Can I complain about Daughter's Driving Test?

Wig

Inactive wrote: »

The subject of this thread and the posts herein.

You have no knowledge of how the DSA Complaints System functions.

You have no knowledge of how a Driving Test Centre functions.

You have no experience of the Driving Test itself, other than when you took your own test/s.

I have taken the facts from this thread and made an observation that on the face of it a refund would be appropriate. The facts I refer to are:

*DSA provide tailored driviing tests to suit candidates with special needs.
*That service was booked by OP
*That service was not provided
*The DSA was contacted about the failure, by the mother
*The DSA is happy to deal with the mother initially
*The DSA have admitted an error has occured.

Yet you make critical comment as if you do, you accuse others of " ignorance " when it is clearly you that is ignorant.

I see people making judgements about the OP's daughter's disability, judgements they are not qualified to make, have no basis in fact to make those judgements.

Wig

JoolzS wrote: »

I think the "issue of her driving skills" is the most important thing considering she was taking her driving test. Driving can be inherently stressful so if your daughter can't deal with that stress then maybe she isn't ready to drive on her own. I have absolutely no learning difficulties (or whatever the current correct PC expression is) but on occasion I have to tell my DH to "shut the f*** up" because I'm trying to concentrate on driving. He also occasionally has to do the same to me, but he's more polite.

I really, really cannot understand why you want your daughter to pass a test that puts her in the most dangerous place in the world unless you and the examiner (who knows far better than you) is absolutely convinced she is capable of dealing with it. I didn't take my driving test until I was 24, after many, many hours of lessons, and the first time I pulled off a slip road onto the motorway I forgot to check my mirrors and nearly got myself killed!!

Julie

It's quite simple really, Let's assume you understand English perfectly well. Your driving test that you eventually passed was presumably conducted in English. Had you requested your test to be in English and were actually given an examiner who spoke in Englishbut also spoke some parts in Welsh, you would be rightly annoyed. When you first got in the car and you clarified with the instructer that you had booked a 100% English language test, and the examiner said "I don't know anything about that" (he says this in English). You then try to clarify further that you don't understand Welsh, to which the examiner raises his voice to you saying "I know what I'm doing" (in English).

Then during the test at certain points the examiner speaks to you in Welsh, you try your best to understand and it does make a stressful situation even more stressful, and it does affect the way you perform on your test.

Do you agree that just because someone speaks to you in a language you don't understand, does not affect how good you are at driving, it just means the instructions are not going to get through as quickly as if the instructions were in English. In order to compensate for this you drive slower and your stress level rises - for obvious reasons, this further affects the way you conduct yourself in the parts of the test that ARE in English.



Are you telling us that "you really really can't understand" why you would want an examiner who speaks 100% English on your test and not one who speaks to you occasionally in Welsh? - Are you serious? - Because THAT is the issue here, not the nonsense that has been fixated upon by the likes of espresso.

beachbeth

Wig wrote: »

Do you agree that just because someone speaks to you in a language you don't understand, does not affect how good you are at driving, it just means the instructions are not going to get through as quickly as if the instructions were in English. In order to compensate for this you drive slower and your stress level rises - for obvious reasons, this further affects the way you conduct yourself in the parts of the test that ARE in English.

This is an excellent illustration of what I have been trying to say.

I don't think Wig is trying to be an expert here, no matter what any of you say. The fact is that he has grasped what I have been trying to say all the way through this thread and understands the situation that my daughter was in. This doesn't mean he thinks he knows it all - it just shows that he has read my posts and understands what I am talking about.

Inactive

Wig wrote: »

I have taken the facts from this thread and made an observation that on the face of it a refund would be appropriate. The facts I refer to are:

*DSA provide tailored driviing tests to suit candidates with special needs.
*That service was booked by OP
*That service was not provided
*The DSA was contacted about the failure, by the mother
*The DSA is happy to deal with the mother initially
*The DSA have admitted an error has occured.

Most of that is not " fact ", it is what somebody has told you is " fact ", you were not there, nor was the OP, so it is all hearsay, second and third hand information in fact.

:rolleyes:

Oh and BTW, the DSA have not admitted that an error has occurred, a member of DSA Staff may have implied that, but until a full investigation is conducted, nobody would be in a position to admit liabilty.


The DSA unlike you, listen to the full facts before making a decision.

Wig

Inactive wrote: »

Most of that is not " fact ", it is what somebody has told you is " fact ", you were not there, nor was the OP, so it is all hearsay, second and third hand information in fact.

