# French Motorcycle Licence Question



## effendi

I am moving to France next year, from the USA.

As I am a UK national I have a UK driving licence for cars and motorcycles. I did not hand it over in America as the colonials did not recognise my English ability to drive and I had to take their tests. The test taking all of 8 minutes and 30 seconds (I timed it) in the car park in front of the test centre.

From what I read I can swap my UK, and even my local Texas licence, for a French licence for cars. No one ever mentions motorcycles. Do any of the gathered multitude know if a UK licence marked up for motorcycles and cars will give me the similar French licence for cars and bikes......the top end A licence for bikes that is?

Thanks in advance.


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## 1790260

effendi said:


> Do any of the gathered multitude know if a UK licence marked up for motorcycles and cars will give me the similar French licence for cars and bikes......the top end A licence for bikes that is?


Yes.


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## effendi

appunti said:


> Yes.


Thanks.


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## BackinFrance

effendi said:


> I am moving to France next year, from the USA.
> 
> As I am a UK national I have a UK driving licence for cars and motorcycles. I did not hand it over in America as the colonials did not recognise my English ability to drive and I had to take their tests. The test taking all of 8 minutes and 30 seconds (I timed it) in the car park in front of the test centre.
> 
> From what I read I can swap my UK, and even my local Texas licence, for a French licence for cars. No one ever mentions motorcycles. Do any of the gathered multitude know if a UK licence marked up for motorcycles and cars will give me the similar French licence for cars and bikes......the top end A licence for bikes that is?
> 
> Thanks in advance.


I don't think so, at least not for all motorcycle that you may be entitled to ride in the UK 'it has to do with test requirements,which are not identical in France.


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## effendi

BackinFrance said:


> I don't think so, at least not for all motorcycle that you may be entitled to ride in the UK 'it has to do with test requirements,which are not identical in France.


Tis why I asked.

I have had differing information:

1. Yes mate, pop along and they will give you a French licence for exactly the same value as your UK licence.

2. Hmm, they will give you a car licence, no problems, but with a motorcycle licence you will only get the A2 and have to do the course for the A licence.

As to driving licence compatibility: The whole One Europe thing was rumoured to result in parity of testing and qualifications, ie a british plumber could work anywhere in Europe and a driving licence was valid and readily exchangeable. So theoretically the whole CBT thing in the UK should have been accepted in the rest of Europe pre-Brexit.


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## BackinFrance

effendi said:


> Tis why I asked.
> 
> I have had differing information:
> 
> 1. Yes mate, pop along and they will give you a French licence for exactly the same value as your UK licence.
> 
> 2. Hmm, they will give you a car licence, no problems, but with a motorcycle licence you will only get the A2 and have to do the course for the A licence.
> 
> As to driving licence compatibility: The whole One Europe thing was rumoured to result in parity of testing and qualifications, ie a british plumber could work anywhere in Europe and a driving licence was valid and readily exchangeable. So theoretically the whole CBT thing in the UK should have been accepted in the rest of Europe pre-Brexit.


It has always been a matter of only getting a limited motorcycle license in France. Forget the so called One Europe stuff, which for most purposes, if not all, has never applied.


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## 1790260

effendi said:


> Yes mate, pop along and they will give you a French licence for exactly the same value as your UK licence.


They certainly did for me. No question, straight swap category for category. Maybe I just got lucky, or said the right things, I don't know. Or maybe it's different post Brexit or something.

Then when I renewed it, I actually droped some categories I'd got from the UK that I didn't need as I would have had to have done a medical (or maybe a retest? I forget now).I still have full motorcycle though.


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## BackinFrance

It is definitely not a post Brexit thing, so I can only assume Appunti got lucky.


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## 1790260

I don't know what to say. Shall I post pics of my licences? The old UK and my current French, and swear on my honour that I have _never_ sat a test of any kind in France!


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## BackinFrance

appunti said:


> I don't know what to say. Shall I post pics of my licences? The old UK and my current French, and swear on my honour that I have _never_ sat a test of any kind in France!


You got lucky.


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## effendi

Ah, well, time to dust off the books then. Or, get a four leafed clover.


