Category - ADI

Theory Test Study And Practice

30/07/2019

Driving Test Success I recently saw an ADI claim that theory test apps are no good because they “only cover 5%” of the possible questions. It’s yet more complete bollocks from so-called “professionals”, and is only true – and even then, only partially – if you (or your pupil) is an idiot.

The only app I recommend to all my pupils is Driving Test Success (DTS), which is published by Focus Multimedia. I have no affiliation with Focus whatsoever – though an agent of theirs did once contact me offering such a relationship, but I never heard from him again. The full version of DTS contains all the official DVSA revision materials, and unless they are telling lies, that means exactly what it says. They also do a free “taster” version, and that only contains about a third of the total questions in the official question bank (that’s about 30%, and not 5%).

Most of my pupils buy DTS if they haven’t already got something else – some will already have the DVSA one, which is perfectly OK, and which also contains all the relevant revision material. They all pass if they use either of these.

The important word in all this is “buy”. If you wanted to get hold of the raw bank of official questions from DVSA and use it or distribute it in any way, you’d have to pay. I know, because I have looked into it myself. You can register and get the question bank for free to play around with, but the moment you start giving anyone access to it you have to pay a licence fee per unit/user to the to DVSA. If you wanted the Hazard Perception (HPT) clips, it’d cost you £800 up front just for those. You have to be approved to get the raw materials in the first place, and I asked if licensing charges would still apply if I only gave access to my own pupils. They said it would. So any official revision software would incur those same costs for the publisher.

Several years ago, I had advised a pupil to get DTS for his phone. I specifically said to get the one that cost £4.99, and not to download the free one, because it was just a trial version that didn’t have all the questions in it (at the time, it may well have contained only around 5% of the full question bank). He subsequently kept failing his theory test, and I was pulling my hair out as to why – I asked him about his school lessons, possible dyslexia and stuff, everything. He assured me there were no issues, and that he was getting 100% every time he did a mock test. After he failed for about the sixth time with a score that you could have bettered by guessing, something clicked, and I asked “how much did that app cost you?” He replied “oh, nothing. It was free”. I think my reply was something along the lines of “you prat! I told you that was a trial version”.

It turned out he’d been answering the same incomplete sample of questions over and over again (he said he wondered why he kept seeing the same ones). It was no wonder he was getting 100%. Once he bought the full version – with all the questions in it – he passed the next time.

ADIs who make stupid claims about apps only containing 5% of the questions must be of a similar mentality to that pupil. They expect free versions to be the full monty, and stupidly assume that when they aren’t then this must be true of all apps whether paid for or not. God only knows how they qualify as ADIs if they are so dumb. I figured out what “trial” meant the first time I saw it – particularly when there was the paid-for version sitting right next to it in the Android market, prompting the immediate question: why?

The only thing you need in order to pass the Theory Test is the DTS Bundle. It costs £4.99, and includes the Hazard Perception (HPT) clips. The official DVSA one is also fine and costs the same, though I haven’t used it in a long while.

There are some free ones which claim to contain all the questions, though those I’ve seen don’t have the HPT included. They contain advertising and “in-app purchases”. As I say, someone somewhere has to pay.

Frankly, for the sake of £4.99, and the risk failing the £23 Theory Test a few times because you didn’t have the right revision resources, you should stop pissing about and just buy it.

DVSA Corrects Media (And ADIs)

26/07/2019

DOAADI

ADI, Driving Tests, DVSA, News

A few days ago, the media was awash with reports about how the driving test pass rate had plummeted, and it was all because of the “new parallel parking manoeuvre” that had been introduced. It was a great opportunity for ADIs who have been against “it” from the start to give their two penn’orth.

Although the link above was from The Telegraph, the Daily Mail ran the same illiterate crap, and several others followed. Comic news site, Yahoo, even went so far as to blame the same “new” manoeuvre on a separate FOI request, which revealed one candidate took 21 tests in a single year.

It seems that in the world of newspapers, someone who has just been given their first job in journalism does one of these FOIs every year. I think it must be some sort of induction test to make sure they can fill in an online form properly. And every year, without fail, there is someone somewhere who has taken an ungodly number of tests before passing (and some of them still haven’t passed, even then). It is a separate statistic which is independent of how easy or hard the test is. It merely shows that just as some people are crap journalists, there are others who are crap drivers and perhaps ought never to be allowed to drive. Ever. But it is separate.