If a red Ford Fiesta is parked outside the post office in my town, and my daughter came home and told me a red ford fiesta was parked outside the post office in my town. And I came to MSE to say a red Ford Fiesta was parked outside the Post Office in my town. That would be a fact. Just because I told you it was there does not make the fact that it was there untrue. Like I said to you earlier, if you are going to disbelieve everything you read here why bother reading anything?

Of course things have to be verified in an investigation (as I have said earlier in the thread), but it won't change the facts, facts cannot be changed. None of us are in a position to to say that anything the OP has said is a lie.

The ignoramus' here which I took issue with have decided that they understand the OP's daughter's disability better than the OP does. They have no basis for their opinion. Whereas I could atleast refer to the facts as given by the OP.

Oh and BTW, the DSA have not admitted that an error has occurred, a member of DSA Staff may have implied that, but until a full investigation is conducted, nobody would be in a position to admit liabilty.

* There you go again disbelieving what the OP has said in this thread, read #47 again. And may I remind you that #47 is written on first hand information, it was the OP that was talking to the DSA. Are you once again saying the OP is lying? Why would she do that? Why do you think that? Why bother coming to MSE if you think everyone is lying?

* Not even you? Surely not! You wouldn't be agreeing with my post #98 would you?

The DSA unlike you, listen to the full facts before making a final decision.

* That's rich, coming from you.

* I inserted a word for you.

Inactive

Wig, you have obviously never heard the saying " there are two sides to every story ", we only have one side here, that is second hand information at that.

It is not " fact " simply because somebody tells us it is.

I never make a judgement on biased half stories, nor do the DSA, however you clearly do.:rolleyes:

beachbeth

Inactive wrote: »

Clearly they will take more notice if the actual test candidate ( the Daughter ) approches them with first hand information.

An update for you. We've received a letter from the DSA this morning asking that we print out a copy of the email I sent them and that my daughter signs it with the words "I authorise.....etc". So the DSA can then discuss the matter with me (or my daughter if she isn't at work or college.)

beachbeth

Inactive wrote: »

Wig, you have obviously never heard the saying " there are two sides to every story ", we only have one side here, that is second hand information at that.

On forums such as this you only ever hear one side of the story. Or shall I ring the DSA and the Test Centre and see if they will join in too?

You can only take what people say as fact on forums such as this and then reply accordingly. Continually arguing about whether someone is making something up is a waste of time. Do you usually get proof from people on other threads before you join in with a debate?

Facts:

1. My daughter is special needs
2. She was told she would have a driving test suitable for a special needs person.
3. She wasn't given the appropriate driving test on the day.

Whatever her driving ability was on the actual day, the above are all facts.

cajef

beachbeth wrote: »

Facts

She wasn't given the appropriate driving test on the day.

That is not a fact, it is just your opinion and and has yet to be decided by the DSA after it has taken all sides of the story into consideration from both parties i.e yourself and the driving centre and examiner where the test was taken.

espresso

beachbeth wrote: »

1. My daughter has been at work all day today and so I can't tell you what she failed on as she has the sheet with the marks. (I don't want to post from memory as I'd rather put the actual facts rather than what I think).
2. Her instructor did give her mock tests.
3. What makes you think she needs to be told to use her mirrors?

You are so determined to prove yourself right that I don't know if I can be bothered to answer you any more anyway.

Point 1. Still no facts posted then!

If she was asked to reverse around a corner into a side street, she obviously understood the instructions given but then failed the manoeuvre which is a serious fault resulting in a test failure.

The DSA investigation may look at the test marks and decide that because she failed on things when she obviously understood what she was expected of her e.g. no one would reverse around a corner without being instructed to do so, just for the hell of it.

Point 3.

beachbeth wrote: »

Also, she had to do a 3-point turn on a steep hill and was asked to reverse round a corner where the road went down a hill and my daughter couldn't see down it properly. She marked her down for not looking in her mirrors, which is one thing she is good at. She got the feeling that the woman was trying to make her fail.

beachbeth wrote: »

I asked for advice at the beginning of this thread but I no longer need it.

Are you even going to report back to this thread with the outcome of the DSA investigation, as you have not received the advice that you wanted?

beachbeth wrote: »

So continually sniping at me to prove your own point is fruitless now.

No one is sniping at you, if they decide to refund the test fee, fair enough but taking the test obviously cost more than just the test fee, so are you then going to claim for the driving instructors fee and her loss of earnings while out of work etc?