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It's a lot of "fun" trying to get acceptable photos. Last week I went to my local American Automobile Association (AAA) office to get an International Driver's
by rconti 2y ago
It's a lot of "fun" trying to get acceptable photos. Last week I went to my local American Automobile Association (AAA) office to get an International Driver's Permit (IDP). It's just a translation of your license, which is valid for 1 year. I had to take 2 passport-sized photos with me, which I did.
But I was told they wouldn't be accepted because I had long hair and a beard in them, but short hair and no beard now. That's absurd, because it's the same photo used in both of my passports, and there's no requirement that you don't alter your appearance from your passport photo. Somehow border guards can crack the code.
Amusingly, my California driver's license shows short hair and no beard, but the AAA person wasn't even looking at my CA license at the time. What happens if I grow long hair and a beard before I travel? Was he just trying to upsell me on a $9.99 photo?
We had a hell of a time getting the UK passport authorities to accept the photos we sent in for her passport; they recommend getting your photos taken at an "official" UK location where the digital photos are identified by a code you send in. Well, we happened to be traveling through Australia during this timeframe, so we were able to stop at an Australian Post Office, which supposedly had the same "digital" system, but instead of a code to send to the UK authorities, they handed us printed photos and a web link. Thankfully I was able to use the web link to download the photo and upload it to the UK site, where it was approved almost immediately, and the new passport arrived back at our home before we returned from our trip. But there's no user-obvious criteria that was being used to reject the SEVERAL rounds of photos we had sent to the UK earlier.
- dylan604 2y ago> But I was told they wouldn't be accepted because yeah, and I would have expected nothing less. from my personal experience, the photos were required to be recent. just based on your having visited a barber would signal to me that the photos were not recent. even if you visited the barber while you waited for the 1-Hour Photo guy to finish, a logical person would realize this was not going to work out well
- rconti 2y agoThe criteria says "Two original passport pictures" ; it does not say "recent". Regardless, the photos are recent (<1yr) and my driver's license has a 5 year validity and passports 10 year validity. As an illogical person, I sometimes change my appearance over a given 10 year span. When I renew my US passport by mail, they don't actually know what I look like at the time of the renewal.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- devilbunny 2y agoIDP's are only valid for a short period of time. I suspect that money-grubbing may play a role, but the purpose of them is to let you identify yourself to police in a language (especially an alphabet) you don't speak. So perhaps it's something that clerk had heard some horror story about and was giving good advice.
- rconti 2y agoYes, I suspect the 1 year validity of the IDP plays a part here. The gentleman who said my photo wouldn't be accepted was front desk (and, apparently, photo-taking) staff; he wasn't even the person creating the IDP. I agree with you that I suspect he was trying to be helpful.
- stavros 2y agoNew photos: $9.99 Fake dressup beard: $0.99 I know which one I'd choose.
- devilbunny 2y ago$9 isn't worth being detained while on an international trip in a place where the police don't speak your language because they don't believe your photo is you. Actually, it's less expensive than the last set of passport photos I had made, so maybe I'll just go to AAA next time.
- brianleb 2y agoSo I actually shave my beard every time I get a haircut (so, let's say every 8 weeks). What does 'recent' mean, since you have already acknowledged that temporal recency is irrelevant? When am I traveling? What's accurate to my current appearance? What if I started a cancer treatment that renders me unable to grow a beard? Your flippant reply ignores reality, and these aren't even edge cases.
- dylan604 2y agoIf you are applying for a new passport where you are needing these photos, the common sense logic from the person accepting/rejecting them would be do the photos look like the person in front of them. No? Reject. Yes? Accept. The flow chart is pretty simple. The frequency of your grooming habits AFTER receiving a passport are irrelevant to the actual approval of a passport. This doesn't need to be hard.
- oneeyedpigeon 2y ago> do the photos look like the person in front of them To what ridiculous extent do you take that, though? You must be wearing the same clothes? You must be made-up in the exact same way? I think it's pretty clear that the test should be "is it obvious that the person in the photo is the same as the person in front of you" and somebody with a beard does look like themself, even when they shave that beard. Of course, this raises other interesting questions: is it OK for you to use a photo of your identical twin?