The really laughable part is the reference to this “new parallel parking manoeuvre” – all the more laughable since there are ADIs who have allowed themselves to be associated with the claims. Because there IS no new parallel parking manoeuvre! Even some joker representing a querulous organisation which, in a previous incarnation, specialised in stirring things, ranted about how “dangerous” it is without clarifying the glaring naming error (perhaps because he didn’t know himself).

What there actually is is a piss-easy manoeuvre which involves checking your mirrors and looking ahead to make sure it’s clear, pulling over on the right-hand side of the road, then reversing back a couple of car lengths without ending up on the pavement or on the other side of the road again, and finally driving off and going back over on to the correct side safely. It’s the kind of thing any 17 year old is going to be doing 5 minutes after he passes when he sees one of his mates on the other side of the road.

The manoeuvre is referred to as “pulling up on the right”, “stopping on the right”, or similar phrases. And it is not a “parallel parking manoeuvre”.

It’s only dangerous if people haven’t been taught to do it properly. Mine have to do it on busy roads in Long Eaton and with oncoming/passing/parked lorries on a busy industrial estate in Colwick, and the only problem I’ve had was when someone decided for reasons not even known to himself to turn the wheel on to half lock as he reversed and veered outwards (and since he didn’t notice until I showed it to him on the dashcam, it was probably best he was caught early anyway). A disproportionate number of tests seem to include it, and I thought they’d pull back on it after the original introduction – where virtually every test did it – but they haven’t.

The media has claimed that the pass rate has plummeted. They base this ridiculous statement on something like the graph at the top of this article – which shows the national pass rate for the last three years. I have carefully adjusted the axes to make it look as bad as possible, just like pretty much every journalist does when they’re talking about numbers. Yet it is only a little over 1% decline over three years. If you ignore the fact that life has been going on for more than the last three years, it looks like the pass rate is on a downward slope into oblivion – even if it would take over 40 years to get to zero at the rate it is going.

However, if you look at pass rates since the introduction of the driving test in 1935, a completely different story emerges.

I cut these data down to one approximately every 5 years up until 2007, and from there on the data are yearly. Because of that, and also because I started the y-axis at 20% instead of 0%, they look a bit more dramatic than they are (i.e. the right half of the graph covers 19 years, whereas the left half covers 65 years – imagine the 1935-2000 part stretched out to three times wider).

Something odd happened between 1975 and 1990, and between 1990 and 2000 (a rise followed by a fall). But since 2000 the pass rate has been virtually flat – hovering between 44% and 47%. It is currently at about 46%, and there are no blips or drops worth a mention (i.e. any changes to the test have neither improved or worsened pass rates to any significant extent).

As I said, the top graph shows what you can do if you don’t represent data properly, and the message that comes across if you’re an ADI or journalist who doesn’t understand data is both confused and wrong.

The only time the pass rate has been significantly higher than it is now was in a different era. No internet, no smartphones, dial phones wired to the house, two postal deliveries a day (one of them before you got up), bottled milk on the doorstep, outside toilets, bin men who actually carried bins overflowing with filth and tipped them in the back of a truck, anything up to 1,000 times fewer cars on the road, no motorways, no roundabouts, and so on. DVSA does itself no favours harping on about training standards being the issue when the pass rate is hovering around 45%. It’s just the norm, and has been for almost 20 years – and up to more than 50 years if you allow a few percent extra variance.

One thing is certain. The pass rate has not fallen (or risen) significantly for the last 20 years. And the proper graph clearly shows its not likely to change much in the next 20 either – unless some idiot forces it to. I try not to say bad things about them, but I’m sure DVSA is disappointed that the 2019 data point isn’t joined by an almost vertical line up at 90%, and will likely blame this on poor training again.

Oh, I almost forgot to mention. The reason I wrote this is that DVSA has had to send out an email correcting the false media stories.

Sheep in the Highway Code

12/07/2019

DOAADI

ADI

People often find the blog on something to do with sheep. The latest made me smile – it was “what should you do when passing through a sheep”. The mind boggles, but I know (I think) what they meant.

