So I accidentally let my Japanese drivers license expire ( never got the letter)and it’s just passed the grace period. I had it for 20 years with no infractions.
They say I need to start from Zero again, but I really want to avoid that. Any experience with this?
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Are “they” the licensing center or the police? I doubt any of us would have more solid advice than them.
That’s what I was told (I haven’t had the experience but they’re pretty clear about that point).
The “good news” is that I believe you’re allowed to just register to take the tests. You’ll need to actually pass them of course, but you’re not in for 40 hours of classes a priori
Oops.
I set calendar reminders in my main email accounts to make sure this doesn’t happen. Count yourself lucky that you didn’t get caught driving without a valid license as that’s a major infraction and would have made everything a whole lot worse.
It might depend on the country you got your initial license from but it happened to me, too. I let mine expire for over 4 years and thought I’d need to take a test as well but turned out that all I needed to do was go in and make a new one. Had to show some documents and fill out some paperwork but I got it on the same day.
If it’s within 6 months after expiration, I think you can renew your license.
I could only find information in Japanese.
https://www.police.pref.fukuoka.jp/kotsu/unshi/kigenkire_2_2_3.html