The grace period for motorists with expired driver’s license officially ended this week. Motorists whose driving license, temporary driving permits, or learner’s license had expired between March 2020 and August 31 2021 were given a deadline of the 5th of May to renew their license. Radio Islam spoke to the RTMC’s Simon Zwane.

Zwane said that the chance of any further extensions to the deadline was slim as there already had been five extensions.  He said, “anyone whose driving license expired between March 2020 and August 2021, they should approach their driving license centre to renew those driver license cards.” He further added, “arrangements have been made for licensing centres to work extra hours to be able to process and assist those members of the public who seek help.” He stressed that the public should not entertain hopes of any other extension as there would be none.

When questioned about motorists who were struggling to get appointments, especially online bookings to renew their license, Zwane said bookings have been available at the RTMC, Waterfall and Echo Park centres. He said, “just for this month we are allowing people to walk in. So, we have plenty of people have come in to renew without bookings, but those who’ve got bookings will take priority, obviously.” He said that those who had not booked would have a longer waiting period, but would still be assisted, and that the centres would remain open until everyone had been helped.

Zwane advised drivers who had already renewed their license but were waiting for the license cards to be printed, to go online, if they had established a profile with NATIS, and check on the dashboard. He said, “You will be able to determine whether your license has been printed and sent to licensing.” Alternatively, one could send an SMS with ones ID number to 33214. Zwane said, “you’ll get a message back that will tell you what the status of the driving license is.”

There are concerns regarding the consequences for motorists who are now driving with an expired license, not only because they would be issued with a fine, but might have bigger problems in the case of an accident, because insurance companies would be able to refuse to honour claims that come from such people. Zwane said that that was the reason they had put measures in place, so that motorists wouldn’t “fall into that trap”. He said extra hours have been added to the centres throughout the country and that they would also open on Saturdays for the month of May, to be able to help as many people as possible, particularly those whose licenses had expired during the lockdown.