I did something that goes against everything that is me. I let my health card expire. To be fair, I never got a renewal letter telling me to get in there, and I didn’t relish dealing with the whole getting a new photo bit. Plus I had read that because pandemic, expired health cards were still good since Service Ontario staff weren’t too keen on photographing our maskless faces, so it’s not like I was just being a lazy schmuck. But I don’t usually let things expire.
But because I worry about getting crap from some health care person about my out of date card, I decided to do what the website said and call Service Ontario to have them verify that I would still be good. Thankfully the short answer, after being on hold for a while, was yes.
But if you’re like me and worry about things like expired ID, here’s the long answer. If you call Service Ontario and ask if your health card or license or Ontario Photo Card is valid and they say it is, they can send you a piece of paper that tells anyone who cares that the card is still good. They also gave me a number of a hotline that professionals can call to check the validity of your Service Ontario-issued ID. I have that sucker in my phone now juuuuust in case. My little piece of paper has already arrived, so it’s in my purse too.
They said that they are recommending that once a person is fully vaccinated, they might want to consider getting their expired ID renewed because when the pandemic is over, there is going to be a wicked rush of people suddenly required to renew their ID’s, so it would be nice if a few people were done before the hoards descend on Service Ontario buildings. Of course, they also recommended getting an appointment rather than just lining up.
So that’s the scoop that I found. I hope it helps anyone else who just looked in their wallet and realized “Crap! my license/health card/Ontario Photo Card is expired! Am I screwed?” But maybe nobody else would do that.
