Whenever I return a hire car, I refill to the brim as close as I can to the drop-off point, and take a photo that includes the receipt, fuel gauge and mileage. If the return depot is open I insist that they photocopy the receipt and include it in the dossier.
I also take photos of all aspects of the vehicle, before and after the hire, ever since a colleague was billed about 1500€ for (to my mind) superficial damage that existed when they collected the car - scuffs to front and rear bumpers and wheels…
Not sure this is correct?
A penalty notice is issued against the registered owner of the car not the person hiring it. When you hire the car you sign to agree that you will pay any fines incurred. The hire company pay the fine and deduct it from your credit card details you have to provide as part of the hire contract.
I pi led up a parking fine about 4 years ago while in a hire car in the UK and the first I knew of it was advice from the hire company and a bill for £110.
The annoying thing was that the hire company had already paid the fine in double quick time at a discount but charged me the full amount. I challenged it but it was all in the contract. A win win for the hire company.
Yes that’s tbe problem with hire cars. You basically lose the right to protest and the fine increases whether they paid it incorrectly as yours was, or whether the process of the hire company providing your licence details to whoever wants to fine you and notice of fine eventually appearing takes 3-5 months.
I have been, for over 20! It is completely unimaginable to the French authorities that a French person might have a UK driving licence so I have never been able to change it for a French one, at least without more faffing about than I am personally prepared to countenance.
I have a strong feeling that once the current ‘urgent’ backlog clears, of people whose licences have already expired etc., in 2 or 3 years we may well be told UK licences that have more than 6 months validity left, will then be accepted to be swapped for French ones.
The recently announced rules heavily restricting new applications for swaps are just for triage of those urgent cases and then for capacity management I am sure and I suspect will be revised in due course when there is capacity.
…all set i hope, …D737 ordered (must be this form) from DVLA (rang every 30 minutes for two days before getting through) and fast track birth certificate (£37.50) from North Lincolnshire registrars.
So the big unknown is if and when I will hear from ANTS about my application which was made in December, it has a reference number and is at under investigation. My uk licence expires in mid August.
Has anybody in a similar situation to me been contacted by ANTS yet? Any one know more, or of progress on expired or soon to expire licences?
Interesting topic, our daughter bought a house in the UK and the previous tenant of a caravan in the garden had registered his driving licence to that address. He is now a lorry driver in France and keeps getting speeding fines.
Thé transport company that he drives for send the fines to his driving licence address, so our daughter keeps getting them. She contacted the DVLA and they will not change or block the address, he has to change it.
The fines keep going up and they are now threatening to take him to court, my daughter was worried that they might hand this over to a debt collection agency. So we have contacted the French lorry firm, the French fines agency and UK DVLA and told them all that this is not our problem and they should deal with it and it does seem to have gone away hopefully, (xxxxx)
We are living in France and sent off for French licences in March 2109 And in July 2020 got all our paperwork back saying it was not necessary.
It all worked so much better when the local Prefectures handled it…
In the last week the facebook group has had a steady stream of happy people getting to the “completion” stage, having licences that were already expired. So perhaps already expired licemces are being treated first and they’ll get to you soon.
No, much more active. That people are being contacted by ANTS and asked for the CoE, or their UK licence, and getting the attestation to drive again - that sort of thing. Varies I guess according to individual details but seems to indicate bright lights at the end of the tunnel.
@JaneJones …is there any information on whether this Attestation will be valid to drive in the UK for drivers whose UK licence has expired…and are waiting for the actual arrival of their plastic French one?
