Choose a side: Vinted v disabled users

Won’t work, Vinted are big enough not to care. I have a blue badge and even though it has (a rather awful) photo of me on the reverse it is not an acceptable form of ID. Unfortunately these days most people will eventually need some form of photo identification

Most jobs require Photo ID even out of date. I qorked in the NHS for years and you needed 1 photo ID. passport / driving license. Even out of date. So not Vinted ate not being unfair. If it is in T&C then she had time to read and be made aware.

The Uk used to have a “citizens card” but a lot of places wouldn’t accept it even though it had a photo on. I had one and it was useless and I still had to get a passport

I’m on disability too and quite honestly was fed up of banks etc needing photo ID I had to suck up paying for a passport even though I’ll never go away on holiday. It’s disgraceful but blame the scammers that make it so normal people won’t be trusted either. Your NDN will need photo ID at some point anyway as more and more places only accept passport/ driving licenses as ID. A lot of places insist on it even for piercings or tattoos! I also couldn’t get away with a provisional driving licence to save money due to my disability. Hope it gets sorted but I don’t think there’s any other option but to spend the £100 or loose the £300.

The bit you copied and pasted doesn't say "this is what you need to apply online but you can apply without a passport via a paper form" It

So your post implies that you have to have a passport.

The UK needs a national ID card system. Most European countries have such a system now (not something you have to carry about all day, just something to keep in a drawer at home until you need it) and it works fine.

You’ve quoted only part of what I wrote in my post. The bit you’ve missed out, the relevant part, is where I’ve copied the text from the online application page, and the need for a passport is quite clearly listed there.

But you knew that, didn’t you?

I'm failing to see the discrimination, tbh. She CAN apply for the passport. She is fully ABLE TO. She just DOESN'T WANT TO. As someone said upthread being poor is not a protected characteristic. Just as equally an able bodied, fully healthy single mother with a few kids and on minimum wage who never travels anywhere couldn't afford the passport. And would be asked by Vinted to provide it just the same. Or a 'single parent' is also a protected characteristic now?

Not the point, but I first heard about passport-less adults upon coming to the UK. I was gobsmacked, tbh, never even knew such a phenomenon existed. I'm from an economically disadvantaged EU country and absolutely everyone from 16 years old onward, disabled or dying, has to have a passport. No exceptions, no discounts. It's the law. You will need it everywhere and will be asked to provide it. No faffing with birth cert and various docs, it's the passport or nothing. You won't be able to access medical care, open a bank acc, rent/buy your place, get a job, register for voting, register your child to daycare/school, deal with the utilities companies, etc etc etc without a passport. Children younger than 16 need passport only when traveling.

It costs 50eu if you're willing to wait a month and a 100eu/5 days. Minimum wage is lower than the UK by a lot and there are no benefits/dole. Instead of faffing, arguing the toss, creating problems where there are none, seeing discrimination around every corner...people just go and get the passport made. Seems pretty simple to me. Never even occurred to me that getting a passport is SUCH a massive trouble..

This. Neither law nor regulation specifies that the only ID you can use to verify customers is a driving license or passport. By having such unnecessarily restrictive ID requirements they are not ensuring good customer outcomes or considering they are meeting the needs of vulnerable customers who may struggle to get ID.

A passport is for travelling, eh?

I've needed it to marry, to divorce, to buy a house, to open a bank account, to rent a flat, to apply for benefits, to get access to professional exams, to get a DBS check, to go through some sort of electronic government check where you scan your passport with your phone (forgot what it was for), I've needed it when I started new employment, it can be used to vote, travel abroad, buy age restricted items, gain access to age restricted venues... And clearly a passport can be used to withdraw larger sums from Vinted.

I've had my new passport actively in use since 2020 and it will travel for the first time this year. "Travel document" - lol!

I wasn't talking about the link. Your actual words were

So quite apart from the fact that the NDN cannot legally drive due to her disability, in order to make a falsified application for a provisional licence to circumvent the need for purchasing a more expensive passport, she first needs… a passport!!

She does NOT need a passport like you said. She just can't apply online for the provisional.

There have been a number of attempts to introduce a national ID card over the years by various iterations of government.

