MisterMMM.com: how to fail the Driving Test

How to fail!

The examiner will give you up to 15 errors and still give you a licence, as long as none of those errors are serious, or dangerous.

The examiner marks all errors on a form called the DL25C. The expectation is that you are perfect with your driving and that they only need to mark the occasional rare mistake. If they had to mark everything you did right, they would be swamped with recording. It would not be sensible!

Have a look at the DL25C. It basically has lots of different categories of error, with a separate column for indicating a serious or dangerous error. On your driving test, you will only be marked on one manouver, and some of the other things are not relevant, like the taxi stuff. If you get 5 errors in the same box, that counts as a serious error, too!

While you are on the test, if you make a mistake, don't judge it, as you may not have the same criteria as the examiner. You will probably then not be concentrating on your driving and things could go really wrong. You might think you have failed, whereas the examiner would correctly judge it as simply a mistake of no real consequence, by an inexperienced driver.

Commonly, serious and dangerous errors are talked about as major errors. They are expensive because at the moment, it's about £50 for a 2 hour lesson, and something like £62 for a test. That means a serious error will cost you over £100.

If you are not ready for test, then a serious error will come quite readily, and even a dangerous. You should never go for test until you are ready. Even so, plenty of people mess it up on the day and do something wrong. It just happens. You watch yourself doing it wrong and just don't take the time to correct it, and instead of being an error, it turns serious. Game Over!

I have sat in the back of the car quite often when my drivers are on test, and still things go wrong. Not too often, but it stills happens. This following list is a series of failure situations that occured while I was there. It's not meant to be anything other than an observation of what makes a fail. I don't recommend that you do these things, but being aware of them, means that you shouldn't do it yourself.