The word “sheep” isn’t specifically mentioned in the Highway Code in this context, but the following rule is the relevant one (it comes under “other road users”):

Rule 214

Animals. When passing animals, drive slowly. Give them plenty of room and be ready to stop. Do not scare animals by sounding your horn, revving your engine or accelerating rapidly once you have passed them. Look out for animals being led, driven or ridden on the road and take extra care. Keep your speed down at bends and on narrow country roads. If a road is blocked by a herd of animals, stop and switch off your engine until they have left the road. Watch out for animals on unfenced roads.

It’s happened to me before where I’ve rounded a bend on a country lane and the road is blocked by a herd of sheep being moved from one field to another (twice in 18 months, though I haven’t had one for a few years now). I’ve also come across sheep just wandering on the road in the Peak District, and one time a lamb had escaped from a field and was being chased by someone trying to recover it.

I’ve also encountered cows browsing on the bushes on the outside of their field (I’m not sure who shit themselves the most that time I came round a bend on a single track road – me, or the bullock that had got through a fence, a stream, and then a hedgerow to meet up with me). Then, of course, you have horse riders – the normal ones who give you a wave, and the ones with attitude problems who take racehorses out.

In the case of the sheep being herded, I stopped and turned off my engine (and had a quick chat with the farmer who was at the front, and who explained to me that the quad bike they were using was cheaper to run than a sheepdog). If they were just wandering around in small groups, I passed slowly, keeping my eye on them. In the case of the lamb, I stopped, then put my hazard lights on when I saw a car come over the brow of a hill behind me.

What should you do when passing sheep on the road?

Someone found the blog with this question recently. It’s from the theory test, and the correct answer is to slow down and drive carefully. In reality, though, stopping and turning off your engine is often the best course of action, so make sure that’s not an option if you see this question.

Should you report a sheep in the road?

Of course you should, if it’s running loose from a fenced field or on a main road (as opposed to being herded by someone), and clearly shouldn’t be there. Someone could get killed. Use your own common sense – I’m no expert on sheep, but I know if one’s meant to be in the road or not.

This doesn’t apply to extremely rural roads, such as in the Peak District, where there are no fences and sheep wander freely across roads. You just drive with care and deal with them as necessary.

Who should you report it to?

Assuming it shouldn’t be there – and bear in mind what I said about places like the Peak District, where sheep do roam across roads – I would either report it to the farmer (if I knew where the farm was), or the police (if I didn’t, or if there was a significant danger).

A sheep on rural road isn’t the same as one on the M1.

I’ve never had to report sheep, but I’ve reported cows on a few of occasions – all times, to the farmer.

Sequential versus Block Gear Changing

22/06/2019

DOAADI

ADI, Training

This often crops up with my pupils, especially when mum or dad is involved in their driving practice.

Back in the day, the standard way new drivers were taught to slow down was to change down through the gears sequentially, using the engine to slow the car down after each change, then completing the stop using the brakes. One of the main reasons it was done like this was because of ‘brake fade’ – a phenomenon whereby the brakes worked less effectively as they got hotter, which happened if prolonged (especially downhill) or harsh braking occurred.

In those days, most brakes were drum brakes. In these, the brake shoes are semi-enclosed and not easily cooled by air flow. Nowadays, most cars have disc brakes at the front, which have an open design and so are readily cooled by air passing over them. Furthermore, technology has improved significantly, and the materials used to make brakes and brake pads are much less prone to the problem of brake fade than their counterparts from the latter half of the last century were.

To do sequential changing properly requires good anticipation and forward planning. The whole point is that with each gear change down, the clutch needs to come up to allow the engine to slow the car down. And here lies the problem – mum and dad only know about 4-3-2-1, but don’t understand why, so little Johnny is taught to simply de-clutch about 200m away from the approaching traffic lights, and carefully move the gear lever from 4, to 3, to 2, then to 1st gear while coasting the whole distance.

It seems to have escaped a lot of people’s notice, but we are now well into the 21st century and, as such, Driving: The Essential Skills (TES), says:

As a general rule, use the brakes to reduce speed before changing down to the most suitable gear for the lower speed.

In the early stages of learning to drive, it may help you to become familiar with the gearbox if you change down through each of the gears in turn. Be guided by your instructor.

