DVLA timed auctions
A real-time online auction platform with Odoo handling complex auction accounting - the DVLA's main sales channel through the pandemic.
British Car Auctions (BCA) operates the auctions of personalised registration numbers on behalf of the DVLA. By 2015, demand for online timed auctions had outgrown the existing platform, which was end of life. A new platform was commissioned on a new technology stack.
Open Digital provided the project direction and solution architecture for the build, directing the delivery team through design, development, testing and live operation.
The work
An auction is a hard real-time problem: every bid can trigger proxy bids, notifications by email and SMS, and rapid data changes that every bidder must see immediately. The DVLA also required maximum-bid ("proxy") bidding with sliding end times to defeat auction snipers - so that anyone outbid in the closing seconds has the opportunity to respond.
Design began with modelling every bidding scenario into detailed timelines, giving the team a deep understanding of the process flow before development started. Testing matched the stakes: unit test suites built into the software, a bidder simulator capable of driving any number of virtual bidders through an auction to tune both application and infrastructure, and mock auctions to validate the public experience.
The platform paired two open source products: Flexibase for the auction itself, and Odoo for the accounting - integrated in real time. The accounting is genuinely complex: winning bidders pay the hammer price plus buyer's premium and VAT; VAT on the premium goes to HMRC; the hammer price, VAT and assignment fee go to the DVLA; deposits are taken above value thresholds and refunded to unsuccessful bidders; and documentation is only released once every lot in a purchase is fully paid.
The outcome
When the pandemic stopped venue auctions, the timed online platform became the DVLA's main auction channel. Auction frequency doubled, and the system coped fully with the increased activity - running well beyond office hours without additional administrative burden.
The format itself improved results: week-long open auctions gave bidders time to consider their strategy, and average prices rose. The client judged that the platform's success had advanced the DVLA's plans by a couple of years, and development continues - including visibility of forthcoming auctions alongside live ones.