THE Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency (DVLA) has announced employers will soon be able to check the validity of employees’ driving licences for free via its online service.
Fleet decision-maker organisation, ACFO, is claiming work with the DVLA in the development of its Share My Driving Record (SMDR) web-based service has led to the victory for small businesses and larger SMEs operating small fleets.
The move comes following the Government’s decision to abolish the paper counterpart of the photocard driving licence by 2015.
Once paper counterparts have been abolished, the DVLA may no longer need to rely on a driver’s “explicit consent to legitimately process their sensitive personal data for driver entitlement checking purposes”.
Currently, to meet the requirements of the Data Protection Act 1998, driver data can only be disclosed for driver entitlement checking purposes with the explicit consent of the data subject.
Consent is valid for up to three years and, in most cases, is recorded on a paper mandate for audit purposes.