UK Photocard Licence

Photocard Driving Licence 10 Year Update

When does yours run out?

All UK photocard driving licences need to be updated every 10 years.

 

The photograph on the licence is only valid for 10 years, therefore the driving licence and photo needs to be updated accordingly. Drivers will not need to retake a driving test but will of course need to submit a new photo of how they currently look.

 

This started to happen in July 2008, with the DVLA starting to issue reminders in May 2008. The holder must renew their licence before their current photo expires. Renewal is necessary to avoid a £1000 fine. The licence expiry date can be found in the section marked 4b on the front of the photocard.

 

The paper part of the licence however does not contain an expiry until the holders 70th Birthday.

 

Businesses will need to review licence holders who drive for work as employees with an out of date licence could affect vehicle insurance and therefore the entitlement to drive legally. All businesses that have employees driving for work should have a record of all drivers’ licences and expiry dates, which should be updated at least annually, or every six months for any driver that is getting near the limit for a ban.

 

It now appears that there will be a charge of £17.50 for the update, this will affect some 300,000 motorists between July 2008 and April 2009. Photocard licences replaced the traditional paper licences, which do not have to be renewed until the holders 70th birthday.

 

However a DVLA spokesperson has said that a motorist's entitlement to drive will not be affected by failure to update the photo on the licence but it will invalidate their insurance. This is because with an out of date licence their entitlement to drive legally has ended, invalidating their car insurance, beware!!

 

 

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	Check Licences

Driver Licence Checking Service

Driver Licence Checking is essential in helping you or your company meet 'duty of care' obligations under HSE (Health and Safety Executive) regulations.

 

Being able to verify that drivers hold valid and current licences for the vehicles they are driving. 

 

No longer is it enough to just look at licences or take a photo copy, as there are a number of easy ways to fake or hide the information displayed on the licence.

 

Data generated by licence checks can also be used to identify 'higher risk' drivers.

 

 

Driven Ltd Driver licence checking service helps you:

• Obtain the correct and current information held by the DVLA
• Find Employees who are unlicenced or only provisionally licenced
• Identify 'higher risk' drivers, and therefore reduce accident rates
• Save time by letting us collate all the information for you
• We send you regular updates
• More information about Driver Licence Checking

 10 Things you should be doing if you run a fleet of vehicles

 

 

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Unwitting motorists face £1,000 fines as thousands of photo card driving licences expire!

Thousands of motorists are at risk of being fined up to £1,000 because they are unwittingly driving without a valid licence.

They risk prosecution after failing to spot the extremely small print on their photo card licence which says it automatically expires after 10 years and has to be renewed - even though drivers are licensed to drive until the age of 70.

The fiasco has come to light a decade after the first batch of photo licences were issued in July 1998, just as they start to expire. Motoring organisations blamed the Government for the fiasco and said 'most' drivers believed their licences were for life.
   
A driving licence from 1998 when the photo cards were launched shows the imminent expiry date as item '4b'

They said officials had failed to publicise sufficiently the fact that new-style licences

- unlike the old paper ones - expire after a set period and have to be renewed.

To rub salt into wounds, drivers will have to a pay £17.50 to renew their card - a charge which critics have condemned as a 'stealth tax' and which will earn the Treasury an estimated £437million over 25 years.

 

Official DVLA figures reveal that while 16,136 expired this summer, so far only 11,566 drivers have renewed, leaving 4,570 outstanding. With another 300,000 photo card licences due to expire over the coming year, experts fear the number of invalid licences will soar, putting thousands more drivers in breach of the law and at risk of a fine.

 

At the heart of the confusion is the small print on the tiny credit-card-size photo licence, which is used in conjunction with the paper version. Just below the driver name on the front of the photo card licence is a series of dates and details - each one numbered. Number 4b features a date in tiny writing, but no explicit explanation as to what it means. The date's significance is only explained if the driver turns over the card and reads the key on the back, which states that ‘4b’, means 'licence valid to'. Even more confusingly, an adjacent table on the rear of the card sets out how long the driver is registered to hold a licence - that is until his or her 70th birthday.

