Parents and their cars under pressure
Backlog causing thousands of learners to practice in their parents’ cars
The pandemic and lockdowns has forced learners into parental lessons. Not only that, but the family cars have become the learners workhorse in the process.
With the backlogs and waiting lists for lessons and tests increasing by the day, the trend looks set to continue.
Behind the wheel
That’s the view of one of the UK’s largest specialist motor insurance brokers, Adrian Flux. They are experiencing a 60% surge in business from learner drivers trying to hone their skills with family.
During April and May, 8,232 policies or quotes were made or taken out by learners who stated the car they were driving belonged to a parent. For the same date range in 2019, the company’s figures were just 5,117. It’s a huge jump in business and just one indicator of the current state of learning to drive.
No easy route
“Learner drivers are doing everything they can to get around this problem,” said Gerry Bucke, Adrian Flux’s general manager.
“There’s obviously a massive demand for driving instructors at the moment and lessons are like gold dust. It’s a frustrating time and learners are now taking the matter into their own hands and getting some time behind the wheel with their parents.
“We wouldn’t be surprised if more people took advantage of that fact that you can get insured to drive your parents’ cars with the backlogs from lockdown likely to take months to clear.”
Gridlock
More than 1.2million learners are thought to be waiting to take a test. On the road there, thousands of learners are scrambling to land prized lessons with heavily oversubscribed instructors.
Since lessons resumed on April 22, the problems have continued to increase. This hasn’t been helped by a 13% decrease in the number of instructors over the last few years. DVSA figures show there were 44,569 instructors registered in the UK in 2013 but this fell 13% to just 38,778 in December 2020.
“The system is just under huge pressure and while we know learning with a qualified instructor is the best option, driving your parents’ car is the next best thing”.
Learners can find tips on how to deal with the backlog by visiting Adrian Flux’s dedicated Learner Driver Hub.