Hi all!
I am an incoming ALT from Australia and just this last month I managed to get my licence (Green P’s from an L plate).
I’m intending on staying more than a year and so will eventually need a Japanese licence to drive after my International Driving Permit expires.
I’m aware that to smoothly transfer your home country licence to a Japanese licence one of the conditions is that you need to prove that your licence was issued for at least three months before coming to Japan. As I just got my licence a month ago I cannot do this..
Does anyone have a similar experience to me? What kind of process did you ultimately have to go through?
I’ve looked everywhere and I haven’t found a solid answer and just want to know what to expect. 😬
Thank you in advance!
6 comments
The only answer is you will either have to go to Australia on a vacation for a 3 month period or go to Japanese driving school. Call your local licensing center to double check though. They have a booklet they will use to check the requirements.
Count the day you got your license to the day you leave. Then if you can afford to take vacations back to your home country to fill out the remaining time to three months you can do it. It doesn’t have to be a consecutive three months. If not, you cannot transfer your license to a Japanese one and have to start the process from scratch here.
Also, it might be worth it to plan on living without a car from the beginning. You may be living in a place that sucks to live without a car, but if you’re familiar with the bus and train system from day 1 it might not be as hard as you think.
Did you have a license before and were renewing it prior to departure? That would be solvable.
Or you can go to Japanese driving school. Expensive though. Not recommended.
You could try ordering a licence verification letter from VicRoads (or your states equivalent). It’s $10 and says when your licence was issued. It’s possible that it’ll say the date you got your Ls.
If you’re more patient you could email them and ask what date will it show
Are green P plates now considered your full licence? IYou still have a provisional licence. So, you don’t have a full licence and the licence you got less than three months before coming. The first one might not be an issue, but together, it doesn’t look good.
https://japan.embassy.gov.au/tkyo/driving.html
As a heads up, when I transferred mine over, I had my licence for yeeeeeeeeaaaarss before coming, but because I had been in and out of the country a few times visiting my partner, it caused confusion because Australia doesn’t do visa stamps.
So, I had to provide paperwork above and beyond my official licence history. I was in my late 30s and could show my licence history for 15+ years and there was still a lot of teeth sucking and head scratching. I came back with 4 years of federal government pay slips with my address and it was finally enough.
Sooooo, you might get that, or you might get someone who just rubber stamps it. For comparison, I just got an IDP to go back to Australia and it to 2.5 hours and seeing 3 different counters plus a photo booth at the driver’s centre. In Australia it took 15 minutes at the local NRMA branch…
I won’t get into the argument of whether your IDP is valid if you are a resident. It has been covered umpteen times here (tldr, it’s not, but the chances of it being an issue are very, very, very small, but still there).
Japan won’t recognize your license for transfer if it was issued less than three months prior to your arrival in Japan. So you will be forced to get a Japanese license from scratch. This means that you’ll need to take and pass the Japanese drivers test. It does not mean that you’ll require driving school however, if you don’t take driving school and you can’t read the Japanese test instructions your chances of understanding how you need to drive for passing are astronomically low.