The trials and tribulations of trying to obtain a Polish driving license

I am quite disgusted with the level of services that the driving vehicle licensing office provides in Puławy. I will explain further.
I am British, and I have lived and worked in this country for seven years now and I regard it as my home. I have a wife and daughter, and my own small business, which I operate from home. I decided last year that I would like to renew my driving license and to be issued with a Polish one. Therefore, I went to the office in Puławy to ask, with my wife’s help, to apply for the driving vehicle, we went in and asked, we got a puzzled look, and they were very rude and abrupt with their answer and barked, “no you can’t have one”. When we asked why, the same women who, is rather large and very rude answered, only Polish people can have a Polish license and because you are English, you will have to take the test. When we tried to ask for further explanation, again she was very abrupt and made us feel as though we were making a nuisance of ourselves and we should get out of their office.

Therefore, we went back in the spring of this year with the latest information that Poland had just agreed that a British person could transfer their license to a Polish one. They looked very puzzled and argued that this is not true and that I cannot obtain a Polish license because I need to be Polish.

After much persuasion, they finally reluctantly agreed to take us to their Lawyer and ask his opinion, he had no idea that the law had changed but refreshingly was quite willing to check the information and see if we could apply.

So we completed the forms and then we had another strange discussion that they wanted my “stay card”, which I may add, was abolished when Poland entered the EU, and I could not provide such document as there was no such document. After another discussion, they finally agreed to put the forms in, and we were given some forms to take home and complete them. We took these forms home and completed them to the best of our knowledge. I have a problem that in 1999, I was disqualified from driving for three months and I never applied for my driving license in the UK since I had no need for it. Under UK law, there is no time limit on when to reapply for your driving license. Therefore, I thought there was no problem and we filled in the form saying that I lost my license, according to their advice; unfortunately we filled in the wrong box. My wife still uncertain as to the definition of this box, went to the office and asked for advice stating that I was disqualified from driving in the UK, and the woman replied “I don’t know, I think that’s ok, and it makes no difference because you are applying for the entitlement for a driving license, consequently we left the information as it is.

This was in June 2007, and we were told that it would take some time, because they have to send the information off to the UK for confirmation. After waiting three months, we contacted them and they said they I cannot have my license because I had never lost my license and there was conflicting information on the application sheet to what the DVLA (driving vehicle license association) said in the UK. Then this Monday I received a letter stating that I was being informed to the Police that was trying to obtain a driving license illegally by providing false information. I was totally shocked and angered because they advised us how to complete the form and now they are trying to prosecute me for this.

This is without doubt the worst office that I have ever encountered in my time in Poland and I am not trying to deceive anyone in this matter, all I am doing is trying to obtain my driving license through what I thought was a professional institution, but sadly this is not the case.

I guess this is a warning to all foreigners in Poland trying to get something done through Polish offices, check and recheck the information that they give you because they could land you in trouble.

this is poland

When I was running a small company (many years) ago, I got once a wrong information regarding the VAT from the Polish Urząd Skarbowy (Tax Office), which almost cost me 20,000 złoty (+5,000 euro), fortunatelly an accountant realised they gave me inaccurate indications, so I went to the IRS again, ******** (just a little) at the lady whom I had spoken to before, and she simply said it's not her fault, blablabla, not even "I'm sorry, I was wrong".

I have the same problem as she says that we are lying now, but the thing is we have three witnesses, that can support us, so she has no chance.

UKPOLSKA...

Please EDIT this long run on sentence and break it up into PARAGRAPHS with a line of space between them and it will be 100% easier to read!!

I'm not going to read it as it is, even tho the topic interests me

thanks

Then fine don't read it :O) This was copied and pasted form word and for some reason the site formatted it this way. Still, I guess you cannot please everyone and there will always be a critic :O)

oh come on. it is easy to c&p and edit here. did you use the "Preview" button over there>>?

don't be so lazy.

it's not fun to read a big post like that with a finger on the monitor as to not lose your place.

I didn't have any problems reading it, and I did find it quite interesting. Keep us posted, UKP, on what happens.

lol, errrmmm, well I am very sorry for being so "lazy" nauczyciel, I will try to do better just for you :O)

You might do better going to Warsaw and going to a large office where they are used to dealing with foreigners. I did hear from a teacher in Sopot some years ago that the 'pobyt na stale' too just depends on their mood of the day. There is some other temporary 'pobyt' before you can apply for a 'pobyt na stale' but sometimes you can just go in to the office first time after getting off a plane and get what you want i.e. a 'pobyt na stale' right then on the spot-no questions asked. I see that you went to the office in Pulawy. I had a girl friend of a sort who lived in Deblin many years ago and her father father died on a park bench from a heart attack in Pulawy many years ago-small World!

