drivers license

If you bring your Statside license, you can just exchange it. But, if you need to take the entire test (written/driving/health), you might want to spend a lot of time studying the book they give you. Living on STT, when they ask what the maximum speed limit in the VI is, remember....STX has a highway! The test is tricky that way. Here on STT the max is 35 mph, where on STX it's 55...so the answer would be 55. My old boss had lived here for 2 or 3 years and her Stateside license had expired, so she had to go thru the entire process. When she came back from her driver's license test appointment (yes, you need appointments for that kind of stuff) I asked how she did and she thought she aced it. A couple days later she found out that she failed it! Tricky questions! And if you have to go thru the entire process, there is more to it than in the States. You have to pay to get a little book and a list of things to do, like getting passport pics taken, go to the eye doctor. etc. You know how people dread going to the DMV in the States? Here, I'd rather try to swim to Puerto Rico than go there! Haha!

Hello Don,

Do you have one already?

If you have a valid US license you will have to take the written test only to get a VI license. If you do not have a license you will have to take both the written and the road test.

There are details about the application, road and written test at the bottom of the Shipping of Car page: Cut and paste the following link:

https://www.vimovingcenter.com/car/

What do folks think... are the written and road test difficult, easy, tricky?

In my experience I found the road test giver tried tricking me several times by telling me to go down a road... a road that was one way or speed up when the area was a school zone... I would have failed if I had done either. The written test wasn't difficult (although I failed the first time - I swear they weren't graded and the test giver just randomly selected some to pass and some to fail - LOL, like 20 test were graded in 1 minute, while we waited outside the room - impossiable; or perhaps I was just that stunned that I failed 🙂 anyhow it wasn't difficult but had a few tricky questions; the test was multiple choice and true-false based on rules in the little driver's guide book (which they sometimes have for you to buy & take home to study or if they don't have any in stock then you get to look through it just before taking the test.)

--Islander

thanks marty,do they check your driving history in the states?

Hello Don,

I don't think so. If you have the valid license then thats that. If it was revoked or suspended.... well the application does ask questions like; have you ever had a license, was your license revoked, why... and at the bottom it says is everything you wrote true & sign, date.

I am not absolutely sure. A related question... do the insurance companies check stateside driving records when getting auto ins.?

--Islander

I know that the answer USED to be "No", but, I have heard rumors that that is not the case anymore. Islander, do you know?

i have a current suspension

can you check it out for me?i have a suspended license now and i wanted to know if it was going to be a problem once i arrive.

A little contradiction between Islander and Marty. Marty says just turn in your stateside license and Islander says take the test. Which is on target?

If you have a valid license, you take a written test to get a VI license. If you don't have a valid license, you must take the written and the road test.

I think that you're going to have trouble getting a license here with your present license suspended.

why do you say that?

In order to get insurance in the VI I had to personally go to the DMV in Illinois and purchase a copy of my official driving record and then send the to the insurance agent in the VI.

Jim

I should have explained better in my previous post as to "just exchanging". True, you DO need to take the written when exchanging a Stateside license for a VI license. You just don't have to go thru the whole rigamorole like when starting from scratch.

And, in regard to the VI checking on your previously suspended license: They were never "in the loop", so to speak, like most of the States reporting to each other. But, that has changed. If you had a Michigan driver's license suspended, and then went to Ohio, they would know that the MI was suspended and refuse you a license. Am I correct?

what happens if you just keep your stateside license and don't get a VI license?

You are supposed to switch to a VI license within 30 days of moving, but I know people that have lived here for years and years and still keep renewing their Stateside license. When they are pulled over for whatever reason, they just say that they only live here part-time and their full-time residence is in the States. It can be done. I still think the VI license is the way to go, though....it proves you are a "local"! Haha! Seriously, though, I think the police might be a little more lenient on an ex-pat that holds a VI license vs. a Statedside license.