Vietnamese motor cycle license

You can swap it or get international one... and about riding without license.. there are roughly 5 million licenses and 90+ million vietnamese... But that said police might not care when they stop you, but when you get accident and not have a license you can be in big trouble so I would not recommend it. Plus insurance might not cover any damages.

Its easy to convert your existing license to a VN one.

Thanks Wald0,

Yeah ive heard many different stories. I've heard police don't hassle westerners/tourists as much, I've heard police target westerners/tourists because they know they can spot fine them easily (quick $$$ for the police). I'm happy to run the gauntlet but thought I'd better ask around. Do you know what the fine is by any chance?

Thanks Colinoscapee,

Do you know how much it costs roughly?

There is a list of traffic fines...Google...citypassguide traffic fines and penalties Vietnam...the cops can also confiscate the bike for a week..the fine is about 4 million dong
I have recently,in December, transferred my Uk car drivers licence and it's the same office for a bike licence which is at
252 Ly China Thang District 3.....directions to find it....travelling from the roundabout at Cong Truong Dan Chu to Nguyen Thong there is a turning on the left hand side into a small road,just about wide enough for a car,about halfway to Nguyen Throng...it has a blue government sign above the entrance...the office is at the end of the small road on the left,you need the second floor,they will take your pic for the licence,you will need someone who speaks the lingo.I think it cost about 100000 Dong for the car licence...it's cheap.....the office is marked on Google maps with pics of it so you can recognise it when you get there
If you cannot find the fines list or the office send me a private message with your email address...I will send you screenshots of both

All the below posted as requested from emails sent by GarethUK

Wow!!! Couldn't have helped much more than that... Thanks Gareth UK and Fred for reposting

Cheers!

You got a valid big bike license and experience. Lots of people have got neither...

Yeah, thanks Gareth. But actually getting the licence? I transferred mine a couple of years ago (beautiful card with holograph, right up there). It took me a couple of weeks of running around for something like $10, instead of the $150 the agents were charging while they still wanted me to run around for photocopies and photos.

But the licence was only valid for the duration of my resident's pass, rather than my passport's validity and valid Australian/Dutch/Malaysian/International driving licences in *all* categories.

I really don't know what gives. My International licence from Australia is still valid, and I carry it along with my secondary wallet with minimal dong in case I get pulled up by the yellow cops.

If you pay the agents, they'll get you towards a 'permanent' Viet licence, where they do the written test but you still have to do the obstacle course. I may need to do that, after 40 years of motorcycling including decades as a motorcycle journalist.

Further thoughts, anyone?

In addition to the above fines, if your motorbike is impounded you have to pay a daily fee, which used to be 50,000dong.   Consequently, cops now don't appear to impound clapped out motorbikes, because their owners don't have to money to pay the impoundment fees. 

Some years ago the Hanoi cops announced in the national press that they would be starting a special, pre-Tet safety campaign which would entail impounding all vehicles transgressing the law. Newspapers even published the daily figures of impounded vehicles.  All the parking space in the police stations soon filled up, then the vacant allotments next door, then the vacant allotments in the ward, then in the city, then in the surrounding districts and on to the provinces. In the end there were thousands and thousands of unclaimed motorbikes which the police were stuck with, because they did not have authority at law to dispose of them. The National Assembly had to pass a new law for the cops to sell off or otherwise dispose of the junk.

The list of fines is rather humorous. I think anyone who has been here a few days has seen these violations occur thousands of times in a few hundred meters each day. While you are lucky to see a police officer all day in many cities.
Be careful of the drivers license you get if you pay for "Special" consideration. Had a friend pay an arm and a leg, ran the license he go through the go'v/t database and it was not listed.
Always been an interesting conversation on this forum though. I wish one could find a way in which we can just legally get a DL, if you do not read or understand VNese.

Diazo wrote:

The list of fines is rather humorous. I think anyone who has been here a few days has seen these violations occur thousands of times in a few hundred meters each day. While you are lucky to see a police officer all day in many cities.
Be careful of the drivers license you get if you pay for "Special" consideration. Had a friend pay an arm and a leg, ran the license he go through the go'v/t database and it was not listed.
Always been an interesting conversation on this forum though. I wish one could find a way in which we can just legally get a DL, if you do not read or understand VNese.

This is exactly RIGHT!!! We just need to have a LEGAL way of getting our right to drive even if we do not speak Vietnamese as long as we follow the rightful law of which they  themselves should be following.

In HCMC they do organize theory parts in english too.. at least they had for A2 but they are rare but do happen, in Hanoi have never heard them happening

Translate the australia-driver-license to vietnamese driver license:
12 - 100$ / 12$ regular / 100$ over office

Drive without valid license from 500 000 - 2 000 000 VND (Nha Trang

Only took the test to obtain a driving licence which in turn enables insurance which is most important to me.
I could not care less if the coppers,if I had no licence,stung me for some money,as expats we are all having a cheap living here anyway .
To me,in the event of an accident,if my insurance pays out ( that's one for another thread) then I have acheived what I have in my mind today to try to guard myself.
The test  itself is nothing short of pathetic.It is not relevant to what is required of you on the streets .I am 61,learnt to drive motorised 2 wheels in Saigon,and went to the test center for 1 hour a day for nearly 3 weeks to make sure I passed.There were young girls ( and guys)there also practicing who were running rings around me everyday who took and passed the test well before my 3 weeks were up.Easy you may think.....but... put any of them on the road and all common sense,,road sense,courtesy  or awareness of danger has not  gone out of the window .......,because it was not shown to them in the first place.The reason why there is so many accidents here is because the users of the road do stupid things regardless if they have taken the test or not
Nothing will change either because the cops are not enforcing the law and they are not even ,in any small way,trying to attempt it!

Even if they have taken the test they still don't know the rules! While it is more likely that car drivers have been learning the rules most still don't understand or care.. the looks I get when I'm in roundabout and make them brake and let me exit first is priceless <3

Wald0 wrote:

Even if they have taken the test they still don't know the rules! While it is more likely that car drivers have been learning the rules most still don't understand or care.. the looks I get when I'm in roundabout and make them brake and let me exit first is priceless <3

Just had a debate on another forum about the standard of driving,and constant use of the horn. One bleeding heart expat came up with the usual "stop pushing your western thinking upon the VN people" reply. He also stated that using the horn was a cultural thing. The standard of driving here is not good, yet there are still expats who will defend the indefensible.

Well I for one am glad they use the horns. Many a time it has kept me from being hit. Not sure what the alternative to using them would be. But I agree it can also be annoying. I just wish something could be done about the young boys who race like mad with reckless abandon like they are invincible. I have seen more than one innocent be seriously injured by them. Horn or no horn you don't have much of a chance to protect yourself against them. They come racing up from behind and have no clue that your about to turn etc.

I'm also convinced that most people don't know what does that pretty blinking yellow light means.. so many times when I'm turning they still insist pushing themselves between car and curb.

Diazo wrote:

Well I for one am glad they use the horns. Many a time it has kept me from being hit. Not sure what the alternative to using them would be. But I agree it can also be annoying. I just wish something could be done about the young boys who race like mad with reckless abandon like they are invincible. I have seen more than one innocent be seriously injured by them. Horn or no horn you don't have much of a chance to protect yourself against them. They come racing up from behind and have no clue that your about to turn etc.

The main use of the horn as a warning is fine. Having a truck or bus blare those airhorns as the counter gets down to 3 at traffic lights is another matter. What about when you see a guy going down the road beeping furiously and there is nobody within 200 mts, thats the type of use of the horn that irks me. Lets not forget the footpath riders or people driving up the wrong way, complete nutters.