It also adds:

Missing out gears at the appropriate time will give you more time to concentrate on the road ahead and allow you to keep both hands on the steering wheel for longer.

Changing down

As a general rule, it’s preferable and safer to brake to the desired speed and then change down into the appropriate gear. It might be necessary to maintain a light pressure on the footbrake while changing down.

That’s quite clear. Current practice is to use the brakes to slow the car down, then change into whatever gear you need for the new speed (although sequential changing is still perfectly OK if it’s done properly). Since many modern cars have 5 or 6 gears, it is quite feasible to slow down in 6th from 70mph and just de-clutch near the end to a stop (actually, you might be pushing your luck a little if you do this from 6th, and may have to drop it down a gear or two part way through, but it will certainly do it from 4th or 5th). You will also note that TES says you can brake at the same time you’re changing gears – if you end up with an instructor who insists on teaching you how to be a police pursuit driver because he’s got a copy of Roadcraft, and who won’t let you brake at the same time you’re changing gears, find another one quickly!

Missing out gears is referred to as ‘selective’ or ‘block changing’. It is absolutely OK to do it – in fact, it is the preferred method, and it is certainly a lot easier to do than sequential changing (but I stress again, sequential changing is fine if it’s done right). You have far less to worry about, which is good for learner drivers.

Unless you are due to take part in the next British Grand Prix, or somehow get access to a time machine and decide to go and live in the 60s, forget about brake fade – you’re not going to experience it except in the most extreme of circumstances.

As an aside, I saw someone post on a forum some highly misleading information about brake fade, and everyone immediately believed him. Brake fade of the kind normal people experience does not cause irreversible damage to your brake pads. Brake fade is usually reversible, and is simply a result of them overheating – going away once they cool down.

I mean, if it was really as terminal as this guy suggested, every car on the roads in the 60s and 70s was pretty much unstoppable by the driver.

As another aside, I recently saw someone comment how they had given refresher lessons to an older driver and had “had to stop them changing sequentially”. This is totally unnecessary – sequential changing is perfectly acceptable if it is done properly, and there is absolutely no reason whatsoever to change someone’s driving style if that’s how they were originally taught.

A few years ago, I taught a woman in her late 40s who had ridden a motorbike her whole life, but who wanted to switch to a car now she was older. She’d taken lessons 30 years ago, and had apparently got to pretty much test standard. Best of all, it came back to her quickly (though she was nervous). She changed gears sequentially, and she did it beautifully – I didn’t make even the slightest attempt to stop her because she did it so well. She passed first time with a couple of driver faults – which were nothing to do with the gears.

Sequential gear changing is perfectly OK.

Pupil Referral Companies

18/06/2019

DOAADI

ADI

I got an email recently from a company which supplies pupils. I don’t have any real problem with places like this (as long as they aren’t ripping people off), but one thing about it made me smile.

The article “Should I Become A Driving Instructor?” is very popular, and one point I make in there several times – indeed, I mention it frequently on the blog – is that independent instructors often go to great lengths to stress how successful they are when they’re advising newly-qualified ADIs on how to start out in the business. “Go independent”, they say. “I did it, and I’ve never looked back”, they add.

So the funny thing is that over the last few weeks, I’ve noticed a lots of these people asking on social media if pupil supply companies are any good! I know of at least one who has already signed up to the company that emailed me.

I’d have thought that if you were the mega-successful independent you’ve been claiming to be all this time, who only has to blink to get all the pupils he/she wants, thus making franchises redundant, you wouldn’t need a service like this – and especially not when there are pupils falling out of the sky right now. I mean, by having to rely on such a service, you’re halfway towards towards being franchised, because you’re certainly not doing it all “independently”. Supplying your own pupils is the key detail in being “independent”.

Doing a bit of checking as a result of the email I received (you have to poke around a bit) it seems that each referral costs £18. It’ll be interesting to see how long they can keep that up, because I’d bet money that it will rise to £20 or £25 over the next year or two. At the current rate they’re charging, it won’t be high-margin for them, and I would imagine it is dependent on them signing up enough instructors in the area to meet a target in their business plan.

