (Technical Cooperation, usually issues to lower-ranking service staff) and 6 numbers. The first three numbers stand for the country or international organisation, the last three usually for the rank of the owner. The lowest number for both sets of 3 is 101. Thus, a car with license plate number 123 101 would refer to Switzerland's (Switzerland is 123) ambassador (ambassadors' or heads of missions' official car usually is 101). The license plate is issued exclusively to diplomats, and cars having such plates enjoy diplomatic immunity.
The Special Plates can be issued by agencies, ministries and local administration for use on their vehicles. Currently, the Army, the Ministry of Administration and Interior and Mayor's Offices are allowed to issue such numbers. Their format, size and style is decided by each ministry via internal regulations - for example - the Army uses plates containing no European strip (as their regulations predate the 1992 regulation imposing the European strip), with the letter "A" (Army) followed by 3 to 7 digits. The Ministry of Administration and Interior standard is identical to the one use by the Army, with the exception that it uses "MAI" instead of "A" and their plates are only used by the Gendarmerie on their vehicles. The mayoralties are free to issue license plates for whatever task needed, as long as the vehicles cannot leave their jurisdiction, or do not need state level authorisation. As such, some cities used licence plates to register their garbage trucks, small sanitation vehicles, trolleybuses, tramways etc. A number of villages have issued such plates to non-road going vehicles, such as combine harvesters, non-road-going tractors, horse drawn carts, etc.

This is the list of counties and their county code (in the parentheses the capital)

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