Answer to Question #245745 in Statistics and Probability for Precious

Question

An anonymous caller told the police that he saw a hit and run incident and had briefly seen the number plate of the car. He knew that the number plate started with two letters – a B and an E – but could not remember the order. After the letters were four digits – 3, 4, 8 and 9 – but again he could not remember the order. The four numbers were followed by the letter V. How many number plates will the police have to check to be sure of including the car involved in the hit and run incident?

Answer 1

We are given the first 2 letters here as BE or EB. After this the 4 digits that could be in any order as: 3, 4, 8 and 9 here. There was a V at the end here.

The number of plates here is computed as:

= 2*Number of permutation of the 4 digits

= 2*4! = 48 is the required total number of plates here.