LoveItaly

I hope someone can answer this question. I have an older friend whose CA DL has expired very recently. Due to health issues she has not renewed her DL.

She is taking a domestic flight the end of this week. Her expired DL is the only ID that she has as she has never had a passport.

Will her expired DL be sufficient as proper ID? If not I am sure she can get the CA ID card (non DL's) but not sure if that is issued at our local DMV office or if it is mailed from Sacramento which if that is the case she would not receive it in time.

I just though of this a few minutes ago so thought I would ask here as I don't want to bring the subject up with my friend if there is no need to as she is quite anxious about her trip as it is.

Thank you in advance for your thoughts and help.

williamscb13

Have your friend get to the airport a little bit earlier than normal just in case her expired DL is not accepted. She can fly without an i.d., she will just have to undergo secondary screening which is why she should get to the airport early.

Don't know where she's flying from, but if it's someplace where people are nice, I would have her ask for help from the TSA. This of course won't work in someplace like NYC where it's a disaster, but if it's a small airport, I would certainly ask for help if she's uncomfortable with any of the security screening rules.

LoveItaly

Hello, william, yes thankfully she is flying from a small and pleasant airport, Sacramento. I had forgotten that one does not need an ID for domestic flights. She does get into a tizzy easy, especially since she has had a health problem which has caused a mutltitude of problems. I will have another talk with her tomorrow. Thanks for your good suggestion, it is truly appreciated.

gail

I would call DMV and find out if it is possible to get a renewed ID quickly - in Massachusetts if one has a digital photo stored by RMV in their data files it is not necessary to have a new one taken and an ID can be issued quickly at any local RMV - but obviously each state varies.

Our info on this matter comes from when our son lost his wallet in Wyoming and then had to fly home to MA. There is no national requirement to have an ID to fly - although every airline requires one. (I was recently told at Logan that the expired driver's license was not sufficient - but I had a current license and just had both in my wallet for some reason).

It is up to local law enforcement, not the TSA, if they will let her fly. And they can refuse. They will ask for whatever forms of ID she can present - and the more the better. Anything with a photo to supplement that would be great - so even the old license with a voter ID, credit card, library card without a photo is helpful. Does she have a car handicapped placard with photo?

In all likelihood they will let her fly. But I would try to see if she can get that ID to reduce hassle.

walkabout

I'm puzzled at the comments that you don't need ID for domestic flights. This is from the TSA website:

Effective June 21, 2008, adult passengers (18 and over) are required to show a U.S. federal or state-issued photo ID that contains the following: name, date of birth, gender, expiration date and a tamper-resistant feature in order to be allowed to go through the checkpoint and onto their flight.

Passengers who do not or cannot present an acceptable ID will have to provide information to the Transportation Security Officer performing Travel Document Checking duties in order to verify their identity. Passengers who are cleared through this process may be subject to additional screening. Passengers whose identity cannot be verified by TSA may not be allowed to enter the screening checkpoint or onto an airplane.

Is this info not correct?

Why would it be up to local law enforcement whether or not a passenger is allowed on the plane? TSA is the agency that does the monitoring and screening, and federal air marshals are the primary enforcement officers within TSA, not local law enforcement.

http://www.tsa.gov/travelers/airtrav...documents.shtm

Thanking you in advance for your response.

gail

I have no idea - who said the TSA makes sense and does not have contradictory rules. And as proof that they do have contradictory rules - the second paragraph of the above contradicts the first.

The first says you must have ID - the second says what they do to you if you don't have ID so you can fly.

As far as local law enforcement - who knows. My suspicion is that, as happened in our case, the Wyoming State Police were in a better position to contact the State of Mass registry to verify certain info without actually having the license in front of them. (But that was after we tried in vain to convince customer non-service at United that Wyoming as in fact part of the US)

I personally, having a week before travel, would not want to risk it. But if you think about it from a practical point of view, people lose IDs/wallets all the time - there has to be some way that they can get home - since home is where the replacement ID in almost all cases must be acquired. And, to add to the replacement ID issue - we were specifically told by everyone involved that a photocopy of a passport was not acceptable - since we had already had a friend break into out house and fax the front pages of our son's passport to us in Wyoming.

mztery

if it's feasible at all if you can get her to a DMV to get a california ID I BELIEVE, based on a friend's situation that they will accept the temp paper ID along with the expired picture ID of the expired license.

better q. is if she gets in a tizzy over this whet if there are any problems enroute? Wll she be OK?

walkabout

I agree that she should try to get an ID. I am uncomfortable with telling someone that they don't need an ID to fly, because in general,you do. I'm sure exceptions are made,but I would not rely on the TSA to just check me through with an extra wave of the wand. They are too inconsistent with the way they enforce policies, which themselves can be ambiguous or contradictory.

I am a former police officer, and to my knowledge local law enforcement would not have jurisdiction in this area. They may have stepped in to assist as a courtesy, but TSA has the responsibility for transportation security.

BeachGirl247

At the DMV or tag agency, I don't recall which, they have an ID that is for those that don't drive anymore. We were going to get one for my father at one point.

I would not show up with an expired license.

mrwunrfl

It is up to the TSA, not local law enforcement, that decides who can enter the checkpoint. That quote from the TSA website says exactly that.

Definitely is a good idea to get an ID. I would show up with the expired ID if that was all I had. I have done so with less.

I think it is odd that the TSA mentions expiration date in that statement above because a person's identity does not expire. It is only driving priveleges that expire.

I did show up at a TSA checkpoint without ID. I had a couple of credit cards and a police report about my lost/stolen wallet, but the agent never looked at that stuff. They just asked me a few questions: full name, zip code, date of birth. This only took a couple of minutes and I was allowed to go thru security and board my plane.

All the info that they asked for was on my driver's license. The person who found/stole my wallet could have memorized the info on my license and used on of my credit cards to get a boarding pass at a kiosk. Then he would have been able to fly as me.