The number 1 reason why people fail the driving test by BIG TOM Driving School

Stats from the DVSA indicate that in 2012-2013 at Grantham Test Centre, 65% of people passed the driving test on their first attempt, in Peterborough Test Centre that figure is 51%.  More recent figures in 2015 show a general levelling out between the two test centres, but both being below 50%.  Why are those figures so low?

BIG TOM Driving School (0800 689 4174) offers some reasons in this helpful blog, it looks at the number 1 reason why people fail the driving test.  Notice that I’m not referring to the driving faults that cause the “fail”, I’m talking about the people who take the test.

What are your thoughts on this?   Common things that come to mind include test day nerves, erratic driving from other drivers, completely losing the plot for a second or two and doing something daft, a very strict examiner, not knowing the roads you were tested on, a shaking left leg that couldn’t control the clutch and so on.

Whilst there might well be an element of truth in your symptom analysis, it’s not the root cause.  The root cause is quite simply that at that moment in time, you were not ready to take the test.

You see, with exams at school/college, if it turns out you had not got yourself quite prepared for the exam, the consequence is often that you just did not quite get the grade you were hoping for.  But with a driving test, if you are not quite ready for the test, you fail it.  You simply fail the test.

So, how do you know if you are ready to take the test?

Your Driving Instructor can assist with their professional opinion, in addition, you will know, in your heart of hearts, how you feel about it.  

But here is the “bang” in this blog.... 

If you set yourself an unrealistic date that you absolutely MUST take your test by.... come what may, you will HAVE to take your test by this date or the whole world comes to an end, then, you have very probably just sealed your own fate. 

The reason why that is such a dodgy strategy is that it completely disregards the fact that we are all different, we all learn at different rates, we all progress differently, and you are no different.  How can you possibly know with certainty that by a given date you are going to be ready to go to test?  The above stats would tend to suggest you simply can’t. 

Why do people insist on going to test before they are ready?  Well, there can be tons of reasons.  But know this, as soon as the little seed of doubt is in your head that you are trying to pass a test that you are not ready for, that seed doesn’t magically disappear, what it does is grow, it grows bigger and bigger every day closer to your test date.  Come to the day of your test, that little seed has now fully grown, to the extent that you are already convinced that you will fail before you have even turned the engine on!

This is a mindset.  

This is something that is entirely preventable and it is something that you have the absolute power to avoid..... you really do have the power to prevent that seed of doubt from even spreading roots, let alone growing.  Not always, but very often, a test fail is brought about because you have set yourself a date to go to test that was based on anything and everything completely UNRELATED to the rate of progress of your driving ability.

So before you go head long into a path of self-destruction, make sure you design in a mindset based on positivity, and not one based on pressure.  It is often under-estimated how the state of the mind can seriously affect the ability to drive effectively (and that will remain a true fact well beyond the time you pass your driving test).

The reason why people fail the driving test is offered as a helpful guide to attempt to raise the national pass rate for driving tests in the country.

BIG TOM Driving School  Intensive Driving Course in Peterborough, Spalding, Stamford, Boston, Sleaford and Grantham 0800 689 4174