- technothrasher 2y ago> But I was told they wouldn't be accepted Huh. Last time I got an IDP from AAA, I don't think the lady behind the desk even really looked at the photo. She just took my $20, copied the info from my app to my permit, stapled one of the photos to the permit, and handed it to me. It was like less than three minutes total.
- dwroberts 2y agoThe criteria for UK stuff is normally really clear? https://www.gov.uk/photos-for-passports https://www.gov.uk/photos-for-passports Can see how it would be annoying if they don't explain which criteria is being violated though
- rconti 2y agoYeah, the criteria is clear, but do everything you can to meet it, and the online submission will just say the photo quality is "poor" (unlikely to be approved) and not explain what's poor about it. I spent a lot of time juggling aspects of the photo itself as well as of the scan (DPI, compression, etc) and nothing seemed to make a difference.
- IanCal 2y agoAnecdata from the other side, I've done a few passports for family now and it gives immediate ratings and we've not had any issue at all.
- rjh29 2y agoI took a phone selfie against a white wall and it was accepted fine.
- Macha 2y agoMy prior passport photo was taken with the Irish Passport office's manual "send in photos and someone decides if it's good enough" process they had at the time. As I always wore glasses, I wore them in my photo too, which given they didn't obscure the face, the manual check indicated they were fine. For my latest renewal, they've moved to an app based process which just flat out rejects any with my glasses on because the prescription is so strong it distorts the outline of my face (at least that's my best guess, as the app claims compatibility with glasses. Anyway, since renewing the passport to one without glasses in my passport photo, I've found I much more frequently get rejected at automated passport gates, often needing to take my glasses off so I match the passport photo better.
- ethbr1 2y ago> But I was told they wouldn't be accepted because I had long hair and a beard in them, but short hair and no beard now. Tell them your religion doesn't permit beardless photos, so you grew one for the photo. When they ask what religion, pick one with beards. It's AAA, not the police -- the person behind the desk will shrug, now with a reason not to care, and create your IDP.
- stavros 2y ago> When they ask what religion, pick one with beards. I just love this sentence.
- donw 2y agoGotta cover all the bases and tell them you're Jewslamic Rastodox Sikhamish.
- b112 2y agohttps://nationalpost.com/news/canada/pastafarian-who-fought-to-wear-pirate-hat-or-colander-in-drivers-licence-photo-scolded-by-quebec-judge https://nationalpost.com/news/canada/pastafarian-who-fought-...
- philsnow 2y ago"I can't tell you, it's one with beards and also secrets"
- 2y ago
- mr_toad 2y ago> but instead of a code to send to the UK authorities, they handed us printed photos and a web link. I had a similar experience with getting UK photos at a chemist, they said they could do digital photos and didn’t. So I went to the Photo Warehouse and it was smooth sailing. I guess the specialist photo outfits are more likely to know what they’re doing.
- TreeInBuxton 2y agoIn my recent experience renewing my UK passport, I found I was able to submit the image regardless of the complaining it gave, I just had to write a note as to why I thought the image did in fact meet their criteria. In my case, whatever detection software they used seemed to think my eyes were closed, which they were not. I just used a normal picture taken on a phone, against a plain white wall, accepted with no issues.
- sokoloff 2y agoI made my passport photos on a phone camera against a white wall, stitched them together with other family members and printed them on a 4x6 photo at CVS. I think it cost something like $0.68 for 2 photos, each of which had all four of our photos plus 2 extra spots.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- avgDev 2y agoThe IDP feels like such a scam. I have to get it every year and it is so annoying.
- csomar 2y agoIt doesn’t feel like a scam. It IS a scam. You were able to get a 3 year valid one but now they reduced it to 1 year. If my permit is valid for 10 years, so should the IDP. But then it’d cost x10 if they were to keep the same profit. So suddenly asking for close to $200 will feel outrageous. Just shows how corruption can be worse than a monetary loss.
- YZF 2y agoYou don't even need it most of the time. Almost every country will just accept a driver's license from most other countries as long as it's fairly standard and has a section in English. I've driven in dozens of countries with my local driver's license.
- jhugo 2y agoYeah, I don't bother any more, but it has happened a couple of times to me in Europe that a rental car company asked for it and then refused to rent without it. In both cases I just walked over to a different company's desk and they didn't ask.
