A part-time coach driver has complained about an ongoing 10-month wait for a licence renewal from DVLA which is leaving him unable to work.
The 78-year-old from the Motherwell area, whose name is withheld, applied in November 2023. Although he was able to work under Section 88 of the Road Traffic Act since his licence expired in February, his Driver CPC expired earlier this month, and he cannot do more training without a licence.
He says he has made several calls to DVLA to try to expedite the case, which has been complicated due to medical issues.
He tells routeone that he can appreciate the need for the agency to investigate his health situation, saying: “I would understand if I lost my licence because you need to consider the public, and I’m doing 60mph down the road. But I don’t understand why it takes 10 months. DVLA can’t tell me whether I can drive or not.”
Although DVLA cannot publicly comment on individual cases, it says: “When considering an application to issue a driving licence, DVLA aims to make a decision as quickly as possible. The time taken to make a licensing decision can depend on the nature of a medical condition.
“This can mean that more complex applications are likely to take longer to process and, where we require additional information from a medical professional or from the driver themselves, we are wholly reliant on receiving this information before a decision can be made.”
DVLA points out that, in the 2023-24 financial year, it made licensing decisions on 84,000 cases within just one day of receipt, and on 240,000 cases within 20 working days.
