The Truth About Learning to Become a Driving Instructor
How would you like a business where you can be your own boss, work as and when you like, doing what you like, driving a new car, enjoying the freedom of the open road with the wind in your hair (well, not quite perhaps)... and earning £500 a week from it too?
Sounds great, doesn’t it?
Well that’s the claim being made by some companies offering to teach you how to become a driving instructor. These training packages are being pushed heavily in the press and on TV at the moment. Yes, they seem very attractive in a recession if you need extra cash or have been made redundant. But are they as good as they seem? Let’s review what’s on offer and find out.
Now I think we all have a pretty good idea what a driving instructor does. But let’s have a closer look at how you could become one.
How do you get started?
There are a few basic requirements: To become a driving instructor you must be over 21, hold a full UK/EU car driving licence and have held that licence for at least four out of the past six years. You mustn’t have been disqualified from driving at any time in the past four years and must also be what the government’s Driving Standards Agency (DSA) call a ‘fit and proper person’.
In order to charge for driving lessons you must be on the Register Of Approved Driving Instructors or ADI’s as they are known. This is operated by the DSA. To get on the register you need to pass three exams: a driving theory exam, a practical test of your driving ability and a practical test of your instructional ability. The two practical exams must be passed within two years of passing the theory exam or you have to start all over again.
These exams are pretty strict with a high failure rate. The pass rate for the theory test and driving ability test is less than half. The pass rate for the instructional ability test in around one in three.
What training do you need?
It’s pretty much impossible to become an ADI without taking some training. There are two options here. Either you can study to become a driving instructor by organising your own training – or you can buy an ‘all in’ training package from a commercial training company. Sorting out your own training tends to be cheaper but you will need to be more organised. Even if you have a full driving licence and consider yourself a good driver you will need more driving training and instructor training from a qualified driving instructor trainer. Taking a training package will mean everything is organised for you, but it costs more.
Training can be done in as little as four months, although most people take between six months and two years.
What is it likely to cost?
As well as the cost of training materials and practical lessons there are exam fees to pay to the DSA. It depends on how you do your training – most of the training companies don’t mention the cost in their advertising. But becoming a driving instructor is likely to cost anything between £2,000 if you organise everything yourself, up to £4,000 or possibly more if you buy a training package.
What happens once you’re qualified?
Most driving instructors are self-employed rather than employed by a driving school. You can either set up your own driving school or work on a franchise basis for an established driving school. There are pros and cons to each method: If you set up your own driving school you will have to buy and run customers and do all your admin, as well as give lessons. If you take a driving school franchise they will often provide a car, do your admin, and find you students (though this is not usually guaranteed) but you will have to pay them a weekly or monthly franchise fee for the privilege.
What’s the market for driving instructors like?
Official figures show that about a million people learn to drive every year, so there is a regular supply of new customers once you are qualified. But you need to bear in mind a few downsides too. As the birth rate has fallen over the years so the number of young people who want to learn to drive has fallen too. And the credit crunch means fewer people can afford to take paid lessons. Official figures show there are already about 44,000 qualified driving instructors plus 65,000 in training at any one time – so the number of instructors is rising while the number of potential customers is falling. The word in the ‘trade’ is that some existing driving instructors are finding it hard to attract enough customers right now.
How much can you earn?
Some of the training package companies claim you can earn up to £30,000 or more a year as a driving instructor. But remember, you’ll be selfemployed so nothing is guaranteed. It depends on how much instruction you do, and how many students you can get.
The best thing is to work back from what you are likely to be able to charge. Say you charge £20 per hour for lessons. Around half of that is likely to go in car running expenses and other overheads. So you could be making around £10 an hour for yourself. If you managed to give 40 hours of lessons a week you’d make £400 a week, which amounts to £20,000 a year assuming you take just two weeks for holidays.
