The Vehicle Keeper Marking Register (VKM Register) provides the unique VKM and name of all keepers (EU/OTIF). It is defined in Appendix 6 part 1 of Decision 2007/756/EC.

The VKM register is updated on a monthly basis.

Since 2014, a joint OTIF/EU VKM Register is hosted by ERA and provides the VKM details in four languages (English, French, German, Russian).

The VKM register is available either in PDF or in Excel format. In case there are differences between both files, the PDF format prevails over the other format.

Any request for a new VKM, a change of the VKM and the change of the keeper´s name should be submitted to the National Safety Authority of that Member State, where the respective keeper has its place of business, using a dedicated form (Word or Excel).

What is the EVR?

The European Vehicle Register (EVR) is a web-based tool that will be used by Keepers to submit applications for vehicle registration and by Registration Entities (REs) to manage the allocation of vehicle numbers and to record vehicle registrations and their updates.

As with the ECVVR, the EVR vehicle registration process is managed at national level.

The EVR will enable:

• REs to manage user accounts;
• Keepers to submit applications for vehicle registration and their updates to the RE of the relevant Member State (MS). All other communications between Keepers and REs remain outside the EVR.

Please note that:

• There will be no direct contact between Keepers and the Agency during the process of vehicle registration;
• Fees and charges for vehicle registration remain the competency of the relevant Member State.

Furthermore:

• Each Registration Entity should publish, at the national level, its own guidelines describing the language policy, including communication provisions; and, if any, the lists of additional fields and supporting documents;
• To explain and facilitate the use of the EVR, the Agency will publish user manuals for Keepers and REs.

EVR state of play (June 2021)

A first release of EVR was put in the test environment in December 2020 and has been open to all Registration Entities (REs) in order to familiarise themselves with the application, test the implemented functionalities, connect decentralised Vehicle Registers and test vehicle data migration.

The Agency has been and is providing business and technical support to the REs that have contacted ERA concerning the use of the EVR.

A new release has been made accessible since the beginning of June to REs that have chosen to stay “decentralised” until 2024. This allows these REs to connect their systems and to check whether their vehicles’ data can be made available to users through the EVR.

Regarding the REs that have chosen to be centralised, the Agency is currently testing, in co-operation with the REs that have provided a copy of their national data, the quality of the data that will be transferred from the respective REs’ current national vehicle registers to the EVR. 

A new EVR test release with a complete set of functionalities has been made accessible to all REs for testing on 30 June 2021.

Access to the EVR test environment is at https://evr-pre.test-era.europa.eu/

The release will be tested throughout Q3/2021 by the REs and the Agency and consolidated when needed.

Next steps (Q3-Q4/2021) 

Starting from the beginning of July 2021, the Agency, together with the Registration Entities, will test and validate:

• The full set of functionalities of EVR;
• MSs vehicle data transfer to EVR; 
• The connectivity of decentralized Vehicle Registers.

Both testing and stability of EVR are of paramount importance;  this comprises the full testing by all different kinds of internal and external users, bug fixing, sanitisation, cleansing and rehearsal of vehicle data transfer to EVR.  This is a joint exercise by the Agency and the Member States and the Agency truly appreciates the commitment and interest of the Registration Entities.

The EVR will be put into production when Registration Entities trust that the EVR functionalities are working correctly, support their vehicle registration process; and that their data are sanitised, cleansed, validated and correctly transferred to the EVR; or that they are properly connected to EVR. 

As the vehicle registration process remains at the national level, the national REs need to check that the EVR supports the vehicle registration process. The transfer of vehicle registrations from ECVVR to EVR; or the connection of a national vehicle register to the EVR, will rely on a common agreement between the relevant RE and the Agency. The data transfer to EVR will be done progressively and the agreed schedule to carry out the transfer for each National Vehicle Register will be published on the ERA website as and when it is agreed.

Business continuity of the vehicle data

In parallel, there is a need to ensure the business continuity, including the availability of the consultation of vehicle registration data.

All vehicle registrations that were available for consultation through the ECVVR will be available for consultation in the EVR once it is in production. 

To ensure business continuity, the ECVVR will be available for regular use until the end of 2021 and beyond, as necessary.

This will allow:

• REs not yet ready to be centralised to continue registration and consultation of vehicle data via their respective national vehicle registers (NVR). 
• REs and the Agency to ensure the full testing and validation of the EVR.

The Agency will publish on its website the list of Member States whose data are available in EVR and the list of Member States whose data are still available via ECVVR. During the transition process, all current stakeholders having access to vehicle data should keep their current access rights in ECVVR until the ECVVR is decommissioned. Furthermore, all current stakeholders having access to vehicle data should be able to be allocated, on request to their RE, access to the EVR.

The EVR Decision 2018/1614 defines the Organisation Codes as a code consisting of four alphanumeric characters. Any Organisation accessing the EVR, or other ERA applications, where organisation code is requested, shall be assigned an organisation code.

Organisation Codes are allocated by the Agency to all interested parties, operating in the European Railway system.

The Organisation Codes are not the equivalent of RICS Company Codes issued by UIC. Each business entity operating in the Single European Railway Area and interacting with ERA hosted registers must have an allocated Organisation Code, even if it has a registered UIC RICS Code. Companies involved into TAF/TAP data exchange and companies cooperating with OSJD members, still need to obtain a 4 digit numeric code from UIC. For these companies ERA will allocate an Organisation Code with the same value as their obtained UIC RICS code.

Any request for a new alphanumeric Organisation Code or for modification of Organisation data should be submitted to the Agency online following the link: https://srm-portal.powerappsportals.com/