My driving licence is just your run-of-the-mill, ordinary, no-frills-attached number.

I need to hire a van, and my preference is long-wheel-base given the distance to be covered and the uncertainty of precise volume to be carried, although visual estimates suggest I'll be fine.

Anyway, yadda etc. Would I be, through Europecar, able to drive an LWB van on a basic driving licence?
I've tried calling the rental depot, but as is the case with these nationalised companies, it's all central switchboards and press this for that and all that frustrating sh1t.

Advice welcome.

Thank you.

probably. your allowed up to a 3.5 tonner on a standard licence i think.

Yes – done it plenty of times.

When did you pass your test?

It should say on the back of your photo license what you are and aren't allowed to drive.

Yes will be fine. You can drive up to 3.5 tons (or 7.5 tons if you passed before 97/98 ish) on a normal liscence. A standard long wheel base spinter is only 3.5 ton max weight so is fine and whatever you need you should fit in one of them. Just bare in mind that it's quite easy to overload vans (especially things like big sprinters) if your moving heavy stuff.

Excellent news. Thanks guys.

I passed in ….. erm ….. 19.. 84 or maybe '85, and have still to upgrade to the shiny photo ID numbers. Wouldn't feel so confident with a 7.5 tonner though, especially as I get further north on some of those highland roads.

Stuff being moved is not heavy, just household goods, so no overload worries either.

Now, all I need is a copy of the Sun and a boatle of Irn-Bru!

I had a LWB Luton van earlier this year for moving household stuff. ie sofa, bed and garden shed, bikes!

I will now never hire a van again without a tail lift. It made it so much easier to get stuff in.

I tried all the company websites, and then tried vanhire 3000 and got £30 or so off. Then went back to the company direct that vanhire 3000 had quoted and got another £10 off!

I had a 7.5 tonne one when I moved, and indeed had to drive up some twisty highland roads. A82 up the side of Loch Lomond was not fun in that van, not fun at all.

If it helps so that you don't hire something bigger (or smaller)than you need….

Transit/Sprinters internal load spaces are:
8ft long (SWB)
10ft long(MWB)
@12-13 feet long (LWB)

Confusingly hire co.s may consider a Medium wheel base to be 'Long' and a Long Wheelbase to be 'Extra Long' so try and get clarification. They'll all be about 4ft between the wheel arches and five wide everywhere else. At medium or long wheelbase the body will be 5 – 6ft tall too.

Some places might fob you off with a Traffic, which class for class is smaller than a transit

The biggest volume you can get on a regular license is with a Luton, with which you'll gain an extra 2ft of width a couple of feet of hight. The bodies are custom built so the length depends on the vendor – I use ones that are 14ft long but they can be as little as 10ft.

The weight of the body and tail lift is so much though that some Lutons can only carry around 750kg, half what you could carry in MWB panel van

You can drive a 7.5 tonner on your license, but not in any capacity that can be linked to work. So moving house is OK, but you can get caught out otherwise (like your pal paying you £50 to help him move house – that gets you both busted!).