THE biggest major change for the expat in Turkey this year will inevitably be the humble driving license.

As of January 1, any foreign driver that drives on licenses from their country of origin will now have to change them and convert over to a Turkish driving license.

What appears to be a straightforward matter is not. But hey, that’s the joys of living in Turkey.

For those yet to face the process, you will need to brace yourselves for the paper chase and the not-so-little cost of about 800TL to achieve this.

First, you will need to get a few matters sorted out. These include getting your driving license and obtaining a photocopy of it; having it translated and legalised in a notary office and the filling out of a driving license form which is available from the Şoförler Odası (Chamber of Drivers) office.

Add your passport, your residence permit, a health check and receipts of fees paid to the relevant bodies, a declaration of your blood group and 2 biometric passport images.

The slight hiccup is the authorities desire to see an education certificate from your home nation, For most this causing problems as many have been retired for years and wouldn’t know where to get one from in the first place.

There are one or two issues that need to be raised.

You can only drive on a driving licence from your home country for six months. The unofficial advice is that leaving the country and re-entering will re-set that six month clock.

Apart from the education certificate scenario, foreign residents have expressed a bit of discomfort in that they will have to hand over their original driving licences to the Turkish police. The police will then send these licenses back to the country of origin where they will be held by the relevant office.

The thinking here is that if a foreign resident decides to move back to their country of origin they can drive on a Turkish licence for 12 months but can re-apply to obtain their original licences in due course.

Failure to obtain a Turkish driving could land you with a 343TL fine and cause untold complications with your car insurance agent.

The British Embassy recently commented: “On the issue of the 6 month validity period the Turkish authorities state ‘kindly be advised that validity term of the driving licences of foreign nationals in Turkey start with their entry to Turkey. This validity term restarts with every new entry.

“On the educational certificates issue the MFA inform us that ‘a certificate of education’ is required for the exchange process. For those expats, like many of us, have no longer got your original school certificates you can apply for a copy using https://www.gov.uk/replacement-exam-certificate

“You can’t get a replacement certificate for an O level, CSE, GCSE or A level – your exam board will send you a ‘certified statement of results’ instead. On this site there is a list of which exam board you need to contact if your old exam board no longer exists.”