Illinois restricted driving permit (hardship license)

Illinois's hardship license is the restricted driving permit: it lets a revoked driver go to work, treatment, school or the doctor — if there is no other way. After a second DUI it is also the road to a license: five clean years on it first.

What a restricted driving permit is

A restricted driving permit, or RDP, lets a person whose Illinois license is revoked or suspended drive for specific purposes. It is discretionary: the Secretary of State “may” issue one, and only where “undue hardship, as defined by the rules of the Secretary of State, would result” without it.

The Illinois “hardship license”

“Hardship license” is the everyday name; the statute's words are “restricted driving permit” and “undue hardship”. Section 6-205(c) lets the Secretary of State issue the permit only where undue hardship, as defined by the Secretary's rules, would result. A first offender in a statutory summary suspension has a different permit available — the monitoring device driving permit, whose holder “may drive for any purpose and at any time”, but only with an ignition interlock installed. The RDP is the permit for revocations and for drivers the MDDP does not cover, and it is limited to the purposes below.

What it lets you do

The statute lists the purposes. A permit may allow driving:

• between home and work, or within the scope of work duties;
• to a medical facility for necessary care, for the person or a family member in the household;
• to and from alcohol or drug treatment or rehabilitation recommended by a licensed provider;
• to classes, as a student, at an accredited institution, for the person or a household family member;
• to take children, elderly people or people with disabilities who live in the household and cannot drive to and from daycare.

Two conditions apply to every one: no alternative means of transportation is reasonably available, and the person will not endanger public safety or welfare.

How you get one

After a revocation the usual route is a formal hearing with the Secretary of State. On a written request the hearing begins within 90 calendar days, in Sangamon, Jefferson or Cook County; a filing fee of up to $50 may be charged. At the end the Secretary may continue the order and, to relieve undue hardship, issue a permit. The permit itself carries an $8 fee.

When the permit requires an interlock

For repeat offenders the permit comes with a device. A person revoked or suspended after two or more DUI convictions from separate occurrences, or two or more DUI-related actions — a conviction, a statutory summary suspension or revocation, or a 6-203.1 suspension — “if issued a restricted driving permit, may not operate a vehicle unless it has been equipped with an ignition interlock device.”

There is a fee for that too: up to $30 a month to the Secretary of State DUI Administration Fund while the device is required. A permit issued for work may allow driving an employer's vehicle without a device, but not after a second offense within five years until a year has passed under revocation or on a device-only permit.

The permit as the road to a license

After a second or later DUI, the permit is not just a stopgap. The person “may not make application for a driver's license until” they have been issued a restricted driving permit and held it for a continuous period of not less than five years during which it was not suspended, canceled or revoked — including for breaking interlock rules. Five clean years on the permit are the price of applying.

After a fourth DUI

A person convicted of a fourth or later DUI-type violation may not apply for a license at all. The one opening is a permit: at a hearing five years after the most recent revocation or release from prison, by showing with clear and convincing evidence at least three years of uninterrupted abstinence and completion of recommended treatment. That permit is interlock-only, and a later DUI conviction revokes it and bars any future permit.

RDP or MDDP?

A first offender under a statutory summary suspension is usually issued a monitoring device driving permit instead — driving for any purpose, but only with a BAIID. The RDP is for revocations and for those not eligible for an MDDP, and it is limited to the listed purposes. Illinois BAIID and MDDP compares the two permits, and Illinois license reinstatement covers the rest of the road back.

Common questions