I hope the boy passes…..he is very introverted, and has never shown an interest, till now.

Positive thoughts please, from the STW hive minds!

I passed second time although it has to be said I was well p.ssed off and didn’t get in the car again until the day before my second test. Point being you get more than one go if necessary

Anyway best wishes and we hope for positive news tomorrow (driving test in pre Christmas shopping traffic 😯 )

I passed 1st time, 2 lessons.

It was 30 years ago though.

I think I’m a better driver now than then, but that’s subjective.

Glad I’m not a young driver in today’s environment, seems stacked against you these days.

Good luck to your son.

I’ll never forget what my driving instructor said to me before my test. Do you best and remember you cannot account for idiots and bus drivers…

Go on admit it. You secretly hope he fails so you don’t have to wait for him to wrap your car around a lamppost.

I passed 1st time, 2 lessons

Passed first time here, no lessons and I shagged the examiner’s wife. They asked me to be an instructor. I told them to **** off – too busy teaching at NASA.

Passed 1st time, 32 lessons. All the best to yer lad, positive head and job’s a good un. 🙂

I’m that old I’ve never sat a test

Passed 2nd time, 0 minors on either test but cocked up a junction and ran a red light on the first test. Didn’t drive between tests and the there was almost 3 months between the tests

I failed my first by stopping at a green light.

Noooooo! I don’t want him to fail at all!

I’ve already bought him a little motor for Christmas….a smashing little Clio on a sort of gold colour. I’d be made up with it…..I learnt to drive in a vw camper, but my first car was a mk1 escort……wish I stayed lo had that!

Passed first time here, no lessons and I shagged the examiner’s wife. They asked me to be an instructor. I told them to **** off – too busy teaching at NASA.

Wow – I heard somebody had shagged that old cow

sort of gold colour

Brown?

Passed first time here, no lessons and I shagged the examiner’s wife. They asked me to be an instructor. I told them to **** off – too busy teaching at NASA.

I suppose that’s why you chose your username, you only do the absolute minimum you can get away with 🙂

My eldest crashed the car on her first day after having passed. Fortunately no one hurt.

Seriously OP best of luck to him.

Good luck Stedlocks, it would be great to have someone else to drive so you can have a few over Christmas and new year 🙂

good luck to the lad when I passed traffic was much less than now, but drink driving was the rule rather than exception and seat belts were optional, middle daughter passed last yr constant worry about the loons out there

I failed my first test as I missed a temporary ‘wait here when the red light shows’ sign at some road works – I was distracted by the top less workmen.

. . . I’m obviously old enough to have appreciated topless workmen – high vis doesn’t have the same effect these days . . . Or maybe it’s because I’m older and less distracted by boy these days!

Good luck to him.

Tell him to just drive the car. Sounds silly, but what I mean is drive how he has been taught. I’ve seen too many learners fail as they do something different ” coz im on me test….”

I always told my students to sing to themselves all the way around their test to help relax them.

Never caused a problem…but I was a motorcycle instructor.

So did he pass? And if so can I hijack and ask about insurance?

Took me 3 goes. First time I just wasn’t ready, so no surprise, although the reason was ‘not making sufficient progress’ – long before the days of STW I might add.

Second time i nearly ran over an old lady on a crossing. A 4 lane town centre road, i was in the left lane with a panel van in the next lane to me. When the lights went from red to flashing amber I was keen to make progress but couldn’t see past the panel van so i nudged forward slightly and then saw her. At that point apparently I was still OK because I stopped. But then she saw me and turned to go back. So I started again. But by then she’d seen me stop and also started again….. and we did that sort of dance like you do when walking where neither of you knows what side you should be on so you both keep swapping sides at the same time until you walk into each other.

I didn’t actually run her over but i definitely drove on while she was standing in the middle of the road.

I still remember it now in her granny hat and shopping trolley. Running her down would have been a kindness really.

My driving instructor told me to wear a shirt and tie and shiny shoes for my test.
Reckoned the examiners would be more likely to pass someone who looked like a “sensible, respectable sort” rather than some scruffy 17 year old kid in ripped jeans and a hoody who would be hooning round in a haze of ganja smoke with four mates in the car twenty minutes after passing the test.

Completely ignored him the first two times I sat the test and rocked up in jeans and a manky band t-shirt. Failed.
Third time I took his advice and the attitude of the examiner towards me was markedly different. Passed.

Hope it goes well! Hated my car test, I’d done 50000 odd miles on the motorbike so I’d have been mortified to fail.

Passed first time, but that may or may not have something to do with the bottle of vodka put behind the bar for the examiner the night before 🙂

I hope the boy passes…..he is very introverted, and has never shown an interest, till now.

Good luck to him. Our son is the same, gets very worked up doing stuff like that, passed his test two weeks ago. We were so relieved for him.

