Instructor Support Update – 31^st July

Driving lesson re-starts and new measures
We are delighted that our Instructors in Wales have now resumed offering driving lessons this week. Here is a link to a previous Instructor Support Update stating guidance on the various steps to restarting alongside marketing material.

Following the most recent Scottish Government announcement, driving lessons in Scotland will provisionally restart from Monday, August 24th. For those instructors affected your Relationship Manager will contact you next week to offer support and guidance measures up to the target resumption date.

We continue to monitor the new measures communicated by the Government late last night affecting Greater Manchester, East Lancashire and West Yorkshire. Andy Burnham, Mayor of Greater Manchester, has commented: “This isn’t a lockdown, this is asking people to take extra precautions, particularly with regard to who visits their home”.

We urge you to continue following the new lesson etiquette and safety guidelines. As a reminder, here is the pupil-facing link on driving lesson safety – https://www.billplant.co.uk/lessonsafety

New Part 3 Standard Operating Procedures
Please find below a new guidance document created by the Training Team at Bill Plant Driving School providing a simplified analysis of the new Part 3 Standard Operating Procedures.

This document is to guide Trainers, Trainees taking their Part 3 Exams and Instructors for their Standards Check.

DVSA urges patience for rescheduled driving tests
The DVSA has asked Driving Instructors to be patient regarding rescheduled tests. The agency has received an enormous number of phone calls and emails to its contact centre, so asks for understanding as it might take time for them to be answered.

In a message sent to Instructors this week, the agency said:
“During these unprecedented times, we are receiving a large number of emails and calls because of coronavirus. Many of these questions have been answered in recent information published on the GOV.UK website.

We’ll be emailing customers who have not yet had a reply and signposting them to the latest guidance. We will also ask customers with unanswered questions to get back in touch with us. This will allow our contact centre to focus on helping those customers whose questions still need answering.”

Public Relations Report
During the lockdown period, we received a record amount of press coverage due to our marketing efforts alongside our PR agency. Please find below a link to their Q2 (April to June) PR Coverage Highlights Report.

Activity such as this is fantastic to expand our awareness nationwide and importantly our credibility and superiority. Moving forward, our PR agency will produce a digital monthly coverage presentation that we will share with you.

Instructor Support
As ever, we are here for you. As previously stated, due to the high pupil call demand on the phone please do use the SMS inbox alongside the general email.

Please only use the below number for text message (not calls) on general enquiries and not to validate pupil bookings.

SMS Number: 07860027558
Email: [email protected].

We continue to do all we can to support our Instructors, Trainers, Trainees, Staff and Pupils.

Have a great weekend all!

Kind regards

Tom Hixon
Head of Instructor Support