Driver's licence saga - RESOLUTION

I finally have it!

Having fought with seemingly every government department in Gauteng Province, and beaten my head on just about every bureaucratic wall to be seen – and some even unseen – I have my temporary drivers licence in my grubby little mitt!!!

And to top that, my credit card style drivers licence will be available for collection in the mythical “6 to 8 weeks”.

This little piece of information makes no difference to me being able to drive in South Africa – but it does mean that my car finance has finally been fully completed and that I can now buy the car I have been wanting…

The process has been long and painful and frustrating, but somewhere hidden in the miles of red tape, there is a process to follow… I will give full detail of the requirements and the process, as to be honest, I have not been able to find a decent set of instructions for this myself – so I may as well make one up and share it with everyone.

But that will have to wait for another day.

Right now I am busy dancing on the ceiling, temporary driver licence in hand…

Drivers licence irony

If you have been following recent posts to this blog, you will be aware that I am having a huge bureaucratic problem trying to finalise financing for a new car, all centred around a South African drivers licence.

In summary, it appears that credit legislation requires me to have a valid South African drivers licence, in the correct credit card format, before any financing can be approved.

You can imagine then how my heart leapt into my throat this morning, when a traffic officer pulled me off the road in a routine check and asked me for my drivers licence. I greeted him politely and casually gave him my UK drivers licence, which I have been using for the last 6 years in England, and last 6 weeks in South Africa. Having checked it over, and checked that I had a valid tax disk on my car, the officer returned my licence and allowed me on my way without further query…

Strange, I thought, how I can drive a vehicle – a large hunk of metal capable of killing and maiming, with my UK drivers licence – but without a South African drivers licence, I cannot purchase one.

I am not sure that the alternatives I am thinking of are printable here….

Caught in Red Tape

You just knew that things were going FAR too well....

I have finally been caught up in bureaucratic red tape.
It would appear that the application for finance for my new car with one bank has been rejected, because I have a UK driving licence, and not a South African driving licence.

This is odd, as I have held a driving licence for half my life, and only held a UK licence for the last 6 years. To my mind I can drive crap using any country;s driving licence...

Apparently though in order for this particular application to be considered, I need to be in the process of applying for a driving licence. A process which requires me to jump through hoops backwards - and blind folded.... Oh yes - I am terribly happy about the situation...

It would seem however that this is just one application with one bank, and apparently another bank may not take such a dim view of me and my foreign driving licence. (I should add that the UK and South Africa drive on the same side of the road... South Africans just tend to use the hard shoulder for over taking purposes)

So it's "watch this space" I guess.

I wonder what licence I need to buy a horse?