Failed the first time and organised a retest for May but he had exams so cancelled. Took a couple of lessons before his last test and I think that made him realise he could actually drive so gave him confidence.

If your son doesn’t pass then it’s no big deal, tell him to book a retest straight away. It’s difficult to pass 1st time these day.

Any news OP? I passed first time with two minors. It was really distracting having the examiner bring his kids along.

What’s that tumbleweed doing?

I failed the first time but I did hit a pedestrian as I went over the pavement back into the testing centre (my 17yr old self loosing concentration whilst doing fist pumps in my head for acing the test) so fairs fair.

my wife failed first time (1991) when she lost control of the car, skidded towards a bus stop and sent all the people waiting there fleeing for safety. The examiner still made her drive around for another hour before telling her she failed 😆

a good mate took the test in his own car (2001), failed so hard the examiner told him he was a menace to himself and others, got out of the car and walked off. Obviously my friend was therefore not legal to drive home. The instructor got back to the test centre, saw my mate’s mum who was waiting for him, and said ‘your son is parked up in a layby on the A1234, you’ll need to go and fetch him’ 😆

I took mine in about 2013 and passed first time. But I was a sensible 34 year old by then 😀

2nd time for me.
I won’t wish Your son good luck Op. If he’s good enough he’ll pass, if not a few more lessons and experience will be a good thing.
Does he know about the car ? If so that’ll be ramping up the pressure !!

3rd time here.

A guy I knew, one of those perenially jammy bastards of which everone knows at least one passed first time despite not wearing a seatbelt. He forgot at first then realised half way through and also realised that the examiner hadn’t noticed. He thought if he then put it on half way through he’d draw attention to it, so he carried on.

If he’s good enough he’ll pass

It’s not quite as simple as that, if he’s introverted then taking the test will cause him a lot of anxiety

Second time pass for me.

I stalled at a junction (due to nerves) on the first one.

TBH it was probably a blessing as it meant that I didn’t spend the summer tear-arsing about in my mum’s car.

I stalled at a junction (due to nerves) on the first one.

That seems like an unlikely reason to fail to me, I’d have thought that was a minor?

Three times for me. The first I just wasn’t ready (I suspect my instructor pushed me in early to get rid because he was pursuing a career change). The second was pretty faultless apart from being in the wrong lane at a junction and not being experienced enough to deal with it; anything classed as potentially dangerous is an instant fail. Third time I did something minor and silly right at the start, thought “that’s it, I’ve blown it,” all the nerves went out of the window so I had a nice relaxed drive and passed.

First time despite speeding, clipping the kerb and have a full on argument with the examiner who marked me down for hesitation when he hadn’t seen a hazard that I had.
He gave me three minors for one manoeuvre, despite saying that he wouldn’t have done anything differently.

Probably the greatest sense of relief I’ve ever felt.

I had a nice relaxed drive and passed

That’s kind of the key to it i think.

I had some i problems getting my test booked after doing my theory, and as a result was up to about 20 lessons before my test. But for the last 4-5 of those it was more about keeping my eye in – i was getting in the car and instructor was asking me where I was driving him today and just pointing out minor things as we went along.

As a result when it came to the test I was pretty confident and the time flew by. As a general rule people make mistakes when they are pressured/stressed, so if you can be in a position where you don’t really feel under too much pressure then you’ll be on to a winner.

I heaped a load of pressure on to myself for my test, somewhat stupidly, as I’d spent all my savings on ferries and race entries for a roadtrip around Europe, about a month after the test date.
Managed a perfect score despite a non-perfect drive, thanks to the fact that the examiner didn’t know where he was going (new to the area apparently), so rather than the usual “turn left at the next junction”, I’d pull up to the junction and sit there while he peered around trying to get his bearings.

I’ve heard various stories about how unfair it is (all from people who’ve failed funnily enough): that they have certain numbers of people who have to pass and fail each month, so they’re biased towards whatever they need to make up the numbers. No idea if that’s true or not though.

No idea if that’s true or not though.

Yep, from what I’ve heard this is true to an extent, my instructor/friend of the family (same guy) used to be an assessor if they had an unusually high pass rate they got “moderated” or even had to re attend the training if it was a regular occurrence. In the small town he’d been assessing in he only had four instructors feeding to him all only sending good people causing him to look easy. He moved south and into a bigger town and all of a sudden there was more idiots and people who he needed to fail.

I stalled at a junction (due to nerves) on the first one.

That seems like an unlikely reason to fail to me, I’d have thought that was a minor?

It was a full on Corporal Jones style DON’T PANIC moment. I deserved to fail.

Passed first time (much to the surprise and disappointment of my parents) although that was 33 years ago. 🙂 More recently also managed to pass my bike test on the first attempt – mightily relieved at that one.

Passed mine first time today too – albeit in 1965 🙂

Held HGV licence for 48yrs (never took a test!)