A few years ago, it used to be very common for newly qualified Driving Instructors to want to sit in on driving tests because they wanted to learn the routes taken by the DSA examiner. With the driving test routes now published on the Driving Standards Agency website, it is very easy for an Approved Driving Instructor to find out what the routes are for his/her local DSA test centre.
There however a few reasons why an instructor would want to sit in on their pupils driving test.
1. You get to know the DSA examiners, their character how they mark and how forgiving each individual is.
2. You get to see how learner drivers act under driving test conditions.
As a driving instructor you should try an sit in as many dsa tests as possible.
Tuesday, 23 December 2008
Monday, 22 December 2008
Becoming Instructor sad story
Here is one of the sad stories that you never hear about or those Red Driving School Adverts don't tell you about becoming a driving instructor.
An elderly lady gets into debt while training to be a driving instructor, steals money from her Son's trust account, and ends up being taken to court and getting a criminal record. Don't just think about a career change just on the basis of these TV or newspaper adverts, the cost, time and effort required are large, and at the end there is no guarantee you will succeed in the driving instructor training course, while you could end up thousands of pounds in debt!
Read the full driving instructor debt story as published by the Arberdeen Evening Express. So before you take any action after watching one of those Red Driving school TV adverts, make sure you fully know what you are getting into, as the only ones really gaining and making the money are the ADI training organisations.
An elderly lady gets into debt while training to be a driving instructor, steals money from her Son's trust account, and ends up being taken to court and getting a criminal record. Don't just think about a career change just on the basis of these TV or newspaper adverts, the cost, time and effort required are large, and at the end there is no guarantee you will succeed in the driving instructor training course, while you could end up thousands of pounds in debt!
Read the full driving instructor debt story as published by the Arberdeen Evening Express. So before you take any action after watching one of those Red Driving school TV adverts, make sure you fully know what you are getting into, as the only ones really gaining and making the money are the ADI training organisations.
Saturday, 13 December 2008
Driving Instructor time is not valuable
One of the not so good things about being an ADI, is that a lot of learner drivers do not value the driving instructors time. The most common way they show this is by canceling a booked driving lesson at very short notice (I've had someone call me 10 mins before tuition was due to begin), or not bothering to even turn up for the lesson (a no show). We all know that things can happen, and there might be genunie reasons for not being able to turn up for or make an appointment, but as a driving instructor you will get to know your learner pupils, and you will soon know those who are serious about their learning value your time and will only cancel a driving lesson if they absolutely need to.
On the other hand, being a driving instructor, you will soon discover that there are some learner drivers who thinks the world revolves around them, and that they are doing you the ADI a favour by taking tuition with you, and therefore you are at their beckoning call, and if they don't feel like a lesson, then they can cancel when ever they like!
So what can the driving instructor do to make sure his/her time is valued and respected by learner driver pupils?
Have a cancellation policy. Let every new learner driver you take on for tuition know what your cancellation policy is, and enforce it, charging for any late notices (it could 24, 36 or even 48 hour notice required). This is not going to be easy, and you will have to decide if you can tolerate late cancelations just because you need the pupil to stay with you. As always, your decisions will be business based, and if you are having a lot of wasted journeys to a pupils house without being compensated, then maybe you need to cut your losses and get rid of that person that is wasting your driving instructing time.
Encourage pupils to pay for lessons in advance. You can do this by offering a discount over those that don't, for example a 50p or £1 pound difference if you pay for the next lesson in advance, while this might not seem a lot, over a learner drivers course of preparing for the driving test, this could add up to a fair amount. People will value the instructors time more if they are likely to lose money for late driving lesson cancellations, than if they don't have anything to lose.
You can also offer a more appealing discount for block advance payments.
Prioritise your instructing time according to your pupils attitude, making sure that you only book learner drivers that are likely to cancel into slots that you can't fill otherwise.
As a driving instructor you will meet many different types of people, professionals who know the value of people's time, students, people who are being forced to take lessons by parent's etc in the end you have the ultimate decision of managing your time, allocating it to the people that value it most first.
On the other hand, being a driving instructor, you will soon discover that there are some learner drivers who thinks the world revolves around them, and that they are doing you the ADI a favour by taking tuition with you, and therefore you are at their beckoning call, and if they don't feel like a lesson, then they can cancel when ever they like!
So what can the driving instructor do to make sure his/her time is valued and respected by learner driver pupils?
Have a cancellation policy. Let every new learner driver you take on for tuition know what your cancellation policy is, and enforce it, charging for any late notices (it could 24, 36 or even 48 hour notice required). This is not going to be easy, and you will have to decide if you can tolerate late cancelations just because you need the pupil to stay with you. As always, your decisions will be business based, and if you are having a lot of wasted journeys to a pupils house without being compensated, then maybe you need to cut your losses and get rid of that person that is wasting your driving instructing time.
Encourage pupils to pay for lessons in advance. You can do this by offering a discount over those that don't, for example a 50p or £1 pound difference if you pay for the next lesson in advance, while this might not seem a lot, over a learner drivers course of preparing for the driving test, this could add up to a fair amount. People will value the instructors time more if they are likely to lose money for late driving lesson cancellations, than if they don't have anything to lose.
You can also offer a more appealing discount for block advance payments.
Prioritise your instructing time according to your pupils attitude, making sure that you only book learner drivers that are likely to cancel into slots that you can't fill otherwise.
As a driving instructor you will meet many different types of people, professionals who know the value of people's time, students, people who are being forced to take lessons by parent's etc in the end you have the ultimate decision of managing your time, allocating it to the people that value it most first.
Friday, 5 December 2008
Critising other ADIs
As a driving instructor, don't build your business by critising your competition, a practise that is very common in the industry.
You don't necessarilly need to agree with the way other ADIs run their business or teach other learner drivers, but the way for you to attract more candidates to come learn to drive with you, is by offering a service that no one else offers.
It's just like the many schools and driving instructors out there offering cheap driving lessons in a bid to gain a hold in the learner driver market. It might work for a while, but in the long run you need value, quality and a reputation to sustain you. So stop Critising other driving instructors.
You don't necessarilly need to agree with the way other ADIs run their business or teach other learner drivers, but the way for you to attract more candidates to come learn to drive with you, is by offering a service that no one else offers.
It's just like the many schools and driving instructors out there offering cheap driving lessons in a bid to gain a hold in the learner driver market. It might work for a while, but in the long run you need value, quality and a reputation to sustain you. So stop Critising other driving instructors.
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