I’ve said before that the driving instruction business is a mature one, and the maximum prices you can charge are pretty much capped in any given location. It isn’t a high margin business, and the best profits are to be had from keeping your overheads down. As far as the entire pupil supply chain is concerned, introducing a stage where someone finds the pupil and farms them out adds a layer of additional cost, and someone has to be paid to do it – meaning someone has to pay for it to happen. The instructor takes the hit, and each pupil referral is equivalent to a lost hour of income.

Points On Your Provisional Licence

12/06/2019

DOAADI

ADI

I’m proud of the fact that I have never had any points on my driving licence. That’s not to say that when I was a newly-qualified 17-year old I was some sort of angel, but as the years have gone by I have become… well, as I already said. Proud. And I always try to convey that to my learners, so that they can aim for the same record.

On lessons I am always aware of the locations of speed cameras and the pupil’s speed around them. This usually results in them asking what would happen if we were flashed on a lesson, and many are surprised to learn that it is the driver who gets the fine and the points. I then explain that if it ever happened in my car, although I wouldn’t legally be able to take the points, I would cover the fine (as long as they weren’t being completely stupid over something).

Many years ago, when I was still a naïve new instructor, I had a pupil who had her test booked but who wasn’t really ready for it. She was from overseas, and just wanted to take it. On the morning it was booked, among other issues, she was moving into and out of junctions at a snail’s pace and causing problems for traffic. Now, she had a serious attitude problem, and on one particular corner after I explained again that she needed to move away more briskly, she deliberately floored it and before I knew what was happening we were doing almost 50 on a residential road with oncoming vehicles. I used the dual controls and pulled her over. After some polite discussion, with both of us knowing full well she’d done it on purpose (but not actually saying it), I simply told her she was not going to test, but that I would cover the test fee. That was the precise moment when I stopped acting as a hire service for desperately bad drivers.

The point of that story is that if we had been caught speeding in that situation, or one like it, I certainly wouldn’t have covered the fine.

I go on to explain that if it could somehow be shown that I was forcing the pupil to break the limit, then I might face a separate charge of “aiding and abetting”, but that isn’t likely to happen in the first place, so it isn’t an issue we need to worry about. Having said that, a couple of years ago I took on a new pupil who had been learning for some time with a local (and very long-serving) instructor up this way, and she told me he had a stick in the trunk of the car that he used to reach over and push the driver’s foot on to the accelerator with if they were going too slow! Make of that what you will.

The next question they ask concerns any points they might get. Many of them are surprised to learn that you can get points on your provisional licence, though it naturally follows from that earlier thing I mentioned where the driver is always held accountable. You can get banned whilst still on a provisional licence (you can get banned even if you don’t have a licence at all). It is worth pointing out that there is technically no limit to the number of points you can get on your provisional. It’s just that when you reach 12, it has to go to court, but any ban is at the discretion of the court, and probably would involve being banned.

While you are still on a provisional licence, you will normally receive a ban if you accrue 12 or more “live” points within any 3-year period. The ban is usually for six months.

When you pass your test, there is a two year probationary period during which you’re only allowed a maximum of six points before receiving a ban.

If you have any points on your provisional, these will be carried over on to your full licence. Since you could have as many as 11 points on your provisional and not receive a ban, that doesn’t mean you’re automatically banned when you pass. You’re simply in sudden-death mode – where even a single point after that will result in a ban. Since you’re looking at a minimum of three points for speeding or traffic light jumping, having just three points carried over still leaves you in sudden-death mode until those carried-over points expire.

Any points on your licence are considered to be “live” for three years from the date of the offence (some serious offences can stay live for 10 years – those involving drink-driving or drugs being one example). After this, they are considered as “spent”, but they remain on your licence for a further year. When they’re spent, they aren’t included in any totting up if you were to get caught again. However, if you’re after a job which involves driving (and in a lot of cases, even if it doesn’t), having a licence which tells people the kind of person you have been may well prevent you from getting the job. So any points, whether live or spent, can be a serious problem.

And don’t forget that if you do something that warrants it, you could get banned immediately for a first offence, and it could be for longer than six months.