Each time it has failed.

Usually the press report the proposal and some idiot campaigner declares that this is an assault on our human rights / we haven’t had ID cards since WW2 / it discriminates against (insert random cohort who likely would not be negatively impacted by this at all) / it’s the start of a social credit score / the government will use them to track your movements / you’ll be digitally recorded every time you buy alcohol / the police will use ID cards to restrict your movements / we just don’t do that sort of thing in this country.

Public pressure then makes the government cave in and the proposal is quietly dropped.

So don’t blame the government, blame the (largely) middle class electorate who bafflingly consider ID cards to be an assault on our freedoms whilst at the same time being perfectly happy to own a biometric passport. They’re not the ones who are affected by this lack of national ID, because they can afford one. The disabled are overrepresented in the cohort of poor people and they are the ones who may be unable to obtain a driving licence so are either forced to pay for a passport or are denied access to many things in society the rest of us take for granted.

The link in my post contains this:

If you do not have a UK passport or a share code
You’ll need to send an identity document by post to prove your identity.

So I thought it was obvious.

But then again, people would have to actually bother to read it, wouldn’t they? Much easier to just pretend they’ve read something or make up their own interpretation based on misunderstanding what they’re looking at.

Case in point - the need to declare corrective eyesight measures to meet the minimum driving standard of eyesight on a first application for a driving licence.

A number of posters were adamant this wasn’t true despite it being written in quite large print on the DVLA application page and one even linked to the information for people who already hold a driving licence! 😂

The case should really be against the UK government for not having cheaper passports or free national ID, unlike other countries.

That’s what I would have thought. If anyone’s at fault here, surely it’s the UK government for charging nearly £100 for a passport and not offering a cheaper option? Vinted didn’t come up with that price, neither did Mangopay.

I am on UC (unable to work) and on a fucking pittance.
The price for me to apply for a passport would be a massive chunk for me too... but I would not see that as being discriminatory.

Sorry, I still feel it is discrimination to ask someone with lower earnings potential than the rest of us (check disability employment rates etc) to pay quite a substantial sum for a passport they are unlikely to use for its intended purpose.

I realise this isn't actually the strongest legal argument out there which is why I suggest linking with a disability organisation. In the meantime, the question about reasonable adjustments remains...

@Tarquina when was this? When I applied for my first adult passport I didn't have to attend in person, it was all done by post. Although granted that was in the early 00s so things may well have changed since then.

Your original post on this matter didn't mention anything about that being to apply online. It read as if you need a passport to get a driving licence by any means.

It may be true that she can't apply for a provisional driving license if she is not allowed to drive..
But she can still apply for a passport.

Exactly ! Vinted have to change their policy so that it is not discriminatory. Your NDN is being treated unfairly because of something arising out of her disability...ie because of her disability she cannot get a driving licence and cannot travel.
Your NDN needs to make firm representations to Vinted. See if she can get some free advice

I posted the documents required to apply online. I copied the list of acceptable documents from the online application page.

If the applicant doesn’t have a passport they cannot apply online.

Do you understand now?

But why should she have to? The bank is discriminating against her!

Vinted are being arses. My argument to them would be as follows, and I would try to engage disability rights organisations to support this.

The law of this country is specific. It is illegal to discriminate against people on the basis of disability. You, Vinted, are requiring disabled people to produce one of two specific documents which they are far less likely to have, or to have access to, then are the general public.

A disabled person may not have any right to a driving licence. They are far less likely to travel abroad than is an abled person. This requirement is thus indirect discrimination.

In addition to this fact, businesses are legally required to make reasonable adaptation to their business practices to ensure that those with protected characteristics are not subject to discrimination. This is a clear case where those with disabilities have significant problems in complying with a policy which is not applied in other countries . What are V doing to make the required accommodations?

It absolutely has something to do with her disability. A service shouldn't have procedures that disadvantage someone because of their disability.
An able bodied person would have the option to use a driving license as ID. A person who is medically unfit, does not have that option and by expecting them to have to buy a more expensive form of ID, you are placing them at a financial disadvantage. Hence discrimination.
I can't understand how people can't see this.