AA WORRIED ABOUT LICENCE RENEWAL SERVICE
The Automobile Association (AA) has shared its relief that the production of driving licences is back up and running again. This comes after a massive backlog due to technical problems with the machinery used to manufacture driving licences.
The AA’s concern, however, is the staggering number of motorists who must renew their licences before the end of March.
IOL reports that Transport Minister Fikile Mbalula announced that driving licences which expired between 26 March 2020 and 31 August 2021 will be valid until 31 March 2022. So far it seems that this leaves about 2.1 million motorists high and dry.
The AA believes that the department won’t be able to achieve its goal of ensuring every single person of the 2.1 million motorists has renewed driving licences in their hands before the end of March.
This number doesn’t include the current backlog of 600 000 cards which are also still due to be printed.
The AA has suggested an extension to the grace period that stretches beyond 31 March would be better suited to deal with the backlog.
The Minister recently announced that new driving licence cards would be available from October 2023. These new cards will have advanced security features and will be capable of being used as official identification.
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