Driving licence renewal during COVID 19

springer5

onomatopoeia99 said:

springer5 said:

2  - Irresponsible because you are advising people to break the government's own guildelines, which are listed here, by suggesting they visit post offices....

Government guidance is not the law.

The law (The Health Protection (Coronavirus, Restrictions) (England) Regulations 2020) says you must have a reasonable excuse to leave the home and section 6(2) provides a non-exhaustive list of 13 reasonable excuses.  As it happens, this is covered in 6(2)(h) "to fulfil a legal obligation, including attending court or satisfying bail conditions, or to participate in legal proceedings;"  Note the wording is "including" so the things mentioned are examples of legal obligations, not an exhaustive list.  Renewing a driving licence is also a legal obligation, for which some people will need to leave the home.

I didn't say it was. Read it again...more carefully. The point remains the government are advising people not to put themselves and others in danger. They even have police officers checking up on that fact. It's really very simple.... are the government syaing we should go out or we shouldn't. If your in doubt about the answer to that, where have you been ?

DaveF327

Somebody got out of the wrong side of bed this morning...

Dinghy

As an update to this ,

I have spoken to police about this issue , If you send your licence away and it is not back in your possession by the expiry date on your old  licence you are committing an offence by driving !  My wife has obtained a D1 form from post office as she's not got a reminder for renewal next month .

The person I spoke to said they'd not been asked this before and she looked through the DVLA site and could see the problem there is in contacting them , and could see that it was about 3 weeks at the best of times and that due to the chaos people could be in an awkward position . Only suggestion was to contact the local MP . Good luck with that.

born_again

All I would say is do not send the form in. Go to a post office that has the facility to do it electronically. You then get proof it has been done.
I dread to think how big the backlog of mail applications is going to be. As well as the scope for them to get lost....

Dinghy

Hi thanks , that's good advice.

I have just done that , as no reminder has been sent, we took the D1 form and a  suitable photo to the PO , but the guy in  there said he could do it all electronically ,  To be honest I thought that meant doing it online yourself but we couldn't because we have no passport and I thought you still had to send the D1 form off and wait for the new card, but times have moved on it seems ,  He did the photos and  the rest  and  said to produce the receipt he gave her if stopped by the law .

custardy

ShiverMeTimbers said:

Gocky72 said:

My license is also up for renewal. I have been on the DVLA website and can let you know that you cannot speak to anyone by phone or by live chat or email unless you are an HGV driver or work for the NHS. Our post office is closed so I am out of options! No passport, not processing postal applications and no help online. Can I drive? I can’t afford a hefty fine!
>

Same here. Healthy 75 years old. Can't get grocery delivery slots so got to make occasional trips to shop.  Impossible to renew online at the moment or to speak/chat/email etc with DVLA. Licence expires soon. Advice please MSE 😐.

Me,I would be using the car as I needed to.
These are extraordinary times and the DVLA have made it clear they dont want people contacting them for such matters.
To be clear,this is not legal advice.

naturaljazz

Dinghy said:

Hi thanks , that's good advice.

I have just done that , as no reminder has been sent, we took the D1 form and a  suitable photo to the PO , but the guy in  there said he could do it all electronically ,  To be honest I thought that meant doing it online yourself but we couldn't because we have no passport and I thought you still had to send the D1 form off and wait for the new card, but times have moved on it seems ,  He did the photos and  the rest  and  said to produce the receipt he gave her if stopped by the law .

Our City (yes City) has no such facility now. Closed. I posted mine after getting a photo online using a company (it was only a renew of my photo), then sent it by recorded form the little post office locally. I have tried MP and the Police, and the DVLA lots of times. I have my receipt of posting and pictures of all the paperwork/driving license.

TooManyPoints

Dinghy said:

As an update to this ,

I have spoken to police about this issue , If you send your licence away and it is not back in your possession by the expiry date on your old  licence you are committing an offence by driving !  

Which demonstrates clearly that you should never take legal advice from a police officer.

The officer concerned needs to acquaint himself with Section 88 of the Road Traffic Act. This says, essentially, (subject to a few exceptions which do not apply here) that provided a licence application has been received by the Secretary of State (i.e. the DVLA) the applicant may continue to drive beyond the expiry date of his current licence. The Section can be read in full here:

http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1988/52/section/88

It's a bit involved so here's the relevant passages:

Notwithstanding section 87 of this Act [which says you must have a driving licence in order to drive], a person may drive or cause or permit another person to drive a vehicle of any class at any time if—

(a)the driver has held—

(i)a licence under this Part of this Act to drive vehicles of that or a corresponding class,...

and

(i)a qualifying application by the driver for the grant of a licence to drive vehicles of that class for a period which includes that time has been received by the Secretary of State,...

Sending an application by recorded delivery and having advice of its receipt should be sufficient to be confident that the application has been received. This does not, of course, overcome some of the other problems, such as getting a suitable photo. But police officers should not dish out advice which is outside their competence.

born_again

Dinghy said:

Hi thanks , that's good advice.

I have just done that , as no reminder has been sent, we took the D1 form and a  suitable photo to the PO , but the guy in  there said he could do it all electronically ,  To be honest I thought that meant doing it online yourself but we couldn't because we have no passport and I thought you still had to send the D1 form off and wait for the new card, but times have moved on it seems ,  He did the photos and  the rest  and  said to produce the receipt he gave her if stopped by the law .

Great.
Just got mine in the post today.

Hexham2018

applied for mine online as a replacement for A misplaced licence , they accepted all my details including my photo passport , and payment of 60 quid , 4 weeks later they sent money back no explanation nothing They won’t entertain any1 unless they are frontline workers . And still no licence . 12 weeks later can’t work , can’t get any job for driving , no income . They ask if your frontline u can’t even get a front line job with no Licence .