Help with first steps after landing - drivers licence

[bairn7]

Hi all

I'll be landing in Calgary in January. I will have a rental for a couple of weeks but I want to buy a car as soon as I can. In order to do that I understand I first need to swap my UK licence for an Alberta licence.

In order to get an Alberta licence I need the following:

- My UK licence
- My passport
- PR card or visa - I assume CoPR is sufficient in the absence of the PR card?
- proof of residence
- secondary non-photo ID

I will be staying in an Airbnb for the first few months so won't have any lease agreement/utility bill etc. A bank statement appears to be sufficient but that will presumably take a month or so from setup.

Can anyone help talk me through the steps I need to take in order to have the evidence necessary to change my UK licence for an Alberta licence? How quickly can I realistically do this? From the above I'm thinking that I probably can't have the evidence necessary for at least 4-6 weeks?

Thanks

 

[Hurlabrick]

Hi all

I'll be landing in Calgary in January. I will have a rental for a couple of weeks but I want to buy a car as soon as I can. In order to do that I understand I first need to swap my UK licence for an Alberta licence.

In order to get an Alberta licence I need the following:

- My UK licence
- My passport
- PR card or visa - I assume CoPR is sufficient in the absence of the PR card?
- proof of residence
- secondary non-photo ID

I will be staying in an Airbnb for the first few months so won't have any lease agreement/utility bill etc. A bank statement appears to be sufficient but that will presumably take a month or so from setup.

Can anyone help talk me through the steps I need to take in order to have the evidence necessary to change my UK licence for an Alberta licence? How quickly can I realistically do this? From the above I'm thinking that I probably can't have the evidence necessary for at least 4-6 weeks?

Thanks

Tis all here on the official site.

https://www.alberta.ca/id-requirements-for-identification-cards.aspx

 

[bairn7]

Thanks, but my question was more around the practicalities of getting the required ID, and how quickly people have managed to do this after landing.

 

[Hurlabrick]

Thanks, but my question was more around the practicalities of getting the required ID, and how quickly people have managed to do this after landing.

You have 90 days, which is plenty of time to gather the required proofs - having said that, you might have 'fun and games' trying to BUY a car in Alberta without an Alberta (or other Canadian province) licence. I managed to exchange mine in Ontario (similar rules of proof) within 2 weeks, then bought a car after a further two weeks.

 

[bairn7]

What proof did you manage to acquire in 2 weeks in order to exchange your licence? Was it a utility bill / bank statement/ etc?

 

[Hurlabrick]

What proof did you manage to acquire in 2 weeks in order to exchange your licence? Was it a utility bill / bank statement/ etc?

I had a bank statement. Opened a bank account on my earlier soft landing and used my Canadisn friends addresss.

 

[bairn7]

Thanks. Think that's what I'll need to do. I'll ask the bank to send some correspondence asap and hopefully will get some correspondence within a couple of weeks.