Car seized by police- odd one

1jim

Hi all
19 year old daughter has had her car seized by police today coming home from night shift after she got stuck in a ditch (shes ok)

police have seized car as the dvla has her as a provision license holder

She passed her test a year ago but has yet to exchange her provisional license for a full one (needed it as ID initially)- she has her pass certificate and this page says she can use this as evidence as having passed test for up to 2 years https://www.gov.uk/apply-for-your-full-driving-licence

she has full insurance including business use (she is student nurse doing placements so this was needed), the police are not taking any action re accident . they accept she can legally drive and that has full insurance, mot etc etc and are not taking any action against her for anything.....
however they have still seized the car- they have asked that she produce a full license in 7 days .... she has contacted dvla and they have advised would take much longer than this time frame

any thoughts? she will obviously need to exchange her license re this, but wont be able to produce what they have asked for in the time frame and I guess she will incur storage fees too, she also needs car for placement in hospital for the next 2 weeks

Im hoping she can go to police station and produce everything she has and show the link which explains she can legally drive with the pass certificate and they will then release the car. Police officer was really lovely but his sergeant had instructed him to do this so this set wheels in motion

any thoughts on this? thanks

Baldytyke88

For what ever reason, your daughter should have chased this up, not just waited a year.

1jim

Baldytyke88 said:

For what ever reason, your daughter should have chased this up, not just waited a year.

helpful insight- the law allows 2 years though as per the link and it is well within that time frame

Arunmor

Looks like a glitch in the system from your link it should be posted out automatically.  Who else is insured to drive the car?  Yourself?  Can you not go and get it?

1jim

Arunmor said:

Looks like a glitch in the system from your link it should be posted out automatically.  Who else is insured to drive the car?  Yourself?  Can you not go and get it?

Im exploring that now, Im insured on her insurance as named driver and also can drive other cars in my insurance

certainly seems to be some kind of glitch- as they wont accept her as provisional driver (L plates, accompanying driver etc) as they accept she has passed her test. it seems that they want her to produce full licence at police station before they will release car

DullGreyGuy

Arunmor said:

Looks like a glitch in the system from your link it should be posted out automatically.  Who else is insured to drive the car?  Yourself?  Can you not go and get it?

No, it's only automatically sent if you surrender your provisional photo licence to the examiner. The OP stated that she needed it as ID so didnt surrender it and so didnt automatically get the full one. 

1jim said:

police have seized car as the dvla has her as a provision license holder

If it's seized, rather than being impounded for being in an accident, then she will have been given a seizer notice with instructions of what to do. She won't be able to get a driving licence updated in time so will need to go with whatever she has already to where the notice instructs at the earliest opportunity. Seized cars are considered surrendered 7-14 days after the notice so if she wants it back she needs to act with urgency

1jim

DullGreyGuy said:

1jim said:

police have seized car as the dvla has her as a provision license holder

If it's seized, rather than being impounded for being in an accident, then she will have been given a seizer notice with instructions of what to do. She won't be able to get a driving licence updated in time so will need to go with whatever she has already to where the notice instructs at the earliest opportunity. Seized cars are considered surrendered 7-14 days after the notice so if she wants it back she needs to act with urgency

she was given a producer but the police told her they were seizing it under road traffic act

she is off to police station now, with her provisional licence, her pass certificate, mot, log book, passport for ID, and certificate of insurance. She also has the link from gov.uk website advising has 2 years to exchange the provisional for full and that the pass certificate can be used as evidence has passed (which to be fair to the officer at the scene- he was happy with). So fingers crossed can be resolved quickly as she has already had to cancel her night shift tonight.

TooManyPoints

"Looks like a glitch in the system from your link it should be posted out automatically."

Not if she did not submit her provisional licence to the examiner it won't (and it seems she didn't).

Seems possible her car was seized unlawfully. The police must have reasonable grounds "...for believing that a motor vehicle is or was being driven by the person in contravention of section 87(1)."

Section 87(1) says:

"It is an offence for a person to drive on a road a motor vehicle of any class otherwise than in accordance with a licence authorising him to drive a motor vehicle of that class."

She has the "entitlement to drive". That is provided by her passing the test and she has evidence of that courtesy of her pass certificate. She simply doesn't have the physical licence which proves it. 

Provided the Government's page you have cited is correct (I haven't checked) and she can use the pass certificate for up to two years, I believe the police had no reasonable grounds to seize her car. She had her pass certificate and a record of her pass must be held with the DVLA (or they would not grant her a full licence when she applied). If the police were correct, it would mean that any driver driving home from the test centre having just passed his test would be liable to have his car seized. He would obviously not be in possession of a full licence and the DVLA's records would be unlikely to have been updated with his pass. That would clearly be a nonsense.

Mildly_Miffed

At the roadside, did she produce her pass certificate?

Because if she produced just a provisional - or they checked the licence online - then that will not show she passed the test. THAT's why they've given her a producer, and want to see either a full or a prov+pass which they'll count as a full. It's also why they seized the car, because she couldn't prove she was driving it in accordance with a valid full licence.

Whether it's still valid or not is a bit of a moot point - it's daft NOT to get the DVLA record updated at the earliest possibly opportunity. Right now, that one piece of paper is the proof that she passed. If that gets lost, or if her failure to get round to it continues, then she's going to have to retake her test.

400ixl

Also check that her insurance covers her for recovering the vehicle from a police impound. Bizzarly some don't and they may well check, so could save some headache you won't want at the time.

1jim

TooManyPoints said:

"Looks like a glitch in the system from your link it should be posted out automatically."

Not if she did not submit her provisional licence to the examiner it won't (and it seems she didn't).

Seems possible her car was seized unlawfully. The police must have reasonable grounds "...for believing that a motor vehicle is or was being driven by the person in contravention of section 87(1)."

Section 87(1) says:

"It is an offence for a person to drive on a road a motor vehicle of any class otherwise than in accordance with a licence authorising him to drive a motor vehicle of that class."

She has the "entitlement to drive". That is provided by her passing the test and she has evidence of that courtesy of her pass certificate. She simply doesn't have the physical licence which proves it. 

Provided the Government's page you have cited is correct (I haven't checked) and she can use the pass certificate for up to two years, I believe the police had no reasonable grounds to seize her car. She had her pass certificate and a record of her pass must be held with the DVLA (or they would not grant her a full licence when she applied). If the police were correct, it would mean that any driver driving home from the test centre having just passed his test would be liable to have his car seized. He would obviously not be in possession of a full licence and the DVLA's records would be unlikely to have been updated with his pass. That would clearly be a nonsense.

thank you, this sums it up pretty much.
the police officer on the scene was happy she had entitlement to drive and had seen evidence to this and reassured her that she was not being considered for any points on license.  It sounds like the sergeant (not at the scene) had advised that must be seized until she could produce a full license.  Will update after she has finished at the station