- avgDev 2y agoI've had several companies refuse rental and ask for IDP. $20 to avoid hassles is worth it for me.
- jhugo 2y agoUnfortunately I don’t live in the country my license was issued in, so until I get a local license (which takes some time) I don’t have much choice, since the alternative is flying half way around the world to get an IDP. The whole system is a bit flawed.
- gregoryl 2y agoYour first mistake was relying on Aus Post to do anything correctly. They cna barely deliver packages.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- laurencerowe 2y agoI found the digital upload thing easier when I last renewed my UK passport since you can just take a photo with your phone and get instant feedback.
- rconti 2y agoIt's been awhile, but probably my mistake was scanning an actual high quality passport photo with a flatbed scanner rather than just halfassing it with a phone camera, since that seems to have worked so much better for everyone here!
- YZF 2y agoUnless you are traveling to some weird place almost everywhere will accept a standard driver's license if it has English on it.
- agurk 2y agoTwo 'weird' places I have visited this year that required an IDP were Japan and Taiwan.
- dizhn 2y agoIndonesia and Sri Lanka require it too.
- williamdclt 2y agoVietnam famously doesn't. You can rent a motorbike without showing any sort of license, but in the most touristic areas (eg Ha Giang loop) the police picks out foreigners to check and get their bribe. And I have a vague remembrance (take with a whole rock of salt) that foreigners from many countries technically _cannot_ legally drive there even with an IDP, because there's 2 competing IDP standards or something like that. But I'd guess you'd be fine
- jhugo 2y agoYeah, the actual law is irrelevant most of the time, since it's just a shakedown. I did encounter one cop who knew about the 2 different IDP conventions and was able to extract the coffee money even if you had one. If you don't want to pay, offering to accompany them to the station to pay there (and get a receipt) usually works, especially if you're out in the countryside, since they don't want to give up on the chance to stop a bunch of other people. If you do choose to pay, they'll usually share your license plate on a WhatsApp group with the other local police if you ask them to, so you won't get hassled again for the rest of the day.
- jon-wood 2y agoNot sure why but I'm quite tickled by the existence of WhatsApp groups to coordinate who's paid their bribe for the day. I think it's the thought of breaking the law being done in an orderly way.
- consf 2y ago[dead]
- koliber 2y agoPublic service message: in many countries, the IDP, International Driving Permit, is not needed. Since it is only a translation, it carries no official weight. Many countries that use the Latin alphabet only need a translation of the drivers license (ie IDP) if the alphabet on the driver’s license is not Latin. Check online before you travel. This can save you a trip to the AAA, a few bucks, and an encounter with a clerk who questions the validity of your beard.
- bux93 2y agoTell that to Mr. Prawo Jazdy. https://www.irishtimes.com/news/phantom-pole-haunts-garda-at-alternative-nobel-awards-1.749764 https://www.irishtimes.com/news/phantom-pole-haunts-garda-at...
- taneq 2y agoAsk them for directions to the Forest of Skund. ;)
- pmontra 2y agoAs an example, Australia wants one. I can't remember if Geneva or Vienna type or both. Last time I've been there was 2019 and my country uses the Latin alphabet too (it was invented here.) The official document is the country's of origin driving license but basically owning a valid IDP states that your country and the destination country are signatories of one of those two conventions and agree to let their own citizens drive in both countries with no need of further tests. Some countries recognize some foreign driving licenses, at least for a while, without the need of the IDP. The USA is one of them but it has been a long time since I drove a car there so it could have changed or be regulated state by state and not at federal level. The USA is a signatory of the 1949 Geneva convention.
- chgs 2y agoI’ve hired cars in Austrailia without an IDP, just my British driving license.
- 2y ago
- unit149 2y agoGeneva Convention which established IDPs in the post-war period ran parallel to measures implemented under the Marshall Plan. The regulation of road signs and establishing protocols for uniformity within the EU and 101 member states involved in its ratification paved the way for the re industrialization of the EU. https://treaties.un.org/doc/Publication/MTDSG/Volume%20I/Chapter%20XI/xi-b-1.en.pdf https://treaties.un.org/doc/Publication/MTDSG/Volume%20I/Cha...
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]