19
What to do if your vehicle is stolen
You should first report the theft of the vehicle at a police station
and get a crime reference number. You should then contact the
Specialist Registration Team (see Section 9). You must return the
V117 registration document to us. You will need to tell us the crime
reference number and the name of the police station where you
reported the theft.
If the vehicle is recovered, and if it is no longer a diplomatic vehicle
then the vehicle will need to be de-registered.
You must scrap your vehicle at an Authorised Treatment
Facility (ATF). To find the nearest ATF go to:
www.gov.uk/scrapped-and-written-off-vehicles
Section 6
Registering a vehicle with a ‘flag’ number
All embassies and high commissions are entitled to have one official
car (usually the Ambassador’s or High Commissioner’s official car)
that has a ‘flag number’ rather than a diplomatic registration number.
Flag numbers can only be used on an official car and must be
approved by DVLA and DMIOU first.
Transferring or keeping your flag number
If you have a flag number that you need to take off a vehicle:
• you can transfer the flag number to another vehicle
• if you do not have a vehicle to transfer the flag number onto, you
can apply to retain the flag number, which will keep it ‘on hold’
until you can put it on a new vehicle.
You can do both by filling in an ‘Application to transfer or retain a
vehicle registration number’ (V317).
You will need to let the Specialist Registration Team (see Section 9)
know what will or has happened to the vehicle that currently holds
the flag number. It will need to be re-registered.