Review of the main instructor training packages
There are quite a few driving instructor packages available today. But let’s look at the most well known ones and see how they stack up:
AA Driving Instructor Training
Tel. 0800 316 0331
Website: www.theaa.com/driving-school/instructortraining/ instructor-training.html
This training package comes from – you guessed it – the same people who run the famous roadside breakdown service. Their course is a flexible, modular course that takes between 6-18 months to complete. Once qualified the AA Driving School will provide a car and ‘pupil introductions’ as they call them, or you can find your own. Either way you benefit from using the well established and respected AA name. A unique figure of this package is they have a calculator on their website to project your likely earnings depending on where you live. They say you can earn about £34,000 (before tax) teaching 40 hours a week in a large city.
BSM
Tel. 0845 855 0158
Website: www.bsmfreshstart.co.uk
BSM is part of the RAC, so with this package you also get the backing of a big name. (There’s little doubt that BSM is probably the best-known name in driver training in the UK.) With BSM you get flexible training sessions and they say it takes between 6-12 months to qualify. Their course costs £2,500 paid in full or £2,800 if paid in stage payments plus exam fees. Unlike the AA training you can start teaching and earning as a trainee, before you are fully qualified, as well.
Once qualified there are a number of different franchise opportunities available with different costs. BSM don’t make any claims about possible earnings in their sales literature – you have to call them for what they call a ‘personalised earnings illustration’.
LDC Driving Instructor Training
Tel. 0800 197 0010
Website: www.ldcinstructorcollege.co.uk/drivinginstructor- training/driving-instructor-training.html
The LDC driving instructor training course is made up of three separate courses, one for each official DSA exam. They say their courses involve about 200 hours of home study and practical in-car training. Once qualified they have very flexible packages where you can just take the services you need, such as pupil lead generation, and not those you don’t. You can either rent a car from them or use your own.
LDC is one of the few training companies that reveal how much their course costs up front – the full cash price is currently £2,345. They don’t say how much they think you could earn. However, it’s worth noting that if you go on to work for them the LDC Driving School has a training system designed to reduce the amount of time the student spends ‘in car’, so this might affect your income.
Red Driving School
Tel. 0800 840 4200
Website: www.go-red.co.uk/become-aninstructor. php
This is probably the most well-known driving instructor training company – if only because of their very extensive, swish TV advertising campaigns. It is one of the newer names compared to the AA and RAC operations, but seems to be expanding fast. The Instructor College, another instructor training company, is closely associated with Red – they are owned by the same company, LVG Ltd.
This is one of the most professional looking driving instructor training operations. They also have quite a slick sales operation to sign people up for their training packages. Although their marketing seems to suggest they are offering jobs, should you go on to instruct for them it is on a franchise basis like most other schools. They claim you can earn around £500-£600 per week once qualified.
Now, I am not for a minute saying Red are doing anything wrong. But if you are considering a training package from this company you really must do a Google search on them before you sign up. There is some very uncomplimentary stuff from dissatisfied customers out there on the Internet.
So what do I think of this opportunity?
Becoming a driving instructor is an honest enough opportunity. It’s definitely not pie-in-sky. It is a real business. People will always want to learn to drive... well, at least until we run out of oil! So it does give you the opportunity to run your own business doing something interesting, useful and reasonably well paid.
But it’s important to remember the downsides. It isn’t particularly cheap and easy to get started. It can be hard work, to say nothing of tough on your nerves... as you navigate a series of 17 year olds through rush hour traffic! It can also be a competitive business, especially in a recession.
So I really do recommend you do your homework very carefully before taking the plunge... especially if you are thinking of buying a training package. Look at exactly what is involved, what you get and what it will cost. Look at the market for driving lessons in your area, what you can charge and whether enough work will be available.
Be a bit sceptical about taking advice from someone who’s trying to sell you a training package! Here is an IMPARTIAL source of information to try: You can get an official ADI starter pack from the DSA for just £5. This includes an explanatory booklet which gives full details of the ADI Register and qualification process, a copy of the Official Register of Driving Instructor Training (ORDIT) and an application form. Contact: Driving Standards Agency, PO Box 280, Newcastle upon Tyne NE99 1FP. Tel. 0300 123 1126. Website: www.dsa.gov.uk