Remember that your provisional licence simply allows you to use the road, so it doesn’t matter if any points are acquired while you were riding a moped. I once had a pupil who had six points on his provisional. Both sets of three were due to speeding on his moped, and both were from the same speed camera. Even better, the camera was about 100 metres from his house along the Long Eaton high street in front of shops, schools, churches, etc. The reason it had happened (twice) was that he “didn’t know it was only 30mph on that road”. When he passed, he was in sudden-death mode for the next two years.

What happens if I pass when points are about to expire?

They get carried over and expire at the same time they would have done if you hadn’t passed. I can guess what you’re thinking, and there is no point whatsoever in delaying your test if you have live points about to expire. They’ll still expire, but will remain on your licence for a further year.

If you need a clean licence for some reason, there is nothing you can do about points until the fourth (or eleventh) year has passed.

While points were only shown on the now-obsolete paper part of your licence, there might have been some merit waiting until the end of the fourth (or eleventh) year before taking a test so that your new licence was clean, thus relieving you of the hassle of updating it all. But these days the checks are electronic, and if there are any points on your licence that are less than four (or eleven) years old, anyone who needs to check will automatically know.

If you commit an offence, you will get points that last for either three or ten years. They are kept on record for a further year after that. If you were guilty, there is nothing you can legally do to get them off, and no legal or honest way of preventing anyone who needs to know seeing them.

Why aren’t you taught this when you’re doing ADI training?

Well first of all, the people providing all the stupid wrong answers are ADI’s themselves – many of whom will be training other people to become ADIs. So there’d be a problem right from the start if they were teaching it. Come to think of it, it might be part of the problem right now if some of them are.

But the information doesn’t really come under ADI training per se, and is something that anyone who is training to become an instructor should find out for themselves. I mean, our training doesn’t cover the Highway Code in detail – it’s just assumed that someone who is training to become an ADI has read and understood it when they prepared for the Part 1 test.

I guess the biggest difference is that I get my information either from solicitors, or directly from DVLA (or DVSA if appropriate), and not from other ADIs on social media or web forums. If I get two different answers, I question further until I find the right one, and don’t just pick the one I like best.

The New Test and Satnavs

06/06/2019

DOAADI

ADI, Driving Tests, DVSA, Training

This article was first published in January 2018, then updated in November of the same year. However, I noticed someone asking on a forum recently what model of TomTom was used. He was given a lot of inaccurate and misleading information.

It was announced mid-2017 – sometime before the 4 December start date – that when the DVSA introduced satnavs as part of the independent driving section, the model the examiners would be using was going to be the TomTom Start 52.

After briefly considering buying one, I decided against it. I’ve used standalone satnavs before, and the problems with mounting them and all the bloody cables has pretty much put me off for life. Even the latest ones are just too bulky to sit anywhere unobtrusively.

In the more recent past, if I’ve ever needed to navigate somewhere, I just use Google Maps in one of its forms on my smartphone. In the weeks leading up to 4 December 2017, I tried using it with pupils. It works (if you know what you’re doing), but its choice of route can be creative to say the least. And it isn’t the most chatty of navigation apps. Worse still is the inability to save pre-determined routes – and that’s essential for a driving instructor.

More recently still, I tried using the built-in satnav in my Focus on lessons. For me, it works. But the graphics are in Super Mario territory, and it also can be rather creative with its suggested routes. It can’t save pre-determined routes, and the erratic split-screen thing it does at unfathomable times is confusing to pupils. And I think the most recent map updates were drawn up by personally Christopher Columbus, because they don’t include road features installed within the last couple of years.

The more I thought about these issues as they pertain to pupils, the more I realised that the only realistic way forward was to use a TomTom in order that pupils wouldn’t be intimidated by a different looking map, different instructions, or different voices. I asked TomTom if there were any plans for an approved app that would run on Ford’s software. It seems that they did have an arrangement with Ford to develop such an app at one point, but that fell through for some reason.

Then I came across the TomTom GO app for Android. It turns your phone into a fully-blown TomTom satnav, with the added benefit of a high-res display (see the screen capture, above). TomTom GO gives you 50 miles of free navigation per month, but that gets used up in a couple of hours on lessons, so it is useless. However, you can subscribe for about £5 per month, or £15 for a full year, and get unlimited navigation (you can also subscribe separately to other TomTom services). You get unlimited world maps for this, and any updates are included. I bought the year subscription – it means I can have an absolutely up-to-date satnav all the time. A standalone one would cost ten times as much and be out of date within a year or so, as far as the base unit is concerned.

