Driving tests in the UK have notoriously been extremely difficult to find for many years now. But why? There’s many reasons as to why this is the case and today we’re going to discuss the reasons.
Lack of driving examiners
Yes, there’s a huge shortage of driving examiners. For an examiner to become fully qualified, they must go all the way to Milton Keynes, for 4-6 months to be trained. This is very time consuming, and keeps people away from their families for long periods. It’s common sense, if the population of the United Kingdom is forever expanding, yet driving examiners are decreasing, this equals a big dilemma. The answer to this could potentially be having more training bases, so future examiners wouldn’t have to travel so far away from home. Making the course more flexible would also be a good idea, and potentially having paid training, as not many people can afford to live whilst training for a career for six months with no pay at all.
The economy
For the past five years or more, the economy has been struggling. All public services have been hit in the face due to huge cuts, which are aimed to enable the UK to recover from the recession. This reason could actually be quite a good one as surely as the countries economics recovers, the DVSA should receive more funding which in turn will make waiting times get reduced. It’s just a waiting game for the government to sort the issues out, then commission the dvla / dvsa with the correct amount of money to enable them to run the service efficiently.
Things you could do about it
Unless you have a couple of billion, if not more sitting in the bank there’s not much you could directly do. Although, there are things, which you could do which would help you on a personal level. You could look for a service which provides driving test cancellations like: https://speedytests.co.uk/driving-test-cancellations, or alternatively you could check for cancellations yourself on the DVSA website. You can go this by logging onto your account frequently to check. If you have a lot of time of your hands this is definitely the ideal solution to your problems.
Prepare in advance
If you haven’t taken your lessons yet, it would be wise to book your test date. Well, now. Yes… Then discuss with your instructor as to how to be ready for this date. Using your brain could pay dividends in terms of the waiting times. If the wait is roughly four months, if you work hard enough you could potentially be ready to take your test by the time the test date comes up. Learning to drive can vary in time differences – if all depends on how intensive your lessons are. Some people can pass within a week, others, it can take them months – if not years which is the unfortunate truth.
