Jan 10, 2021

your driver's license is yours!

Minister of Transportation Miri Regev announced today that she is changing policy and from now on, actually from October 1, 2021, all new driver's licenses to be given out will no longer need to be renewed every 10 years but will be valid until the age of 70. From 70to 80 the license will need to be renewed every 5 years and from 80 every two years.
source: Kipa

The cost of the license until 70 will be 510nis, which will save drivers a lot of money, as much as 1500nis when compared to the cost today of renewing your license every ten years. 

Obviously the older you are when this goes into effect the less you will save, and if you have to renew your license at age 63 or 67 and have to pay 510nis for a license good for just a few years that seems unreasonable, but for most people it will be big savings. 

Maybe they will, or should, prorate it depending on your age at the time of the last renewal when this goes into effect.

It never made sense to me to have to renew your license every ten years. Seems like a money-making scheme. If you get too many tickets or violations, they can revoke the license anyway, send you to refresher courses, charge fines, etc. Once you get the license, it should be yours to lose. If somewhere along the way any major rules of the road undergo massive changes, they can require everyone relevant to take a refresher course, if necessary.






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2 comments:

  1. Rafi - I can think of two reasons for everyone to need to renew a driver's license regularly. The first is the vision check - it is very common for someone's vision to change over time, and it is important to check if a driver's vision is still good enough to drive, or if there's an need for corrective lenses/a changed perscription. Given how the change is gradual, it is very likely that the driver himself does not reaize the need for the change unless tested.

    The second reason is the picture. A driver's license can be used as ID (I know, less so in Israel where a Teudat Zehut is more commonly used), and people change over time, to the point where they're no longer recognizable. While some states allow a picture to continue to be used even decades after it was taken, some require new pictures every X cycles for this reason - and I think Israel requires a new picture each renewal.

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    1. funny story this reminded me of. After one of our children was born, we got the kid a US certificate of birth abroad with a passport. 3 or 4 years later the kid looks like a kid now and not a baby, and the airline security was upset with the picture of a baby in the passport that looks nothing like the child in front of them. They told us to replace the passport and update it with a new picture). All we could say was that it is not our fault they give a new baby a passport for 5 year. they know the baby isnt going to look the same for the entire five years.

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