A massive additional benefit of using a TomTom (other than pupils hearing the same voice they will hear on test) is that by logging into your TomTom account on your PC or laptop you can create entire routes using a drag-and-drop map and save them. They sync automatically to all your devices through your account, and so appear in your list of saved routes. This is how DVSA has created the routes it uses. The benefit of these pre-determined routes is that you can force a specific journey around specific roundabouts or road features, rather than have the satnav try and re-route you through a shorter route to a specific destination. Of course, you can also save favourite places – like test centres or retail parks – and just set one of those as a destination and let the pupil follow whatever route the satnav comes up with. It’s all extremely flexible.

The TomTom GO app speaks through the vehicle audio system via your smartphone’s Bluetooth link (if you set it up that way).

How are pupils managing with the satnav?

At the time I started teaching it for the test, some of those I expected to have problems took to it remarkably well. A year down the line, I don’t even think about that anymore. It’s just part of what I have to teach them.

How much training does it take?

Very little, actually. The vast majority of pupils find the satnav easier to follow.

When I first started teaching it, I was planning to do it a lot. However, I now find that I bring it in nearer to their test and don’t worry about it before then. As I say, most take to it like ducks to water, so there’s no point me behaving as though ducks can’t swim.

You don’t need a TomTom

True. However, like it or not, my job is to get pupils ready for their tests, and I do that by focusing on road layout in Nottingham and not those in, say, Birmingham or Glasgow. To that end, it also makes sense to use a TomTom instead of something cheaper or just what I happen to own at the time.

It doesn’t matter what satnav pupils use

Also true – for most of them. Like I say, most take to it easily – but a few don’t. I just like to remove that variable from the equation. A significant number, for example, already have problems with roundabouts in a lesson and driving test context, so why risk them freaking out on test with unfamiliar instructions from a satnav they haven’t used before?

An example of that is the screen position and layout of the advance warning a satnav gives. If it is different on the one they are using on lessons compared to the TomTom one used on tests, they may get confused.

Like it or not, many of our pupils reach test standard by the skin of their teeth. Unlike instructors (if they were taking the test), pupils approach it from the bottom up because they are beginners. That’s why I prefer to keep directional instructions as close to those they will experience on test as possible.

You might see things differently, and that’s fine. I see it my way and teach accordingly.

ADI Licence Renewal

14/05/2019

DOAADI

ADI, DVSA

This article is now obsolete, as it partly dates from 2010 and includes details up to 2018. I have written a new article outlining my badge renewal in 2022. Things are slightly easier now.

My ADI badge was due for renewal in October 2018. I got the initial alert that my DBS check (formerly the CRB check) needed to be renewed in early April – 6 months before my badge expired. This alert came from DVSA via email.

I applied for my DBS immediately online. DVSA supplies you with a PIN number and a secret word. You apply via an online form.

Once you have completed your DBS application, you take a printout of the completed form along with the necessary documents to a Post Office branch that does identity/document checks (you can find a branch at GOV.UK). Note that your local Post Office will almost certainly not have this facility – you will need to go to one likely to be situated in the middle of a large city, with no easy parking, and with queues of people with prams and other annoying things, doing what people who use Post Office branches in the first place usually do. In other words, be prepared for a long wait.

This article is obsolete. I’ve written a new article for my badge renewal in 2022.

Be careful with your initial DBS application. I am paperless, so had to go to my bank separately to get an official bank statement printed out as one of my check documents. You have to physically put the date of the statement on your application form – even though it is clearly printed on the actual statement. The problem is that you can only use a date in the past, so get the statement first, then fill the form in the next day. Trust me: if the statement date is today or in the future, the online system won’t let you proceed, and if you try to post date it, the Post Office will reject it because the dates won’t match.

When I did mine in October last year, I used my driving licence as a check document (and you probably will be, too). At that time, the date you had to physically enter on the form was the date you passed your test. It was NOT, as you might reasonably expect (as I did), the “valid from” date on the front of your licence (i.e. when you last did your photo update). It was totally f—ing stupid, but that’s how it is, and it isn’t explained anywhere that I could find (nor was it such an issue any of the previous times I had a CRB/DBS check done). The woman at the Post Office told me it catches a lot of other people out , too. Basically, if you don’t remember the exact date you passed your test (and I bloody well didn’t), you have to infer the date from the list of entitlements on the back of it.