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## Bevdeforges

Just to add a bit to the confusion here - there have been recent changes (i.e. within the last two years or so) to the French licensing of motocycles so that there be some requirements for training or testing. Also, if the OP is coming from several years of living in the US, there may be some "issues" in getting any sort of reciprocity for a UK license where they can't prove that they have been living in the UK the last few years.


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## 1790260

Bevdeforges said:


> there have been recent changes (i.e. within the last two years or so) to the French licensing of motocycles so that there be some requirements for training or testing.


I prefer that explanation to me 'getting lucky'! I've seen some mention of only A1 being allowed and French training/testing is required for the full A - but it didn't say from when that applied.

I think I swapped my UK licence at the sub-prefecture around 2010 (well before ANTS days) Looking at it now, the classifications which I dropped on renewal in 2018/19 we're C1, D1, C1E and D1E.


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## effendi

Bevdeforges said:


> Just to add a bit to the confusion here - there have been recent changes (i.e. within the last two years or so) to the French licensing of motocycles so that there be some requirements for training or testing. Also, if the OP is coming from several years of living in the US, there may be some "issues" in getting any sort of reciprocity for a UK license where they can't prove that they have been living in the UK the last few years.


The question was asked of DVLA and they said renewals could be done and licence retained as long as there was still a UK postal address, which I have.

Slight tangent: I assume that a German car/bike licence, being EU, is 100% transferable to France. Not that I have one, but I can stay with friends and/or family, do an intensive course to get the German licence and then take that to France.


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## effendi

The requirement for UK licences is not that you live at the given address, merely that you can be contacted through it. I did some digging on the matter for a mate when I was a copper, as he was effectively an itinerant IT contractor living in hotels for a couple of years he had his address put down as his brothers house.


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## effendi

Bearing in mind that you get one answer from one civil servant and a different answer from another.


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## BackinFrance

appunti said:


> I prefer that explanation to me 'getting lucky'! I've seen some mention of only A1 being allowed and French training/testing is required for the full A - but it didn't say from when that applied.
> 
> I think I swapped my UK licence at the sub-prefecture around 2010 (well before ANTS days) Looking at it now, the classifications which I dropped on renewal in 2018/19 we're C1, D1, C1E and D1E.


No, if you retained your full UK mogorcycle licence at that time you definitely got lucky in that the sous-prefectute made a mistake. J9u5trjw_e0


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## 1790260

Not just me, there might be a lot of lucky ex-UK bikers - unless they haven't swapped their licences as yet, which is possible of course. In which case they're going to be not so lucky at some point in the future. Admittedly, it's not been a topic of conversation amongst the biker friends I have but neither do I recall a (re)test being mentioned. I must ask the question, purely out of interest.


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## Bevdeforges

effendi said:


> Bearing in mind that you get one answer from one civil servant and a different answer from another.


This is probably the relevant factor in your and many other folks' case. With the rise of these centralized online registration and processing systems, some (but not all) the inconsistencies seem to have been removed from the various exchange and registration processes. And then there is Brexit....

Having had to (for other reasons) obtain a German driving license ("the old fashioned way" - through testing), be careful what you wish for. The German licensing process was somewhat easier for me because I've relatively fluent (or was then) in German, but I still spent quite a bit more than expected on the driving school stuff. And the Germans may be requiring evidence of "residence" in their country in order to take a German license these days.


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## BackinFrance

appunti said:


> Not just me, there might be a lot of lucky ex-UK bikers - unless they haven't swapped their licences as yet, which is possible of course. In which case they're going to be not so lucky at some point in the future. Admittedly, it's not been a topic of conversation amongst the biker friends I have but neither do I recall a (re)test being mentioned. I must ask the question, purely out of interest.


It is all about cc though. The cc of the motorbike you can ride in the UK by just having a car license is higher than what a car license allows you to ride in France. However I think that there is a test in the UK for riding higher powered bikes.


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## 1790260

From my reading, you have to retest if you have a licence from outside the EEA (or your UK bike licence was issued post Brexit) ....