No such thing here now it was abolished six months ago, and they are undecided what to do next and they are waiting untill the election is over.

Well, there you are. I know nowt!

Just out of curiosity ukpolska, why did you want a Polish licence? Given that there is no requirement to exchange them I will keep my British one and enjoy the bonus of not picking up Polish penalty points....

Because as I said in my post that in 1999, I was disqualified from driving for three months and I never applied for my driving license in the UK since I had no need for it.

And to apply for a driving license in the UK you need to have a address in the UK and I have none because I have lived here for eight years now, so I thought the easiest way was just to write to the DVLA in the UK to obtain evidence that I passed my test, but then the problems started as above.

Now the problems have been sorted out and I have my Polish license, which is a lot easier as I am permanently settled here.


If there are any problems with the Police then they will have the right to take your GB license away from you, so you cannot avoid the driving penalties that Poles are open too.

very intersting read ukpolska, I am in the process of getting my polish licence to, but I have to sit the test only.

I had a piece of luck really because my wife's uncle is a Colonel in the Polish air-force and he took me to a airfield and told me to drive around the runway and then gave me my licence lol

If you know the right people it's quite easy to get a Polish licence :)

may be is a quit sensitive subjest but i always knew you was a drunk :)

hehe, nothing to do with alcohol, my car was being repaired at the time and was parked on private land and was stolen and driven into five cars by a teenager and the Police prosecuted me for no insurance.

Their argument was that the public had a right of way on this land and therefore the car had to be insured, which really pizzed me off because I lost £1500 through fines and loss of earnings due to court appearances, and the teenager only got 30 hrs community service.

Strange justice eh!!!

very strange justice i agree.

OK that makes sense in your scenario then, fair enough. Yes I can get banned by the Polish police but I don't pick up penalty points. For example I got stopped for speeding a couple of months ago and the penalty was 2 points and 100 zloty (if I recall correctly). I paid the fine and didn't get the points. So I think that for most of us it's better to keep a foreign licence.

Yeah you're right, but I am just wondering if they keep your data on file, and if you amass a lot of driving offences whether they will have a right to confiscate your license then.

I have a friend who works in the Police force and I will contact him and let you know :)
Can I ask that when you were stopped, were you asked for any karta pobytu or anything to prove where you live?

I don't think they are that organised. They can't confiscate your licence because they didn't issue it, the DVLA did. They can only ban you from driving in their country. Given that I don't drink drive or do anything too stupid I hope that will never occur. It's just the odd speeding ticket here and there that would worry me if I was able to accrue points here....

At that time I didn't have my karta pobytu and I don't think I was even carrying my passport (I don't normally). He just took UK address (which is old - sold up and move out a year ago) from my driving licence and seemed happy with that.

What they can do, and will do if they have reason to do so, is take your licence from you and send it to the British Consulate in Warsaw. The Consulate will then forward the licence on to the DVLA. However, for that to happen you have to have done something which is almost certain to result in a Pole losing their licence if they committed the same offence (e.g. drink driving).

What I should have said was "revoke" rather than "confiscate". Interesting what you say above - I trust that is how it works but I can't find any information about it whatsoever.

But (slightly alarmingly) I did find this:


driveandstayalive.com/info%20section/news/individual%20news%20articles/x_040501_driving-on-european-continent.htm

Hi Ben,
sorry to bothered you but you seems to be the right person to ask, we will be moving to Kraków soon, buying house in Pcim between Kraków and Zakopane and I just want to know how difficult it would be for Sean - my husband, I am polish so no worries there but him...hmmm no english what so ever:) the plan is to run hostel in kraków, so let's say work wise Sean is sorted but just on a day to day basis are you enjoing your time in Poland after all... i just found your blog and will have a read through with Sean but it would be nice just to get something off the blog...do you think it was good/wise to move to Poland, I will appreciate if you could e-mail me on katy.janus@cips.org

Thank you
Kasia

They sound more incompentent than the DVLA and that really is saying something!, I would just reapply for you UK one as the police leave you well alone when you use the words "Anglik tourista i am very sorry, now what was that you said again" and offer them a cigarette.

Also a UK driving license means you passed a test and simply didn't collect tokens from cereal packets and send them off with a stamped adressed envelope in order to recieve a laminated piece of card which apparently allows you to drive like a d***head.,

just a thought