Driving in the Netherlands

[lagartija]

I live in Spain.
I will be on holiday in the Netherlands next month and will be hiring a car.
I have a UK driving license (photocard one)
I will be travelling on my UK passport.
Will I be OK to drive on my UK driving license even though I don't live in the UK and I'm flying in from Spain?

I don't know about driving in the Netherlands but usually EU countries have rules about exchanging driving licences when you move countries. In Belgium, you have to exchange an EU licence for a Belgian one within a time-frame (don't ask me what it is), so when my UK licence was due for renewal, I exchanged it for a Belgian one. If I were stopped by the Police and had a UK licence here and also residency here, I'm sure they'd be fining me for not exchanging my licence. But if you are stopped in the Netherlands by Police, surely it's easier just to hand over your UK licence - the only problem comes when they ask you for your address and it has a UK address on it and in reality you don't live there.

yes, if you are on holiday.

no bother at all.

UK driving license fine and dandy.

as nat says, different rules if you are moving there permanently.

check with car hire place about their insurance regs though, sometimes the hire car factor can be the pisser. they will know regs wrt age etc. should be on the website. unless it's just a local one, the big multinationals are pretty straightforward.

Just to add, if it's regulations you don't need to exchange your licence in Spain when you reside there and have a UK licence, then it should surely be acceptable to travel to another EU country on a UK licence. I would be in trouble if I used a UK licence in the Netherlands (and Belgium) because I live in Belgium.

yy, but the netherlands won't care about the spanish regulations. they'll be happy with a uk license.

the police there are also well used to stopping british military on uk licenses in germany, belgium, france and the netherlands, so most of them to get to see quite a lot of uk licenses routinely. it's a well boring drive when you do it every weekend...

Yes.

In fact I drive on my old UK paper one... and it's in Welsh. I use it as my "get out of jail free card" as it never fails to confuse the police/border police. :)

natation - I got stopped a few times in Belgium over the years with my UK license, nobody said a dickybird - I always just played the dumb tourist!

Yes if you pretend you're a tourist and they accept it in Belgium, fine. If they decide to run your name through the national database and find you on there as a resident, then they can come down hard on you. Looks even worse if you are driving a UK registered car. My husband officially resided in Belgium and the UK and worked in the UK (and Belgium and France) and Belgian Customs still insisted that we re-register our car, thankfully when I got stopped, I was driving on a Belgian licence so we didn't get done for that too.

I kept my uk licence for years and years!

Oh dear, guess this is something else I'd better look into? We're both driving on our UK licenses. Anyone know what the timeframe is? We've been resident less than 9 months in Belgium.

brussels.angloinfo.com/countries/belgium/exlicence.asp

Says here it's ok?

"People with EU-issued driver's licences who take up residence in Belgium are not required to exchange it for a Belgian licence...

...If a driving infraction occurs, Belgium may require the holder to obtain a new licence. An exchange becomes compulsory if the licence holder commits a driving offence - this is so that points can be subtracted."

I think the Belgian Police are not as interested though in what country your driving licence is issued by, as there is no financial gain to Belgium. But if you've got a British licence and it's a photo one, they are only valid for 10 years. I thinks there might be harmonisation in the EU that at a certain date everyone must have a photo licence which has expiry date for renewal of the photo (just like a passport). So if you've got a UK licence and it is expiring and you live in Belgium, you definitely have to take a Belgian one - and of course hubby instead renewed his UK licence rather than having anything Belgian in his pocket understand the sentiment so he just ignored the obligation to change to a Belgian licence, well he does work in the UK still and is officially resident there too. Driving around with British plates on your car is another thing altogether - get caught and you do risk a massive fines, especially if Customs can prove you've been doing it for years. I do know people here 10+ years who have got away with it with a British car on British insurance (which may even have been invalid due the car being in Belgium 365 days a year).

Is there a problem with dvlc, though, as I would have thought that you need an up to date address on the licence? You cannot have a non-UK address on one, however, although there are probably exceptions for bfpo's etc.

We changed our licences after about a year out of the UK.

If you're visiting short term and renting a car, then your UK licence will be no problem.

I exchanged my UK licence for a Dutch one when I'd lived here for about 4 months. I was told that as I was living in the Netherlands I had a certain period of time before I had to exchange it.

But have just checked the rijksoverheid website and it says that if you become a resident of NL and have an EU licence you can drive on it for a maximum of 10 years from the issue date. If your licence is older than 9 years, you can drive on it for a maximum of one year, calculated from the date you register with your local town hall.

Dutch link....

www.rijksoverheid.nl/onderwerpen/rijbewijs/vraag-en-antwoord/mag-ik-met-mijn-buitenlandse-rijbewijs-in-nederland-aan-het-verkeer-deelnemen.html

Guess they must have changed the rules. When I first moved here I had a Spanish acquaintance who was fined for driving on her Spanish licence for 5 years.