An email alert from DVSA warns learners how they can save money by avoiding scam test booking sites. DVSA doesn’t refer to them as scams, but that’s what they are – even if they do actually book your test for you. If you book your test thinking you’ve done it using the official route then you have been scammed.
The theory test costs £25.00 (down from £31.00 from October 2014). The practical test costs £62.00 (or £75.00 on weekends). If you get asked to pay more than these prices you are being scammed. If you don’t get a booking immediately, or if you cannot choose the date from a list, you are being scammed. You should only book through GOV.UK.
As DVSA says (in the link embedded in the email), it is difficult to know when you are on the official site and when you’re on a scam site. Many of the scammers deliberately make themselves out to be the official DVSA site, and ALL of them want to purposely mislead you to take your money, no matter what words they have put in the small print now that the hounds are on to their scent.
If you see a misleading advert on any web page, you can report it here. Don’t be afraid: do it. ANYONE who is trying to handle test bookings for you other than your instructor is a scammer one way or another (and if your instructor tries to charge you a fee for doing it then he’s a scammer, too). It’s best we all report them.
DVSA says it is “working with the search engines” to have misleading sites removed. This is funny, since most of the scammers will have paid to get themselves to the top of the searches in the first place, and I can think of one very large search engine that is particularly averse to removing anything that affects its revenue in any way. So good luck with that one, DVSA!