Do you charge for cancelled driving lessons?

Cancellations are to be avoided if at all possible.

Cancelled lessons mean reduced income for driving instructors so please forgive us if we try to encourage you not to cancel any.

All driving instructors are self-employed and as such I feel that it is only fair to allow them the flexibility to set their own individual cancellation policy. At first read this may seem like a recipe for chaos. This is not the case. We do discuss cancellations and I make sure that whatever they are proposing is reasonable. Reasonable both to them and to the pupils. For example:-

24 hr rule:- With the 24 hour rule you need to give notice of cancellation at least one day before the lesson that is booked is due to take place. If you fail to allow this time then the lesson fee is charged.

Sounds a bit official and it is but it also works both ways. According to a ruling by the Office of Fair Trading a rule of this type has to work both ways. In other words if an instructor demands 24 hours notice then they have to be prepared to give 24 hours notice themselves if they need to cancel a lesson. If they do not then the next lesson has to be provided for free.

Sounds a little more reasonable now. It is not uncommon to use a 48 hour period for notice of cancellation.

I personally do not charge for cancelled lessons. Cancellations are the bane of a driving instructors life but I do not charge. You cannot help it if you are ill. Life does these things to all of us at some time or other.

What I do however is keep a track of how many lessons an individual pupil has cancelled. If I think that a pupil has cancelled too many lessons then that pupils time slot will be sold to another customer.

Pupils do not like it when I sell their time slot but in my defence I feel bound to ask you the following questions. If you went to work and your employer did not need you on a particular day, sent you home and told you that you would not be paid for the time how happy would you be? How many times would you allow this to happen before you looked for a new employer?

There is no hard and fast rule as to how many lessons the instructor will allow you to cancel if they use this method.

Whatever system an instructor decides to use with respect of cancelled lessons they are obliged to make you aware of it on your first lesson with them.