Why Choose Gold standard driving?

This is an important choice to consider, learning in a manual without doubt will take a little longer but as coffee lovers will tell you instant isn't always better. It can be more fulfilling to smell the aromatic aromas whilst grinding the coffee beans yourself instead of sticking a teaspoon of instant in you favourite cup. 

But after all you are reading about learning to drive, not an energising beverage, so I'll try to stay on point. Manuals are dying; it is true, the numbers don't lie but everything comes to an end eventually; even a mountain will erode to sea level given enough time. According to the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders 40% of cars sold in 2017 had an automatic gearbox, in 2007 it was around 23% so automatic sales are increasing in place of manuals.

This is partly due to the fact automatic gearboxes have changed a lot in the 21st century so they are now more efficient than the energy sapping automatics of yester-century. Also, the increasing sales of hybrid and electric cars are contributing to that increase of automatics. Having said that, the average age of a car on UK roads is 7 years and manuals have a lot of life left in them. Companies like Porsche and Aston Martin are starting to sell special manual editions of their automatic only cars because demand for the manual is still strong. The majority of cars on the road are still manual and that will be the case for a while yet, therefore even today 92% of people opt to take manual driving lessons as most people prefer the freedom to drive all cars instead of being restricted to only automatic. 

Interestingly enough despite being easier, automatic driving tests have an 8% higher failure rate than manual. This is definitely a case where correlation doesn't always equal causation, the higher failure rate is likely because some of the people opting for automatic driving lessons do so because they find driving more challenging than the average learner and therefore are less likely to pass a driving test, even if it is easier. 

Whether you decide to drive a manual or an automatic after your driving test, manual driving lessons will help you become a better driver. To be successful in a manual you need to learn to stay calm, compose yourself and get the car fully prepared before you reach any junctions or hazards. This encourages you to learn to look ahead and plan unlike auto driving lessons where you only have two pedals and no gears to consider. A lot of people who learn in a manual learn to love the manual, this is one of the reasons they have stayed so popular for so long on our twisty roads. There is a form of satisfaction to be had from performing a clean crisp gear change on a winding B road or the extra control a clutch can give you when the weather gets bad and the roads get slippery.

However, if you want the quickest route to a licence and don't mind being limited to automatic transmission cars, automatic driving lessons will be for you. With gearless electric cars firmly on the horizon I'm sure the manual driving licence will likely become a thing of the past, but not until at least 2045 by which time petrol and diesel engined vehicles are predicted to make up a minority of the cars on our roads. But no one knows for sure what the future will bring.

According to the Driver and Vehicle Standards Agency (DVSA) there are 338 Approved Driving Instructors in the Buckinghamshire area at the time of writing. Choosing the perfect one for you is a difficult task as you can hardly try all 338 instructors.

It is best to try an instructor who is able to fit your availability, that bit is fairly obvious. What is less obvious is price, should you pay more or less per hour? Well, to be honest the answer is in the price, if an instructor is able to charge more this is a good sign that they have enough customers willing to pay more. On the other hand, an instructor who is less successful would have to lower their prices to try to make their service seem more appealing. So with driving lessons you normally get what you pay for, but consider this, if you save £2 per hour but it takes you 10 hours longer to learn to drive, are you really saving money?

Asking people you know who have recently learnt to drive and reading online reviews is a reliable way of narrowing down your choice, people are rarely willing to recommend a service unless they are very happy with it.

Try calling the instructor, when you speak to someone - even over the phone, you can normally judge if you would feel comfortable sitting next to them. You can also get a good idea if they sound experienced and confident in their ability to help you. You want the best instructor for you so trust your senses and listen to how you feel about them.

We offer corporate training options to help your employees become safer and more confident drivers. Contact us to learn more.