Hiring a car without a licence

Shoshannah

I have hired vehicles from Avis before without problems, and may need to do so again shortly.

However, my driving licence is currently at the DVLA because I sent it for photo renewal last week. There is a chance it will not be back before I need to hire the car.

I'll give them a call next week to ask, but for now was wondering if anyone else has been in this position before and whether I am likely to be allowed to hire a car without a licence on my person.

EycplUK

Had a similar problem when went to hire a van once , forgot my license and told the guy on the desk i would have to go back home and get it !
No problem he said , picked up the phone and called the DVLA , he spoke to them and then passed me the phone where a woman asked me some personal details inc name d.o.b and when i had passed my test suchlike , then asked to pass back to desk , he wrote down the info she gave him and then proceeded to hire me the van !
Maybe still use this system ? give it a try !

property.advert

Hired a van from Enterprise the other day without the paper part. Also hired a car last year without paper part. Both times they said they wanted it and both times they said they had a way around it.

vikingaero

Call up the hire company beforehand and explain. Then that way they can call the DVLA if they choose to or maybe ask you for utility bills/passport for extra ID.

Road_Hog

As has already been said, the hire company should just phone the DVLA and then hand the phone to you. You confirm some details and hand the phone back to the hire company and then I believe they give them your driving licence number.

Certainly this is how it should happen with the nationals, if however you're using some local independent company, they may not be geared up to do this.

Shoshannah

Thanks everyone. I did take photocopies of the licence before I posted it so those might help as well, if they accept them.

27col

I hired a van a couple of years ago. I seem to remember that the hire company rang the dvla and I had to answer a couple of questions. It was probably because I had forgotten to take the licence counter part with me.