Échange de permis de conduire obtenu hors EEE (installation en France)


Vous vous installez en France et vous vous demandez si vous pouvez conduire avec votre permis étranger ? Un permis de conduire délivré par un pays non européen (à l'exception d'un permis britannique délivré avant 2021) est valable pendant 1 an à partir de l'acquisition de la résidence normale en...




www.service-public.fr







> Il n'est pas possible d'obtenir le permis moto A par échange. Un permis moto A2 vous est délivré et vous devrez suivre une formation au bout de 2 ans pour obtenir le permis A.


...but I've yet to find anything to suggest it would be the case for a pre-Brexit issued UK full motorcycle licence... but I am still researching this.

It's of interest to me because my wife still has her UK licence (with full A bike category) and will need to swap at some point.


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## effendi

Bevdeforges said:


> This is probably the relevant factor in your and many other folks' case. With the rise of these centralized online registration and processing systems, some (but not all) the inconsistencies seem to have been removed from the various exchange and registration processes. And then there is Brexit....
> 
> Having had to (for other reasons) obtain a German driving license ("the old fashioned way" - through testing), be careful what you wish for. The German licensing process was somewhat easier for me because I've relatively fluent (or was then) in German, but I still spent quite a bit more than expected on the driving school stuff. And the Germans may be requiring evidence of "residence" in their country in order to take a German license these days.


The German thing is not a problem for me. I was born as a German before a British stepfather married the old dear and I sort of became a Brit. I still hold a German passport and being born as well as having lived and worked there my German is native level.......a tad rusty after 12 years in the US, but it comes back. I can register as living there with family, or friends, which will ease the administrative process a tad.

There are two possible routes for a full licence along with a motorcycle licence by going through Germany:

1. The German civil servant says, "you can have an A2 licence". German licensing laws allow me to then immediately do the A licence if: a. I am over 20 (oh yes), and have two years motorcycle experience with an A2. Or,

2. The German civil servant says, "welcome back, here is your A licence". According to my reading around the subject they still accept for exchange most variations of a UK licence, which I still hold.

Back to the French thing:

I spent a few hours today looking and I found a thing about driving licence exchange on the Service-public.fr website pages. It says there in pixels, clear as day, that there is no way a non-EU/EEA will get a full A licence on exchange. Indeed, it states that such an individual will have to wait the mandatory two years whilst holding an A2 before receiving an A.

Follow the link then look under *Which Foreigner permit can be exchanged

Link===> https://www.service-public.fr/particuliers/vosdroits/F1460?lang=en*



So, taking up residency in Germany and then moving to France seems a better route to still allowing me to do any half decent motorcycling.

@appunti , you wuz lucky mate.


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## 1790260

effendi said:


> @appunti , you wuz lucky mate.


Not just me seemingly. In my non authoritative small sample size so far, I have yet to find a single Brit biker who swapped licence and had to sit a test. Not one. Different departments too.

You quote the same article and text that I quoted above. It states the situation as it stands *now*, w*i*th the UK being *out* of the EEA*.* That is, the situation has changed. Prior to Brexit, the UK was in the EEA and all licence categories where mutually recognised by member states. Hence, Brit bikers were able to swap A for A without needing to retest.

What I am trying to ascertain is whether this situation pertains to licences held (i.e. tests sat and passed) before Brexit, and not only post Brexit licences. I don't think it does, and have read a remark to that effect. That is, if you passed your full motorcycle test in the UK prior to the Brexit curtain falling then you might still be able to swap without retest.


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## effendi

appunti said:


> if you passed your full motorcycle test in the UK prior to the Brexit curtain falling then you might still be able to swap without retest.


That would be most excellent, if possible.

I read the German law pertaining to the exchange of licences with the UK. They simply state: Yes you can.........a little more wordy and legalistic, but that is the upshot of it.

I have dropped an email to the relevant German government department to ascertain if it is the full A licence they are granting - I will inform on here when I get a response.

Going the long way around through Germany then presenting that in France is administratively burdensome, but compared to losing two years worth of biking privileges at my age it is well worth doing.


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## 1790260

effendi said:


> Going the long way around through Germany then presenting that in France is administratively burdensome, but compared to losing two years worth of biking privileges at my age it is well worth doing


I agree entirely. Certainly worth taking that route if it's open to you given the uncertainty.


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