Official Type Designation

Official type designation

Passenger cars licensed for road use in Germany need a general type approval for the issue of a vehicle title document.

Type approval is issued by the Federal Ministry for Transport in Flensburg after the type inspection. This procedure was permitted up to 12/31/1997 - and after that in exceptional cases.

In other member states of the European Union (EU), the procedure for issuing a document similar to the German vehicle title was different. Each member state could set up a national type approval according to its own procedures up to 12/31/1997.

Since 01/01/1998, all passenger vehicles licensed for road use within the European Union must possess type approval according to EU guidelines. Vehicles licensed for road use with single vehicle approval according to 21 StVZO in Germany are excepted.

Therefore, the same guidelines apply to all automobile manufacturers. Consequently, international trade within the EU has been simplified.

Official Type designation/Sales/Trade name
In the following table, all VW vehicles which already have EU type approval are listed in the column "EU type".

All VW vehicles which were granted general type approval according to the procedure valid up to 12/31/97 are listed in the column "General type".

If entries appear in both columns "General type" and "EU type", there are vehicles of this model which are approved according to both the StVZO and the EU guidelines. In this case, it must first be established what sort of vehicle yours is. here are two possibilities:

1. Possibility
The last page of the vehicle title includes the field "Certified holder of a general type approval/EEC type approval". Either the general or the EU type approval number appears here, if the vehicle title document is original. This is the case only if the vehicle was not unregistered in the past for longer than 12 months.

2. Possibility
Check whether the general or the EU type approval number is entered on the vehicle identification plate.