Epicurious

In post #98 I gave a direct quote from the UK Govt website which would indicate yes, they do become invalid. Another official website states that it is compulsory for the license holder to update their permanent address if it changes, and the DVLA will not accept a foreign address. Anyone failing to do this may get away with it for many years, but if they have a really serious accident I wouldn't want to be in their shoes.

eCdD

Many, many, many.

1 million times cheaper and 2 million times easier.

Teh Tarik

So, I have followed the very helpful advice of Epicurious (and others) on this forum and driven down to Putrajaya armed with all my documents and my paper counterpart to start the conversion process for my wife and myself. The staff were very helpful and it was not busy. For my wife, they took all her paperwork and told her that it will be ready in about 30 working days. For me, they said they could not accept my conversion because I already had a Malaysian motorcycle license (N.B. mid life crisis - don't ask) and so I have only one option but to go back to driving school and do the whole thing again to get my car license.

Anyway, I can confirm that they will accept your paper counterpart (if you still have one) instead of ordering form D737 from DVLA which still hasn't arrived for me here in Malaysia .

Epicurious

Good news about the paper counterpart, bummer about having to take car lessons and a driving test purely because you already have a MY motorcycle licence. In my case they refused to give me an exchange motorcycle license (I have UK car and large bike), saying that they will only exchange a category D car license for foreigners. It's just so poorly thought through.

A tip for your wife: when checking the JPJ website for progress, append GBR to her passport number (assuming she's applied with a UK passport).

IanBlakeley

That's rubbish, at the moment I don't think I LTSVP have a path to exchange although my wife as a returning Malaysian may have, however, I do use a bike here.

Epicurious

I did challenge the lady at the front desk at JPJ Putrajaya on this matter. She went inside the office and brought out her superior who confirmed that only car licenses can be exchanged/converted. Go and ask them yourself if you don't believe me.

IanBlakeley

Ah no I believe you, I've given up expecting officialdom to make sense anywhere

Teh Tarik

So, after 30 years of driving in UK and Europe, I have just signed up for my manual car driving lessons and test to be conducted over the next few weeks. I have the following joys to look forward to:

1) 6 hour mandatory theory course
2) theory test
3) 16 hours of mandatory practical driving lessons
4) practical test

Plus I am somewhat lighter on the bank balance. My wife has been very helpfully laughing at me all day and reminding me that I was a fool to take my motorcycle driving license in Malaysia.

IanBlakeley

How much of a PITA was it to take the motorcycle test here? I wonder if I can get the car licence swapped[1] If I can retake the bike test here.

Teh Tarik

I can’t sugarcoat it: it is a PITA. Especially the mandatory theory course where the instructor spent most of the time plugging his book. I noticed a young guy playing with his phone the whole day. I found out he was doing the Theory test past questions on an app. I followed his lead and passed no problem.

The practical motorcycle lessons were more interesting for me but I did not know how to ride a 500cc bike. You take the test on the same bikes you train on but I noticed the two bikes at the training centre behaved differently so I had to get time on each bike and do the course to remember how each behaved.

I noticed some guys who were clearly very good on the bikes and so had probably been riding for a long while without a license. They came, signed on, spent a bit of time on the bikes and then quietly disappeared - a less painful way to rack up the mandatory hours if you already know what you are doing.

Scuba Tyke

Today I have finally managed to collect our Malaysian driving licences from JPJ Seremban. Apart from the obvious delay caused by the MCO the whole process for me was held up by the fact that I didn't receive the UK DVLA document until my third attempt at getting one. It was delivered to a friend's UK address, eventually. Goodness knows what happened to the previous two that I am told were sent. Once I had all the documents together I handed them in to JPJ HQ Putrajaya, unfortunately just before the MCO started. This morning I was surprised to learn we would only be issued the 2 year PDL, instead of a full 5 year licence. I have now caught up with recent posts above and understand why. The whole process seems to have been described adequately in this forum, but if anyone has any lingering questions I will do my best to answer them.

ChrisC1955

A very interesting thread. Lots of talk about MM2H paperwork but what about us on LTSVP? Are there restrictions?

Also if I understand correctly, even though I have a full motorcycle license qualification on my UK DVLA issued licence, I cannot get a MY motorcycle license. Surely that contravenes the International Agreements which only refer to "Vehicles" and not classes of vehicle.

Thanks to all contributors. What a surreal situation, coming from a country with 2.9 road deaths per 100000 to one with 23.6 per 100000 and we need to "learn" to drive!

IanBlakeley

I finally stirred myself into action and ordered the D737 from DVLA. Had to hang on the phone line around 3/4 of an hour but all fine and they were in my mail box when I got back from KL this week ~ 2weeks maybe less to get here. The form clearly states if you use it to obtain a foreign licence you UK one is invalid. Not sure how they'd know TBF. Mrs. B and I will trot over to the JPJ in Butterworth next week and see if we can start the process, pretty sure as a Malaysian with a foreign licence she can, LTSVP I am unsure and will update. can I confirm what we need is

1. original licence
2. d737
3. photo
4. Application form (I see 2 listed are both needed?)

Anything else?

Tks

Teh Tarik

For all the documents and photocopies check out post #78 above where epicurious gave a very helpful photo of all the docs required.

As for whether your UK license becomes invalid after getting a Malaysian license I do not believe that it will. When i spoke to DVLA about this back in January/February they said that UK and Malaysia do not have an official “exchange” programme and thus you are not actually “exchanging” one license for the other. Malaysia is actually just giving you a new license.

Epicurious

Suggest you re-read my posts #78 & 80.