A total of 25million new-style licences have been issued but - motoring experts say - drivers were never sufficiently warned they would expire after 10 years.
Motorists who fail to renew their licences in time are allowed to continue driving. But the DVLA says they could be charged with 'failing to surrender their licence', an offence carrying a £1,000 fine.

AA president, Edmund King said: 'It is not generally known that photo card licences expire: there appears to be a lack of information that people will have to renew these licences. 'People think they have already paid them for once over and that is it. 'It will come as a surprise to motorists and a shock that they have to pay an extra £17.50.' The AA called on the Government to use the annual £450million from traffic enforcement fines to offset the renewal charge.
Before photo card licences were introduced, old-style paper licences were valid until the age of 70. 'Many motorists still believe this to be the case with the new ones.'

A Driving instructor questioned, said: 'It's outrageous; everybody thinks their driving licence is for life. 'Why - when you have already paid £50 for your photo card licence - should you pay the Government an extra £17.50 every 10 years?
'It's another stealth tax. Drivers will be very annoyed.'

The DVLA said the date of expiry was carried on the new-style licences, even though the AA says this is 'not clear'.

The Agency was unable to say whether motorists were told the licences would expire when they were first issued. It said it was issuing postal reminders to drivers whose photograph was due to expire, to get the renewal message across. But a spokesman admitted this was the limit of the DVLA's publicity.

A DVLA spokesman said: 'Previous experience has shown that wide-scale publicity is less effective and can generate enquiries and concerns from those not affected. Instead, DVLA focussed on targeted publicity to ensure that we got the message to the right person at the right time.'

The Driving Standards Agency is allowing L-test candidates with out-of-date photo card licences to sit their driving tests as long as they provide a valid passport. This concession will end in January 2009, raising the prospect that some L-test candidates will be turned away.

The DVLA said no one had so far been charged with failing to surrender a licence.

 

 

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FIVE YEARS ON FROM INTRODUCTION OF MOBILE PHONE LAW, BUT LIVES STILL LOST!

The Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents is reminding motorists about the risks of making a call or texting at the wheel five years after it became illegal to use a hand-held mobile phone while driving.

 

A new law introduced in Britain on December 1, 2003, banned the use of hand-held phones while driving and also made it an offence to cause or permit another person to do so.

 

But casualty figures show that people are still being needlessly killed and injured in phone-related crashes.

 

There were 25 fatal accidents, 64 serious accidents and 259 slight accidents on Britain's roads last year in which a driver using a mobile phone was recorded as a contributory factor, although these figures could underestimate the true extent of the problem.

 

Kevin Clinton, RoSPA head of road safety, said: "RoSPA led the campaign to ban the use of mobile phones by drivers and as we reach the law's fifth anniversary, it is important that people do not forget the clear road safety reasons behind it.

 

"Research has shown that using a mobile phone at the wheel - whether hand-held or hands-free - makes you four times more likely to crash. This is because of the distraction of the telephone conversation, which can cause drivers to tailgate, weave about on the road and vary their speed. While the law specifically covers hand-held mobiles, research such as this means it is wrong to suggest that using a hands-free device is safe.

 

"Police are able to check telephone records when gathering evidence in careless driving and dangerous driving cases and use them to show that someone was distracted. This can lead to tougher sentences because using a mobile phone of any kind while driving is likely to be viewed as an 'aggravating circumstance'."

 

Observational research has revealed a reduction in the number of motorists using mobile phones since 2003, including a fall after harsher penalties for breaking the law were introduced last year.

 

But Kevin Clinton said: "It is disappointing that people are still being killed and injured on our roads because telephone calls or text messages are deemed more important than someone's life. Our advice to drivers is clear: switch off your phone when you get behind the wheel and let voicemail do its job, and we urge employers to make this part of their road risk policy."

 

Drivers caught using a hand-held mobile phone at the wheel face a £60 fine and three penalty points on their licence.