My 17 year old daughter had started driving lessons in the UK this year but never managed to get as far as her test before we left to come here. Yesterday we went down to the driving centre to enquire about what she has to do over here to be able to drive and to cut a long story short she took her theory test and passed and now has a NZ learners licence. She's applied for an exemption to be able to go straight on to the restricted licence as she's held the UK one for 6 months now and we should hear very shortly whether they will do this for her or not. But.... in the meantime she can't drive with hubby or me in the car with her even though she's got a learners licence and she'll have "l" plates because we haven't held a NZ licence for more than 2 years. I spent quite a long time clarifying this with the people behind the counter and stressed that I've held my UK licence for over 23 years and have never had an accident or any points on it etc etc but it doesn't matter! Even when she gets the restricted licence hubby and I still will not be allowed in the car with her! As you can imagine we're pretty annoyed about this but it gets worse .... our 17 year old can also apply for an exemption to allow her to carry our 15 year old in the car with her (for the purpose of taking her to school etc) but she will still not be allowed to carry me or my husband in the car with her!!!! We can't believe it to be honest, even though we do believe it.
It also appears that even if she had tried to pass her test in the UK and managed to do that she still wouldn't have had a full licence over here as she wouldn't have held the UK full licence for 2 years.
I know there's nothing anybody can do but just felt like a bit of a rant!!! It also points this situation out for others. I wonder if anybody else has discovered this too?