You operate a taxi, dial-a-driver, shuttle or private hire vehicle(s), or you facilitate a service that connects drivers with passengers by electronic or any other means (excluding answering or call centre services), or you operate a third party facilitated cost-sharing service,? and your vehicle(s) has 12 seats or less (including the driver). Drivers for the above services must operate under someone who holds a SPSL or hold a SPSL themselves.
There are exceptions to the requirement to hold a SPSL for some operators, such as council-run carpooling schemes more information on this follows in the table below.
If your vehicle (or vehicles) seats more than 13 people you need to hold a Large Passenger Service Licence. The information below is primarily about the changes for small passenger services.
The Land Transport Amendment Act was passed on 3 August 2017 and includes a couple of changes affecting drivers and providers of large passenger services (13 seats or more, including the driver), such as buses. Other requirements for drivers and providers of large passenger services, such as vehicles requiring CoFs, remain unchanged.
From 1 October 2017, Passenger Service Licences no longer exist and are replaced by either a Small Passenger Service Licence (SPSL) or a Large Passenger Service Licence (LPSL) or both.
If you previously held a PSL, we automatically issued you with both new transport service licences at no cost.? If you do not currently have a PSL and you intend to run a passenger service using large passenger service vehicles, you need to apply for a LPSL. You need to hold a Certificate of Knowledge of Law & Practice in order to be granted a LPSL.
The P (Passenger) Endorsement course
You are still required to hold a passenger (P) endorsement in order to drive a large passenger service vehicle but you no longer need to sit a course as part of the P endorsement application process.
You must have held your full New Zealand licence for two years before you can be granted a P endorsement. No further driving test is required to get your P endorsement (previously a driver was required to re-sit a full licence test if five years had passed since the test was taken).
A small passenger service vehicle has 12 seats or less, including the driver.? For example, taxi, shuttle, app-based service, private hire service. You also need a P endorsement if you drive for a dial-a-driver service and are driving the customer’s vehicle.
To drive a small passenger service vehicle you need:
a current P endorsement, and
a current driver identification (ID) card and
a current licence for the type of vehicle you’re driving (for example, if you’re driving a car or a van, you need a class 1 licence), and
to hold a small passenger service licence, or work under someone who holds a small passenger service licence.
A large passenger service vehicle has more than 12 seats.
To drive a large passenger service vehicle you need:
a current P endorsement, and
a current licence for the type of vehicle you’re driving (for example, if you’re driving a bus with a gross vehicle mass of 10,000kg, you’ll need a class 2 licence), and to hold a large passenger service licence, or work under someone who holds a large passenger service licence.
You don't need to have an ID card to drive large passenger service vehicles.
