If you are the parent or guardian of someone taking driving lessons, and you are wondering why a driving test hasn't yet been booked, read on.
It is a perfectly reasonable question to ask, but the answer isn't a quick or simple one. Things aren't quite as straightforward as any of us would like.
Ok, let's start where the current industry problems began. The Pandemic.
For the vast majority of people, the Pandemic is now a distant memory. Something that happened way back in 2020. Things are pretty much back to normal and it no longer has any meaningful effect on our day to day lives.
For some industry sectors, however, the learner driver industry being one, the effects of 9 months closure are still being felt, with big practical test backlogs still in evidence.
For driving instructors and their clients, things are far from normal, and the backlogs look set to continue well into the future.
Because our circumstances are now different, the way we approach things has had to adapt to make the best of a bad situation.
Pre Pandemic, things ticked over fairly well. You could get a Theory Test in a couple of weeks and a Practical Test in 4 to 6 weeks. Back then, the supply of tests was plentiful.
That was then, now fast forward.
The Pandemic hit, and the learner driver industry was shut down completely for 9 months, with the exception of a couple of very short windows when we were allowed to work.
During that 9 months, young people continued to turn 17 and want the opportunity to learn to drive, but couldn't. For those already in the system before shutdown 1.25 million driving tests were cancelled.
Fast forward again, to the end of the Pandemic, and when the industry finally re-opened, there was a tsunami of new learners entering the system, adding to those those already in it. Quite simply, all parts of the industry were overwhelmed, and couldn't cope.
Instructors were receiving 10's, if not hundreds of calls a day from people looking to start lessons. This led to new learners having to wait many months on an instructors waiting list just to make a start.
The test system buckled under the sheer weight of demand for tests, both from the million plus candidates whose tests were cancelled, but also from new learners looking for a test.
The result is what you see now. Average waiting times across the country are between 3 and 6 months. In big towns and cities, it is closer to 6 months.
The DVSA have done their best to recruit new examiners, and at last count, they had 300 new examiners out in the field, and are still actively recruiting.
The problem of course is that you can't just plug a gap without training those new examiners, which takes up to 6 months. So there is a significant time lag between starting the qualifying process and seeing the results. As with any industry, there will also be examiners retiring or leaving the job.
So the recruitment solution is very much a long term one, and the DVSA wanted to start chipping away at waiting times sooner, rather than later.
The response has been DVSA's e-document entitled "Ready To Pass".
In my opinion, it is a well written and well overdue document. I would suggest that you take 10 minutes to read through it, because it will makes sense of, and give context to, what follows.
https://readytopass.campaign.gov.uk/
On the assumption that you have paused to read the above, you will now have an extremely good idea what the DVSA expects from both learners and instructors.
The days of badly prepared candidates "having a go" or "winging it" or "taking a punt" just to see if they can scrape through, those days are now thankfully gone.
Driving instructors are the unofficial thin blue line that now police these standards, to make sure that only test ready candidates are presented to examiners.
Let's be clear. Test ready doesn't mean someone will pass, but it does mean they possess the skill and confidence to pass. The test itself is the one part of the process that the candidate must take full ownership of for the 40 minute duration.
The aim, of course, is to reduce test waiting times by making sure that more people pass first time, rather than keep going back for re-tests, as has often been the case in the past.
I can honestly say that, in my 12 years as an instructor, I have never presented anyone for a driving test who is not completely capable of passing first time. Hopefully my Facebook and Google reviews back up my record.
Unfortunately, though, in the past, not everyone has been so thorough. The problem with this, of course, is that people taking 2, 3, 4, 5 or more tests denies others the opportunity of taking a test themselves without a lengthy wait.
Last year, there were in excess of 50,000 candidates who took 5 or more attempts to pass the test. Put another way, that's in excess of 250,000 wasted test slots that could have been used for well prepared candidates, which would have ultimately reduced the current waiting times.
So something had to change, hence the Governments new, tougher, approach, which I wholeheatedly endorse.
The message is now crystal clear. If someone isn't ready, don't take the test.
When someone calls a driving instructor for lessons, typically, the first 2 questions are always the same:
How much do you charge?
How long is it going to take?
The first one is easy, prices are on my website.
The second question is close to impossible to answer. Consider this.
Line up 10 prospective learners side by side, and just by looking at them give an estimate of the number of hours of lessons each will take to reach test standard.
By the law of averages, one or two will go through the process fairly quickly. At the other end, one or two will really struggle and take twice, possibly 3 times the amount of time to reach test standard. Then, of course, you have everyone in between.
So we could be looking at a range of somewhere between 50 and 150 hours of lessons.
Just by sight, where will each of those 10 people be on that scale?
Will the 17 year old rugby playing straight A student learn much faster than the grandmother? Will the person with a Masters Degree learn faster than the kid who dropped out of school?
