Grumbles from the Gearbox
Where are we Today, What is happening to our Industry and has anyone seen the dvsa CEO ?
When, What, Where?
When will things get back to normal? What is the next thing that's going to happen ? Where are we going from here?
All questions that are being asked on a daily basis by the average ADI on the streets out there.
When?
Let's start with 'Back to normal'. Normal is what happens when we get up each day and roll out the door to do whatever we have to do, just to get by. Everything else is an extra. Well that's gone for a burton then, we all have to adapt to a new way of thinking, a new set of goals and priorities in life.
Keeping one's own family safe has taken on a new meaning. Last year the baddies we could see, and quite often hear them coming, at times it was even possible to smell them from some way off and we had either the time to get out of the way, or lock the doors to keep the family safe. Today the new baddy is, to all intents and purposes, invisible as he is microscopically small, but deadly to quite a large section of the population. All our elderly, anyone over 65 that is (!) and overweight, possibly with Type 2 diabetes or other underlying health problems is at risk. Just think how many ADIs fall into that category and you will understand why so many have not slipped back in behind the dual controls just yet.
I don't know about you, but I hate the term 'New Normal' but I am having to choke it down as that is just what has to be done for our everyday survival as ADIs. The cleaning of the car has almost become a case of OCD and I really have a new understanding of those of us who suffer with this condition as I frequently find myself re-cleaning a switch that I thought I had missed, a handle I forgot, or did I do the seat buckle? I have a regime now where I work my way clockwise around the cockpit of the car to try and beat it and therefore don't have a problem...until....sh**... did I do the indicator, the wiper switch - just incase the pupil touched it etc,etc,.. More than once we have gone just a few car lengths and pulling over as I remember the sanitizer that we
forgot.
My pupils, just like yours I'm sure, are really great and go along with all we have to do, they are incredibly supportive, and let us be honest here, it is great publicity and marketing when people see us being so careful and taking such great care of our pupils' well being plus our own family and our communities in the long run. With all we are seen doing beside the car, before even getting in, mums and dads appreciate the lengths we are going to in our attempts to look after their offspring. Just imagine the image this gives to the general public as they subconsciously notice the decals on your car, then bring it up in a conversation later in the day, or even the week with a friend or colleague over a coffee or beer?
What?
What's next? This is a tough one and nobody has found the crystal ball to tell us what to do to be ready for next week. So, let's get stuck in with what we have. Our existing pupils are so keen to get back behind the wheel again but, I hear you say...what about the tests, the waiting list are so long and getting longer?
Nothing we can do about it, that is for the dvsa to solve, so why are ADIs worried? Accept it for what it is and bend like the willow tree rather than fight a battle you just cannot win, we need that for other items. Fight the fight that we can win, and there will be plenty of them on the road ahead of us. The use of loos and waiting rooms for one. I am over the moon that the ADINJC have followed our lead here again and contacted HSE on this matter. The extra weight of another complaint alongside the ones we had already put in has added power to our issue. Thank you ADINJC, much appreciated.
Our pupils. All we have to do is be brutally honest with our pupils and tell them the truth exactly as it is. Please do not treat them as the dvsa treated us. Tell them the truth, be honest, and they will work with you. Some who are ready and don't want to continue with the lessons, then book them in every other week, or even just once a month to keep the muscle memory going and the complex relative velocity calculations needed at junctions and roundabouts from going away. There are plenty of new pupils out there just itching to get started and out on the road. Be honest here as well and explain about the plight of your long term pupils, and how you may ask the new guys to help out and to cut back on the lesson hours for a few weeks while you get the old timers ready again for their tests. Pupil loyalty is awesome, if you are honest and loyal to them too. They are more than willing to help each other and you, their instructor, as they may need some leeway later on when closing on their tests and would like to think they may have scored some Brownie points by helping you out.
Our pupils. All we have to do is be brutally honest with our pupils and tell them the truth exactly as it is. Please do not treat them as the dvsa treated us. Tell them the truth, be honest, and they will work with you. Some who are ready and don't want to continue with the lessons, then book them in every other week, or even just once a month to keep the muscle memory going and the complex relative velocity calculations needed at junctions and roundabouts from going away. There are plenty of new pupils out there just itching to get started and out on the road. Be honest here as well and explain about the plight of your long term pupils, and how you may ask the new guys to help out and to cut back on the lesson hours for a few weeks while you get the old timers ready again for their tests. Pupil loyalty is awesome, if you are honest and loyal to them too. They are more than willing to help each other and you, their instructor, as they may need some leeway later on when closing on their tests and would like to think they may have scored some Brownie points by helping you out.
