pete72

I have a long term contract working in Ontario and currently hold a full UK driving licence,whats the best way to apply for an Ontario driving licence? as its my understanding I can only us my UK one for 6 months.
Will i need to resit a driving test or is it a matter of an exchange?
Also car insurance seems really expensive for expats even with my 20 years no claims has anyone used companies that take this into account?

Thanks in advance

Former Lancastrian

Read this link re driving licences
http://www.mto.gov.on.ca/english/dandv/

Ontario has private insurance so you need to shop around for the best rates and who will accept UK NCB as previous experience.
Johnsons is always mentioned.
http://www1.johnson.ca/

Siouxie

If you here are a visitor only you can drive on your UK licence for 3 months, however, if you move to Ontario to live permanently or to work then you have only 60 days to exchange your licence.

http://www.ontario.ca/driving-and-ro...rivers-licence

http://www.drivetest.ca/EN/licencing...l-Licence.aspx

orly

Fairly simple process to exchange the licence. It seems you have a lot of years experience in the UK so they'll issue you a full "G" licence. No testing beyond a simple eye test.

Just have the UK card and the counterpart with you and go to a DriveTest location in the province when you arrive. Took me about 20 minutes to get mine switched. They issue a temporary paper licence to you and then mail the card version to you a week or two after.

jaminsk1

if you swap it in then be careful about swapping it back in the UK (assuming you want to do so) as UK may only allow you an "automatic transmission" license when you trade in your Ontario license to the DVLA.

Flowerina

Easy to switch out your old licence as the previous poster says but yes you will need a small mortgage for the car insurance. Our broker got us insurance via Intact 10 years + no claims evidence provided to them but still cost us $3,300. Other insurers were quoting $5k and upwards

Good luck

Zoe Bell

Not a problem
Keep a note of your drivers number ( photocopy your paper bit)
Then if you need to swap it back the dvla will just refer back to your previous uk license categories

Bostonspa

What a shame a UK driver paying those rates, if you took your test in UK you should be 10x the driver of any other new Canadian driver- the drive tests here are a joke in comparison

yzf.shaun

Insurance here is Brutal. That's as polite as I can put it

pete72

Just a quick update took my UK licence and paper counterpart in and after a quick eye test they issued me with a Ontario driving licence.
They retained my UK licence and paper counterpart which they will send back to DVLA in Swansea as I'm spending more than 9 months of the year here in Canada,They gave me photocopies and I can request my UK licence back when ever I return to the UK.
On a positive note my insurance quote with a UK licence from CT Bank was $250/month that's now just $120/month now I've told them my licence was issued in Ontario mega saving.

Mircha

If you go to any Drive test centre you will be able to exchange the license there. You have to fill a couple of questions on a straightforward form, they'll then do a short eye test and then take your picture too. My process took about 30 mins in total until I found out they spelt my Canadian address wrong so the whole process had to start again minus the eye test as she had the results. It costs $75 for five years and they stated that the license takes about 6 weeks to arrive. I went in about 2 weeks ago now and was issued a paper version.

They will take your UK license and photocopy your counterpart for you. I personally will be ordering a new UK license for £20 to pick up when I go back to visit as I still have a car there.

I'm afraid I can't help with the insurance much but the info in the other posts all look helpful.

orly

You'll be entitled to what you had before.

SambaDeAmigo

Cheapest insurance I got were from Johnson and TD