What do you need to know about 17 Seater Minibuses?
A 17 Seater Minibus is designed for 1 Driver and 16 passengers. The number of seated passengers can vary to allow for Wheelchair user access.
Some good news about 17 Seater Minibuses is they can be driven without a D1 licence if specific conditions are met. you can learn more at, “Can I drive a Minibus?”.
What is a lightweight 17 Seater Minibus?
Asking, “what is a lightweight 17 Seater Minibus?” is a great question. Lightweight Minibuses are also known as Minibus Lite.
The primary purpose of 17 Seat lightweight Minibuses is to provide a 16 passenger Minibus that can be driven without the need for a D1 licence.
It is important to note that a Lightweight Minibus with 17 Seats, can not be driven for Hire or Reward without holding a D1 licence.
Lightweight Minibuses with 17 Seats are vehicles that have been professionally adapted to allow for wheelchair access whilst keeping the gross vehicle weight (GVW) below 4.25 Tonne.
Lightweight Minibuses with 17 Seats are vehicles that have been professionally adapted to allow for wheelchair access whilst keeping the gross vehicle weight (GVW) below 4.25 Tonne.
Without the adaptions for wheelchair access, and other conditions required to drive a 17 Seat Minibus on a standard car licence. Drivers would be required to obtain the additional D1 classification on their driving licence; which can be quite costly.
Who buys or Leases 17 Seat Minibuses?
Through our years of experience in providing Minibuses we have found that 17 Seat Minibuses are popular across, Schools & Education, Care & Nursing, Charities and other industries.
Most popular with Schools, Education, Care and Charity Minibus operators are the lightweight version of 17 Seat Minibuses. It is across these sectors where Minibuses are regularly not driven for Hire or Reward and also most often meet the other requirements for driving without a D1 Licence.
Your Minibus Your Way…
Many Minibus operators with a D1 licence opt for 17 Seat Minibuses as they offer the greatest diversity in carriage options. As you may expect in order to accommodate 17 seats, we tend to use the larger L3 and L4 vehicles. These can be provided from a range of manufacturers vehicles including:
With the additional GVW of a 17 Seat Minibus there are a range of options to customise the Minibus to your requirements, see a few of the options below:
- 4.2 split onboard platform ramp
- Automatic electric cassette side step, located under side loading door
- Twin step system on service door (manually operated cassette type)
- Seatbelt Alert System
- Rear saloon diesel fired Eberspacher heater
- Isofix system (per seat)
- Hardwired HD Dash Camera
- CCTV basic single camera system
- Additional CCTV Cameras
- Reverse parking camera
- Front parking sensors
- Rear parking sensors
- Single overhead luggage rack
- Twin overhead luggage racks
- Twin foldout handrail system, to aid boarding at service door, with accompanying vanity panel
- Left hand grab pole
- Right hand grab pole (can only be ordered with left hand pole)
- 4-way pop up emergency roof hatch
Speak with the experts..
To ensure you purchase the right Minibus with 17 Seats talk to our expert team.
What about Short-Term Rental?
Great News! Through our sister company CVM World Rentals, we offer a range of 17 seater Minibuses on short-term hire.
