Grumbles from the Gearbox
*'What's your Test Centre'* loo like, does it flush, can you wash your hands, do you even have one?
Are you flushing comfortably?
What is the Loo like at your Driving Test Centre? Can you flush, is it clean, can you wash your hands or, do you even have one?
What is it really like at your local driving test centre, is the DVSA really flushed with success with the facilities that it provides for you and your clients. After all, at £62 per driving test this equates to an hourly fee of £93 and your driving test is acknowledged as one of the most stressful times there is.
Let's face it, we all are affected by nerves at stressful times, our bladders and bowels can develop minds of their own when confronted by that live baby eating creature that emerges from the cave behind that locked door with a secretly coded push button security access in the corner of the room. We would all prefer to be facing the fire breathing dragon from the dark side than wait for a driving test examiner, even the dentist's waiting room holds fewer fears with less terrified looking people. All of us are afraid to eat before an exam just incase our bladder and bowels decide it is time to rapidly move south like someone waiting for the bailiffs to ring the door bell and yet, we are advised to eat something before hand to get our sugar levels up to help us concentrate. Devil and the deep blue sea or frying pan and fire spring to mind, which do you do? Eat for mental and physical well being or go hungry, just in case there is no loo available to use?
Remember that it is not just the candidate for the driving test but it can also be motorcycle rider test, HGV, PCV and the dreaded Check test for the ADIs plus qualifying exams for PDIs. Can you imagine examiners not allowing visiting examiners using their facilities and saying, "Sorry guys, just nip up to Tesco, or the Esso garage around the corner near the funeral parlour?"
Since this subject came up recently I have been stunned at the number of comments made by ADIs, my main source of information, on the test centres that are either without toilet paper, soap, are not very clean even worse some unbelievably have no toilet facility at all.
This raises two points
1. Given the current situation with the COVID19 virus, I think the very least that could be supplied is a basic hand wash facility, even my garage does. Then the examiners may have some chance of not catching anything from the candidate and even be unafraid to shake hands with the candidate without fear of dissolving into a pile of ash on the spot.
2. How can a building within the government's control allow there to be no bathroom facilities for candidates taking a driving test in today's' modern thinking society. This is just unthinkable in a civilised culture like ours. Think about it for a tick, pop into
McDonalds for a coffee or a cheap burger costing about £3-5, or the pub for a pint for around the same and you can use the loo for free and most are pretty well supplied these days. £62 for a driving test and you can get nothing or a bathroom with no paper, crappy dryer or dirty towel. How on earth is this allowed to happen in 2020?
I bet the bathroom facility for the CEO at the DVSA is nice and clean with plenty of soap, paper, hot water and lots of top class hand drying facilities that are on a different planet to those that they provide for their customers. Could this happen anywhere else apart from a back street garage on a tight budget? As I understand it, the guys who empty the rubbish bins and miners have better facilities than we do, that is when we have them. Come on DVSA, let's get ourselves into the 21st century and we can all be happy little flushers.
The DVsA response to recent media criticism about the current test waiting times is to throw in the kitchen sink - but, is this the right solution?
Are the DvSA morally bankrupt?
Why bother, the job is not what it used to be?
Where on earth does the dvsa thinking come from, we know where it belongs?
The AADI is offering to help the dvsa with its poor public image to help clear up some confusing issues on the driving test for driving instructors and learners in the UK and make their lives easier.
AADI advising the dvsa, and they are at last listening.
Did the dvsa go too far opening new theory centres when tests are not available?
We are all Ambassadors for our chosen profession
Dear dvsa,
DVSA thanks for all the recent emails,... keeping us ADIs up to date. I should like to discuss with you a few of the points that you have raised.
"It is all our fault (the ADI) that the booking system is in chaos and our fault that candidates are not turning up for the test".
how the dvsa fails its customers on a daily basis
