Hi all, the day has finally come where I’m in a position to do my HGV training.
Now I have the conundrum of which school to use, based on who I have interacted with.
Data Academy have many positive reviews, but I find their “banter” a bit annoying when I went in to enquire. However they were friendly enough and offer their own medical in their offices around the start of each month. They reckon they have a quicker turn around if I was to sit my Cat C, the Cat CE is around a extra month or two wait.
1st Link told me they have more struggles with car to class 1, and recommend I go cat C then do my Cat CE.
J Coates said from it’s around a 4 month process regardless of with category I go for, and they have around a 60-70% pass rate with car to cat CE, and they recommend going straight for cat CE so I don’t have to pay for two tests in the long run. They suggest I can have a driving assessment in the CE to see if I want to go forward, or select cat C. However when I enquired with Data Academy the assessment is £60.
Any other companies any of you can recommend? I’m going down the medical and theory etc off my own back, it was £200 for medical and theories with Data Academy.
I have heard similar stories to what 1st Link told me, people going car to cat CE and failing over and over again and spending £400+ a resit.
GO DATA but do what you can yourself such as medical (max £60) and book all theories (mods 1a 1b + 2) for the same day at the theory test centre - ignore the times they give you for that day as they do them one after another if you want to
Thanks for the advice, Data did come across as the most competent company with the best fleet.
I will get my theory dates etc and get myself booked in with them.
For those in my situation and in Leicester, D4Drivers (£55 in a hotel in town centre) do your medical cheap as well. Other sites I found had dead websites and phone numbers.
ARandomer:
Thanks for the advice, Data did come across as the most competent company with the best fleet.
I will get my theory dates etc and get myself booked in with them.
For those in my situation and in Leicester, D4Drivers (£55 in a hotel in town centre) do your medical cheap as well. Other sites I found had dead websites and phone numbers.
I would give Peter Smythe Transport Training a call or email. I did Class C and C+E with them and travelled from South Wales on both occasions. I couldn’t fault them at all and would recommend them to anyone.
Goff118:
I would give Peter Smythe Transport Training a call or email. I did Class C and C+E with them and travelled from South Wales on both occasions. I couldn’t fault them at all and would recommend them to anyone.
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Sadly that’ll be around 90 miles and 2 hours travelling each day of my course. Data Academy are looking like the ones, I liked their overall professionalism when I approached them a few months back, the others seemed like ran down companies with tired old trucks.
Data Academy said they will do a £60 driving assessment beforehand (once my provisional entitlement comes back) to see if I’m up to the par for C+E.
Goff118:
I would give Peter Smythe Transport Training a call or email. I did Class C and C+E with them and travelled from South Wales on both occasions. I couldn’t fault them at all and would recommend them to anyone.
Sent from my DUB-LX1 using Tapatalk
Sadly that’ll be around 90 miles and 2 hours travelling each day of my course. Data Academy are looking like the ones, I liked their overall professionalism when I approached them a few months back, the others seemed like ran down companies with tired old trucks.
Data Academy said they will do a £60 driving assessment beforehand (once my provisional entitlement comes back) to see if I’m up to the par for C+E.
Ah cool. I did a residential course option with PSTT and they’ll include accommodation in the price. Sounds like you have found a good one though. Good luck with it all!
Almost sounds like an advert from someone who works there. Pretty sure there was a thread about them recently about the standard of their training from one particular candidate, obviously I know they have existed for a long time, but it doesn’t automatically make them a good bet. I haven’t used them myself though.
But I did use PSTT and they were top notch in everything they did.
Of course even the best places sometimes have minor problems and things that do occasionally go wrong.
The views put on here are so biased a public health warning needs to be added.
Pretty sure there was a thread about them recently about the standard of their training from one particular candidate
Pretty sure means not sure so should this statement be made? To get an unbiased reflection of J Coates then look at what the customers say on trustpilot? uk.trustpilot.com/review/jcoates.co.uk
These reviews have been verified by Trustpilot that they are genuine customers views and not those by competitors and individuals who have an axe to grind
No doubt this will get removed from the forum because it does not fit in with the agenda of the forums sponsor and the moderators!
The views put on here are so biased a public health warning needs to be added.
Pretty sure there was a thread about them recently about the standard of their training from one particular candidate
Pretty sure means not sure so should this statement be made? To get an unbiased reflection of J Coates then look at what the customers say on trustpilot? uk.trustpilot.com/review/jcoates.co.uk
These reviews have been verified by Trustpilot that they are genuine customers views and not those by competitors and individuals who have an axe to grind
No doubt this will get removed from the forum because it does not fit in with the agenda of the forums sponsor and the moderators!
Maybe you would like to respond to this thread then and how it went.
I was merely stating I remember a post where a trainee was extremely unsatisfied with the training from your company, and your business was named by him.
It’s always good for people to consider the good and the bad. I had to spend time trying to find the post for me to be able to give it some context. Hence why I said I was pretty sure, as in not 100% sure.