It is desperately important that the ADI realises that he/she is not a god able to solve everything and know all the answers. We are human and have limits, just like others, and need to know when to step back and say, sorry I cannot help you, you need to try another instructor, I am fully booked with my current pupils.
Where?
Where is here and now. Unless of course you are the CEO of the dvsa.
By the way, has anyone seen or heard from the mythical beast in the last 4 months. He has more in common with the Minotaur of ancient Crete roaming through the depths of the labyrinth under the palace of Nottingham than the ADIs, PDIs and multitude of trainers across the registers and activities of the dvsa. He roams the dark tunnels hidden away from the light of the flashbulbs of the cameras until the day of departure whereupon he will raise from the depths in all his splendour of a fat reward package for achieving a breath-taking level of nothingness during his time in office.
Unfair some will say, unprecedented times, unprecedented demand and unprecedented pressures others will say, unprecedented unprecedentness leading to unprecedented absence and invisibility ask I and others in the industry. Someone please tell me I am wrong and I have completely misread the situation, please show me the achievements and the ideas, the proposals and the unprecedented imagination to meet the times we are in, ................................innit quiet........................I'm still waiting?
By the way, has anyone seen or heard from the mythical beast in the last 4 months. He has more in common with the Minotaur of ancient Crete roaming through the depths of the labyrinth under the palace of Nottingham than the ADIs, PDIs and multitude of trainers across the registers and activities of the dvsa. He roams the dark tunnels hidden away from the light of the flashbulbs of the cameras until the day of departure whereupon he will raise from the depths in all his splendour of a fat reward package for achieving a breath-taking level of nothingness during his time in office.
Unfair some will say, unprecedented times, unprecedented demand and unprecedented pressures others will say, unprecedented unprecedentness leading to unprecedented absence and invisibility ask I and others in the industry. Someone please tell me I am wrong and I have completely misread the situation, please show me the achievements and the ideas, the proposals and the unprecedented imagination to meet the times we are in, ................................innit quiet........................I'm still waiting?
The staff on the switchboards (mostly in the bedroom or over the kitchen table, if not fortunate to have a spare bedroom) have done remarkably well with what little they had. The management had all the months of lockdown to work out a pattern, a plan to be ready to open the doors. All they had to do was ask the BBC for a few reels of historical videotapes as to what happened at the major stores when they used to open for the January sales and they would have had a clue as to what to expect. They could have even, randomly rang up an ADI or two and asked what would happen and how should we prepare - Nope, the smelly stuff hit the fan and the system failed in record time. Followed by an embarrassing shut down, open up - shut down etc............Boing said Zebedee as he bounced off down the road of dvsa super heros!
Possible New World Record!
A queue of 80,000 people on the phone with 2m separation equates to a 100 mile long queue, The dvsa exceeded 200 miles and almost reached 300 mile long queues to book driving tests. Anyone got the number for the Guiness Records Office, we have a huge achievement for someone to claim for their CV in management...!
Conclusion.
The ADI is something special, very special. They like to have a moan, but they work exceedingly hard and often very long hours to make a decent living, for many it is a continual battle and balance of life/work balance,just to get by. The job is littered with divorces and breakups and still they carry on. The dvsa come up with ideas and proposals that are pointless and just to use up the bank balance so they don't show a profit and still the ADI carries on. They have a check test, changed to standard checks at a huge expense for no real gain, change the grading system that was backward compared to other industries and then hide when some form of, not leadership, but guidance was needed from a licencing authority. The ADI was still there on no wages, just a sub for some, not all of us, from HMG against the taxes we have paid to keep us going while the dvsa management sat at home on full salary, pensions and holiday entitlement growing nicely racking their brains deciding Netflix, Amazon, Now or a video/dvd?
We are losing hundreds, if not thousands, of ADIs (examiners are leaving in droves too) who have given up, retired or found alternative employment rather that sit behind the dual controls again. For many this was the last straw, nobody blames the dvsa or even old Boris.co for what happened, but the silence that was the dvsa was too much. With fewer ADIs and DEs the system will not cope, normality is light years away and the dvsa need to say this out loud. The guys and ladies out there who do this job are awesome, they love the job and their pupils, they are proud of the Badges they worked so hard to get and pay to keep, they still have their integrity and their honesty intact. They do the best to help each other out when they can. They look out for each other and all just for a friendly wave and a bit of banter on test day in the waiting room.
I for one am proud to say I am an ADI and I have massive respect and love for all my colleagues.
Keep safe out there on the roads folks and take care.
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
