No names, locations, or training schools mentioned, as it is an ongoing complaint with the dvsa, but a friend of mine, who has his own training school, had a cat c candidate, pick up 2 driving faults for not making progress, one a dual carriageway, one on a motorway, both times for not getting up to 60 mph. The truck was limited to 52 mph, and during the debrief (which the instructor was privy to) the examiner as good as said he didn’t know what a speed limiter was, and thought the candidate wasn’t confident enough to get up to the required speed.
The examiner in question is getting on in years, passed his Hgv in the army, and has never driven a truck commercially, and has been examining on cars for years, it’s only the last few weeks/months that he has been drafted onto trucks and buses.
It’s lucky the candidate did not fail on this, however, the instructor felt the need to take it further, rightly or wrongly.
The chappie passed, with 5 faults, only should have been 3 though. I’ll update further when I know more.
There should be a sticker in the cab showing the speed restriction. Most UK registered lorries are either restricted to 85km/h (53mph) or 90km/h (56mph).
If you’re going to be examining, you need to be better than the average. IMHO this examiner is not suitable for the job, regardless of current circumstances.
Do examiners not have discretion to remove marks?
I’d be ■■■■■■ if I failed because of such a situation.
When I was an LGV instructor in the mid noughties, one company turned up in a, new to them 53 plate Renault 18 tonner with the pop out tray type tachograph with the digital display. Digital tachographs had just come out so it must have been around May/June 2006. The examiner came out and inspected the truck and said, “oh, this must be one of those new digital tachographs that I’ve heard about,”
Most examiners that I dealt with, were decent enough guys, but hadn’t done much real world driving, and some of the decisions were difficult to agree with.
TruckerGuy:
If you’re going to be examining, you need to be better than the average. IMHO this examiner is not suitable for the job, regardless of current circumstances.
Do examiners not have discretion to remove marks?
I’d be ■■■■■■ if I failed because of such a situation.
It used to be that once the test was over under no circumstances could the decision be reversed, if you won an appeal, all you got was a free retest
I’m not sure about examiners but I find it extremely odd that you require ZERO training or accreditation to be a HGV trainer. All you need is to hold a hgv licence for a few years.
Compare that with becoming a car driving instructor. gov.uk/become-car-driving-instructor
adam277:
I’m not sure about examiners but I find it extremely odd that you require ZERO training or accreditation to be a HGV trainer. All you need is to hold a hgv licence for a few years.
Compare that with becoming a car driving instructor. gov.uk/become-car-driving-instructor