Oh and for reference my view is unbiased I have no affiliation to the forum sponsor or the moderators or yourselves. I merely used the forum sponsor when it was owned by Peter Smythe myself.
Based on recommendations on here and from going and visiting them myself. Something I would strongly urge all people to do is visit the provider in person.
The views put on here are so biased a public health warning needs to be added.
Pretty sure there was a thread about them recently about the standard of their training from one particular candidate
Pretty sure means not sure so should this statement be made? To get an unbiased reflection of J Coates then look at what the customers say on trustpilot? uk.trustpilot.com/review/jcoates.co.uk
These reviews have been verified by Trustpilot that they are genuine customers views and not those by competitors and individuals who have an axe to grind
No doubt this will get removed from the forum because it does not fit in with the agenda of the forums sponsor and the moderators!
Maybe you would like to respond to this thread then and how it went.
I was merely stating I remember a post where a trainee was extremely unsatisfied with the training from your company, and your business was named by him.
It’s always good for people to consider the good and the bad. I had to spend time trying to find the post for me to be able to give it some context. Hence why I said I was pretty sure, as in not 100% sure.
As regards that particular trainee the other side of the story is that he had his original test cancelled due to the lockdown and then decided that all he needed was an hours warm up training before his test sometime after his training. Despite the advise of booking more training he took a test and failed his reverse! He then just booked a test and failed blaming his failure on the truck! There was no warning lights on the vehicle, we had it checked over by our own workshop, no faults found so put it back on training with no issues at all.
We then had the old “give me a retest else I will slag you off on social media” bullying tactics by this individual. We stood our ground and did not submit to this behavior.
I see that this same individual posted this on trucknet now blamed the DVLA (DVSA!) for himself not passing his test! Looking at the dates this could have been with another training provider!
I’ve come to the conclusion that the DVLA jobsworths only pass certain people aligned to certain haulage companies or organisations.
For example, I was advised that a very high percentage of drivers passed their test first time at a very large local RAF base, which makes no sense when the passrate for everyone else is much lower.
The only thing that i really learnt from my instructors was to look in the mirror, and not much else, because i have been driving for 33 years, legally, and 39 years in total (including agricultural work)
I don’t think the DVSA CAT C test process is fit for purpose, myself. Particularly the stupid CPC crap. “What should i eat for my dinner, muesli or chips ?”
He also never got a refund for his training as there was no evidence to suggest the truck was at fault. If the truck had been faulty then the examiner would have aborted the test and not class it as a fail, which all training providers know but failed to recognise in their responses!
You can make your own conclusions now after hearing the full facts.
Then clearly the other parts of the post are just gossip and hear say that funnily enough the moderators allow!
Keyboard warriors and forum moderators need to be very careful what is written and allowed to be posted especially when it can effect peoples livelihoods. I know lots of people put plenty of hard work in everyday to maintain their good reputation and deliver a good experience to their customers constantly for over 50 years so there comes a point when it needs to be defended.
Well at least now you have been able to put your side of the story out there.
And feel free to report it to the mods if you feel any of it unfair. I’m sure they will look at it unbiasedly and remove any offending posts.
burnie1:
… forum moderators need to be very careful what is written and allowed to be posted especially when it can effect peoples livelihoods.
Yes burnie1, that’s quite true, so we’re well aware of it.
I’ve had a quick look through this topic, but I can’t find that any of TN’s forum rules have been broken.
I’ll gladly take another look if you can point me in the right direction though.
I’ve seen that links have been posted that go to other sites where people have commented somewhat negatively, but the point is that it’s on other sites. TN’s policy on this is that we won’t get involved in adjudicating between parties who are in dispute because we’d never truly know the whole of both sides of the story. If such a dispute happens on TN, we usually remove the topic and then invite the participants to resolve their issue(s) privately.
From earlier in this topic…
burnie1:
No doubt this will get removed from the forum because it does not fit in with the agenda of the forums sponsor and the moderators!
What you’re doing here is within the forum rules… it’s only blatant (unauthorised) adverts that get removed.
Defending your company on TN isn’t a problem because you’re responding to something that was written on TN, this includes you linking to other sites to back up your assertions as the other poster did.
I spoke to J Coates a while back, they have a long wait between theory and practical, I think it was like 4 months.
I used another company, they even had theory dates they were willing to sell me for a little mark up. Instead of doing my theory in mid August I did it and passed a week after phoning them. In for my practical soon, well before the quotes the other companies gave me.
Very few companies are willing to pre-purchase test dates without a pupil ready to book. But I can understand it’s a gamble if they don’t find a pupil it’s a loss of the test fee.
ROG:
Which school did you choose for the practical
Data Academy on Scudamore Road. They’re more expensive than other schools, but you get what you pay for. I’ve had a driving assessment in the CE as well, I drive too quickly and don’t observe the mirrors enough, but that should all be corrected when I have my training.
I will write them a proper review with all the costs broke down and the time frame it’s took me to get in for practical from medical. Of course for others it may vary depending on DVLA and how busy the test centres are.
