New Jersey Driving Licence

I heard about this Telegraph article from two sources - my father and excellent online forum British Expats.

In it, expat Elizabeth Webster moans about her experiences getting a New Jersey State Driver's Licence - something I've had cause to moan about as well.

But the difference between her experience and mine is that my complications were caused by the oh-so-typically 'Roly' experience of being 'a special case.'

Ignoring the fact that the journey towards my New Jersey licence involved a trip to Staten Island and the exchange of several hundred dollars, the actual process was pretty trouble-free.

I went in. I showed them valid I.D. I took my (computer) test and then I emerged with a New Jersey driver's licence. No, I didn't need to take a driving test itself. Although considering it took me seven attempts to pass in the UK, that's probably a good thing!

Yet, Elizabeth Webster's similar experience obviously warranted an article in the Telegraph.

Her first complaint: "New Jersey has a complex system of allotting a number of points to different pieces of identification. In order to qualify for the driving knowledge test you have to accumulate six points."

In applying for a driver's licence, you have to provide proof that you are who you're claiming to be - since an American driver's licence is basically THE essential form of identification. That's fair enough - and no different to applying for a passport or licence in the UK.

Providing this is EASY.

A valid foreign passport with valid entry visa is worth four points.

In order to get the other two points, you can use any of the following: A Social Security Card (which you receive with your green card.) A bank statement or ATM card (from a US bank.) A utility bill (such as power or cable) that's less than 90 days old or your health insurance card.

A Green Card itself is worth four points.

So anybody who is a valid resident of the United States for more than a month can easily provide enough evidence to get a licence. In fact, when I was just a visitor on a tourist visa in 2002, I still had enough valid ID to provide 'six points' to the New York DMV and registered a car to ferry me about during my visit.

Yet Elizabeth Webster complained that they didn't accept her passport or Birth Certificate because they were both British.

This is rubbish.

Utterly wonderful stuff for an article complaining about the red tape of New Jersey's MVC, but it's utter rubbish. Total crap. Twaddle. Claptrap. Codswallop.

I have been to three different New Jersey Motor Vehicle Commissions on three separate occasions and while they won't accept a British credit card or bank statement, there has NEVER been any issue in accepting a British passport.

After all, it has a valid stamp issued from the Bureau of Citizenship and Immigration Services and the US Embassy in Grovsner Square, so what's good enough for them is good enough for the MVC, I can assure you.

Elizabeth Webster then goes on to complain about the endless waiting she had to endure at the DMV (has she ever been to a British Post Office? Because I can assure you, the wait time is comparable.) And then has a gall to complain about having to pay a whopping $33 for the experience! That's barely fifteen quid (compared to £48.50 for a British licence.)

In short, her terrible article is nothing more than a bland whine about queueing up in a government office interspersed with what can only be wildly exaggerated claims about the 'troubles' she faced proving her identification.

It's utter rot.

If by some tiny chance her article reflects her true experiences, I can only assure her that this is not the normal practice of the New Jersey Motor Vehicle Commission and she should complain immediately.

Somehow, I don't think that'll happen. My feeling is that Elizabeth Webster was more than happy to exaggerate her experiences for the sake of a good yarn about those 'backwards' Americans.

The Instrospection Imperitive

One complaint people have about the American mentality is how introspective it is.

Because America is such an enormous country, with so many natural resources, it's understandable that the average American sometimes doesn't look far beyond their own borders. The American economy could survive based purely on a domestic market - not many countries can say that any more.

If the rest of the globe suddenly vanished, America could still continue to operate, given that it produces fuel and food in abundance (although we might have to cut back on the SUV's.)

The problem with this mentality, however, is it's inflexibility.

Take, for example, this morning. Tina and I drove out to have a look at a car we were interested in buying. A stick-shift Subaru, it drove well and seemed tidy and all we had to do to put our minds at rest was to follow the car's history to find out if it had ever been written off or involved in an accident.

Doing this is wonderfully easy. The VIN number that all American-sold cars have on their windscreen (printed on the dash, just under the glass) allows you to track every incident the car's ever been involved in - from passing it's first inspection to being involved in a fender-bender at a traffic junction.

In order to track the history, you can use an American website called CarFax.

For $29.99, you can run a background check on a car you're looking at (as many as you want for one month) and find out what the seller might not be telling you.

Well, in theory, anyway. Because I can't.

I signed up. I paid my money on my American VISA card... And CarFax threw a hissy fit because my email ended in .co.uk instead of the standard .com.

This is America, Buddy, the program was telling me. Nobody's emails end in anything other than .com. That's the American way.

So in the end, I had to use Tina's email address. Mine simply did not compute - even though it was good enough for the Bureau of Citizenship and Immigration, the Bank of America and the Department of Motor Vehicles.

Sometimes it's worth companies like CarFax realising that there is another world south of Texas and north of Vermont.