There’s no denying that receiving points on your licence can have a damaging effect on a number of things. It can make it more difficult to be successful at job interviews if the job requires driving, your insurance quote can increase and even hiring a car can prove more difficult than it would be with a clean licence. But that’s not to say it isn’t possible to still hire a car…

You can receive points on your driving licence for various different offences, some including accidents, drink or drugs, disqualified drivers or careless driving, to name just a few. The number of points you receive can vary from anything between 3 and 11, with those more serious of incidents remaining on your record for a minimum of 4 years.

Generally speaking, most car rental companies will still accept you for rental with up to 6 points. But this is simply an average statistic, as you will find that some companies will be much harsher and will not accept business from those who have any number of points – even 1! However, their decision whether to allow you to use their services or not also relies on a number of other factors:

1)   Your personal driving experience

If you can show evidence that you have held a valid and clean drivers licence for a decent length of time (for instance, 20 years), then some car hire companies will be more inclined to turn a blind eye to those more minor, less serious offences.

2)   The nature of the offence

If the nature of your offence is a few points for speeding, the car rental business may discount this for its triviality in the grand scheme of things. Whereas a DR10 on an account indicates the serious offence of driving above the legal alcohol limit, which means between 3 to 11 points will remain on your licence for 11 years. Something as major as this cannot be ignored by any car rental company and most will not rent to you for up to a minimum of 5 years after the anniversary of the incident.

3)   Your age

Age is an important factor when it comes to driving. Not only does it largely affect your insurance quote, but if you are under the age of 25 and have points on your licence, the majority of car rental companies will not accept your business. As previously mentioned, this is largely reliant on on the severity of the crime.

It is important to remember that these three factors are a rough guideline and should NOT be relied on as a rule of thumb for all car hire companies, as each one will be subject to their own rules and regulations when it comes to their policies on individuals who have points of their licence.

Caversham Vehicle Hire: 

If you’re considering hiring a car or van, then Caversham Vehicle Hire offer a flexible, affordable rental service on a variety of vehicles for long or short term periods – simply give us a call today to find out more.