Does anyone know definitively - if you take your personalised plates off a car and replace them with standard plates, do you have to immediately surrender your personalised plates to the Licensys agent? (VTNZ, AA Centre etc)

I always thought you had to surrender them immediately, but last week when I bought a car with personalised plates on (which I didn't want), the seller and I both went to the AA centre, filled in the paperwork, got new standard plates issued, and then the seller left with his personalised plates in hand.

While I don't necessarily disagree with surrendering them, I do object to the plate owners being stung with a remanufacturing fee when they want to put them on a car again.

While I am on the issue, I actually bought a second hand set of personalised plates on Trademe recently, and the seller sent the physical plates to me in the mail. This also shoots down my theory that you have to surrender them immediately after removing them.

Just wondering if these are two random cases of the agency slipping up, or if the rules have been relaxed. I couldn't find any info about this online (so far).