Renewing a Lorry or Bus Licence at 45 and Over: The Five-Year Cycle

A vocational licence is not a qualification earned once. Up to age 45 the entitlement renews in step with the licence; from 45 onwards, lorry and bus drivers renew every five years, and each renewal carries a medical. For drivers the process is free but not automatic, and for fleets it is a calendar item with teeth: a driver whose entitlement lapses is a driver you cannot schedule.

The five-year rhythm

Between 45 and 65 the cycle is five-yearly; the entitlements continue as long as each renewal completes. Drivers sometimes assume the reminder makes the process automatic - it does not. The forms initiate the application; only a returned D47P plus a completed D4 produces a renewed licence. Northern Ireland runs a different process through DVA, so cross-border drivers should not rely on the GB timings described here.

What arrives and what you send back

DVLA sends two forms 56 days before the licence runs out: the D47P (application for renewal of lorry and bus entitlement) and the D4 (medical examination report). Renewal itself is free.

If the forms do not arrive - moved house, lost post - do not wait: get a D2/D4 pack from a Post Office that offers DVLA services and proceed with those. The 56-day window is the planning horizon, and the forms’ non-arrival is the driver’s problem to fix, not a reason to drift.

The application steps:

1. Complete form D47P - the renewal application itself.
2. Get the D4 completed by a doctor. An optometrist or optician can fill in the vision assessment section if the doctor cannot complete the whole report. The doctor, optician or optometrist will normally charge for this - the fee is for the medical, not DVLA.
3. Send both forms to DVLA, Swansea SA99 1BR.

Variations: the form will say if a new passport-type photo is needed; a name change requires original supporting documents; and drivers still holding a paper licence must also send original identity documentation plus a passport-type photo.

The medical is the schedule-driver

The D4 is the piece that determines the real timeline. GP appointment lead times vary wildly, and many drivers use specialist driver-medical clinics precisely because a routine GP slot can be weeks away. Practical rule: book the medical the day the D47P lands, not the week before the deadline. The vision assessment can be split off to an optician if that speeds things up.

Remember what the medical underpins: the higher Group 2 medical standard that vocational drivers must meet. The D4 examination is not a formality - eyesight, blood pressure, diabetes management and cardiac history all get assessed, and conditions discovered there feed straight into the notify-DVLA duties that apply all year round.

Driving while renewal is in progress

You can drive while your licence is being renewed if all of the following conditions are met:

• you have not been told by your doctor or optician that you should not drive
• you had a valid licence
• you only drive under the conditions of the previous licence
• your application is less than a year old
• your last licence was not revoked or refused for medical reasons
• you are not currently disqualified
• you were not disqualified as a high risk offender on or after 1 June 2013

That provision is a safety net for DVLA processing time, not a licence to be casual. Every condition matters: a driver whose last licence was revoked on medical grounds, or who has been told not to drive, is off the road regardless of a pending application. Fleets scheduling drivers on the strength of this provision should record which conditions were checked and when.

The fleet’s renewal calendar

For an operator, vocational renewal is one of the highest-consequence dates in driver management, because the failure mode is invisible until it bites: the driver looks identical, the card expired quietly. Build the controls:

• Track entitlement expiry separately from card expiry and set alerts at 90 and 60 days - before DVLA’s 56-day forms arrive.
• Check at every licence check (you are doing six-monthly checks at minimum) that the next renewal date has not moved.
• Support the medical logistics: time for appointments, and a clear policy on who pays the D4 fee.
• Confirm the new licence back on file after each renewal - the check that proves the loop closed.

The drivers most at risk are the experienced ones who have renewed for decades and assume the rhythm. The rhythm is fine - as long as someone is watching the dates.

Sources

• Renew or change a lorry or bus licence: if you’re 45 or over - GOV.UK