As an update to the date on your licence thing, a reader emailed me recently (May 2019) and told me that he had used his pass date, as I outlined above, and the idiots had rejected it and wanted his “valid from” date from the front of the licence. He tells me he was shown the document dated January 2019, so it seems the morons have moved the goalposts and not told anyone. Just be aware of this if yours is due – it looks like the required date is now the one on the front of the licence, which it definitely wasn’t when I did it (though it should have been)!

This article is obsolete. I’ve written a new article for my badge renewal in 2022.

It’s a stupid system, because the dates on bank statements and driving licences are integral to those documents, and all you are effectively being checked on is whether they caught you out when asking you to write them down on a separate form. It’s even more stupid when you get it wrong, and the Post Office worker shows you how to fill it in properly with the correct figures, so you go away (you have to generate another form) and make the corrections. There is no security aspect to it whatsoever.

I used my passport, my driving licence, and a bank statement as my check documents. I had recently had to apply for a new passport and used this instead of my birth certificate (which has to be an original, and not a copy like mine is).

My DBS certificate came through about seven days after the document check was completed (the check at the Post Office triggers your application process). It costs £6.00 for the service.

Now we come to the actual renewal of your Green Badge. There is no warning later in the year from DVSA – it’s up to you to keep track of your application.

Every Green Badge expires on the last day of whatever month you originally registered in. You apply to renew as soon as possible in the month in question. In my case, with my badge expiring on 31 October, I had to apply any time from 1 October (I would not have been allowed to do it on 30 September).

This article is obsolete. I’ve written a new article for my badge renewal in 2022.

You simply log into the IRDT system – which every instructor should have access to – and make your application. You will need to provide the number on your DBS certificate, which DVSA will have a copy of/access to. You need a means to make payment (credit or debit card). It costs £300. I applied for mine on 1 October, and it was issued and is now current since 2 October. It arrived in the post 5 October, and has an expiry date of 31 October 2022. All set for another 4 years, now.

To summarise. Assuming you have a credit or debit card, and are not still holding out against technology and the internet, the times taken to actually get both the DBS and your new badge are very short. The documentation and chasing around required for the DBS application is a right pain in the arse, so plan ahead. Application for the Green Badge is simple.

On the other hand, if you insist on using paper money or cheques, won’t use the internet, or want to kick up a stink about which photo you want on your badge… good luck with that. I have no idea what to do in those circumstances.

This article is obsolete. I’ve written a new article for my badge renewal in 2022.

DVSA: Find Your Lost Theory Test Certificate Number

05/05/2019

DOAADI

ADI, Driving Tests, DVSA, Tips

I wrote this article way back in 2012. At the time, DVSA had just launched a new facility where you could find your Theory Test Certificate (TTC) number online if you’d lost the paper sheet. Here’s the link to the feature on GOV.UK.

You need the number if you’re going to book your practical test – and note that I said the number, not the certificate itself.

A lot of pupils get worried that they need to take the actual TTC to their practical test, though. By that time, many will have lost or misplaced it (quite a few of mine have, and we usually only find out the night before or on the day, which allows me to wind them up a little). Indeed, the booking confirmation you get when you book your practical says you should take your licence and TTC along with you.

In all the years I have been an instructor, I can think of only one or two occasions where the examiner has asked to see it – and those were at least ten years ago. More recently, when a pupil has offered the TTC along with their licence, the examiner isn’t interested. They only want to see the licence.

If you think about it, you wouldn’t be able to book your practical if you hadn’t passed the theory, so it’s obvious you have done when you turn up on test day.

When any of my pupils starts to fret over not being able to find their TTC – and after I’m finished winding them up – I tell them the examiner won’t ask for it, and even if he or she does, just say that you didn’t get one or that the printer at the testing station was broken when you were there. None of them have ever had to do that, though, because the examiners simply don’t ask for it.

If you still have your TTC, take it along with you by all means. But don’t worry if you’ve lost it, because unless there is some problem with your booking, I cannot see any reason why they would demand to see it.