These are the assumptions that people make about themselves and others all the time, but in the context of learning to drive a good percentage of those assumptions are completely wrong.
This is why my answer is always "it takes as long as it takes". Not satisfactory from the consumers point of view, but it is a truthful and honest answer. It takes as long as it takes.
If I could find a fool proof method of telling how long each persons course of lessons will take, I could sell it to the industry and retire comfortably.
The bottom line is that you cannot force someone into learning to drive to either a budget or timescale. Cutting corners will result in someone who is badly prepared and potentially unsafe. This is precisely the type of learner driver that "Ready To Pass" is aimed at.
Learning to drive is a complex skill, and the process has to be taken at a pace to suit each individual, and that is where the wide variations in training time come into play.
Done properly, you finish with a confident and competent driver who can not only pass the test but feel comfortable in a car on their own.
Done badly, you finish with someone who lacks the skill and confidence to either pass the test or drive safely on their own.
Pre-Pandemic, a course of lessons looked something like this.
Irrespective of someone's ability, take as long as required to get that person to test standard. If that means 6 months, fine. If it was a year or longer, so be it.
Irrespective of however long it took, as soon as someone was nearing test readiness we could book a driving test in the knowledge it would only be a 4 to 6 week wait, and that time was used to fine tune everything, leading usually to a successful test.
Life back then was so simple. Now to the present.
Post Pandemic, it is a very different story. Now, instructors are having to try and determine when an individual is approximately 6 months away from being test ready. For all the reasons already discussed, that is close to impossible.
Quick learners will put themselves ahead of the curve. A nice place to be. This group, however, tends to be in the minority. So 6 months may well be more than enough time.
Others may find the course and subject matter more of a challenge. This represents the majority of people who learn to drive, to be fair. A minority will really struggle. For these people, the 6 months from the date of booking, up to the test, simply may not be enough time. Therein lies the problem.
So nowadays, the timing for booking a test with a 6 month wait is, frankly, complete guesswork, particularly as that 6 months won't actually be 6 months when you factor in missed lessons for holidays, sickness etc etc. Once a test is booked, the best we can do is hope that the timing works out.
For both groups of learners, however, life is made a lot simpler if they have access to a family vehicle to continue driving outside of lessons.
For the quick learners, who get up to standard ahead of their test date, rather than continuing to pay for professional lessons they don't need, they can continue with Mum or Dad.
In doing so, those learners become very comfortable with the family car very quickly - the feel, the dimensions etc, and ultimately they take their test in that vehicle because it makes sense to do so.
For everyone else, if it becomes apparent that the clock is counting down and sufficient progress isn't being made, in some, if not all of those cases, the shortfall can be picked up through private practise.
There is a final category. Those learners who do not have access to their own, or a family car, to undertake additional practise in. This is where things can get tricky.
Once we mutually agree on a date and book it, the clock is counting down. We only have that amount of time to get where we need to be.
So, for those who do not have a family car to undertake additional practise in, I play things very cautiously by breaking the back of the course to get the candidate up to a certain standard, where they are reasonably proficient with all subjects. They won't be perfect, but they understand the subjects well enough.
When that point is reached, after discussion with the learner, we will agree to book a test in the knowledge that it will be around 6 months down the line.
We then have to keep our fingers crossed that, allowing for missed lessons due to holidays, sickness etc, we then have enough time to get where we need to.
This approach sometimes leads to questions from parents as to why someone has done X number of lessons but we haven't booked a test yet. It is a perfectly reasonable question which I hope I have answered - albeit in a very detailed manner.
By delaying the booking of a test until a certain point in the training, it is simply to try and give that person the time they need to get to the required standard in the time available. It isn't a scientific method because there isn't one. It is guesswork, pure and simple. We book a test and keep our fingers crossed.
Irrespective of the individual, in the month leading up to the test, a series of mock tests are conducted. This gives the candidate a very good idea of what to expect on the day, but it also gives the instructor and learner a very good idea how they will do in the real test.
Unfortunately, if the mock tests don't go well, as you will have read in "Ready To Pass" the only advice an instructor can give is to put the test date back. Everything I have said about the methodology used in this process is designed to minimise the number of times I have to say to someone "Sorry, you aren't ready".
Regrettably, though, there have been a couple of instances where this has been necessary. It's no fault of either the instructor or the learner. Everyone has done their best, but things just haven't worked out. If and when that happens, it is as painful for the instructor as it is for the learner, but what are the alternative options?
I appreciate that everything you have read has been a lengthy and possibly complicated read, but I hope it made sense.
It is important that parents and learners understand how things are, and why decisions are made as they are. Decisions aren't made to impede someones progress. Decisions are made because they need to be made for the benefit of the learner.
The only certainty about this whole process is the uncertainty. All we can do is our best, hope the timings work out and keep our fingers crossed.
