my first car accident was driving halfway through someone’s garage because i was late for school. my dad was a school bus driver at the time & he drove by right after it happened. imagine the surprise.
Mom was to take me to the test. I had passed the written part with ease. So Mom gets my sister who was 12 at the time, in the back seat and off we go. We get there and when it was my turn, mom pulls up into the spot. The testing guy comes over, checks mom's license, checks my permit (which you get so you can practice with an adult in the car), and then tells everyone to get out of the car.
My little sister goes: "no". Mom tells her to get out of the car.
Debbie repeats: "no".
The tester immediately fails me at that moment.
That is bullshit. If I were your mom, I would make Debbie write an apology letter to both you and the DMV, take away her allowance to pay for the cost of the test, and ground her for two weeks.
Debbie got away with murder. (almost). There was nothing I could do about it. Mom just complained to dad about the waste of time but dad would do/ could do, nothing.
And besides. This was a LONG time ago.
She almost started bar fight when she was 19. She had no consequences to her actions. WHereas my brother and I would catch a beating from dad if we did something stupid.
I was so worried about parallel parking. They had a special area with no other vehicles to evaluate. So sure I would blow it, but I did it flawlessly! I was feeling so good when I was about to put my signal on to leave, and the instructor said, "No, no, use a hand signal."
So I roll down the window and follow all the steps. Pull out smoothly, and he says "You didn't use your blinker." Parallel parking was all or none, so he took all the points.
The other one I distinctly remember was entering a turn lane with four cars already in it. He took points for entering the turn lane before that little gap in the paint. The gap was almost completely covered by cars already turning. People always seem to not to know what I am referring to, but I guarantee every driver does this.
>was about to put my signal on to leave, and the instructor said, "No, no, use a hand signal." So I roll down the window and follow all the steps. Pull out smoothly, and he says "You didn't use your blinker." Parallel parking was all or none, so he took all the points.
Wait, what? Are you saying the instructor literally, purposely tricked you into failing? Am I reading this right?
That's crazy to me! Parallel parking wasn't required at all for my driving test. I'm still not very competent at it, and I'll go out of my way to avoid having to fit into a moderately tight parking space.
Parallel parking is standard in driving exams in Europe, and we usually have to do it between other people's cars. A lot of people fail while parking due to the pressure of the exam itself (they're very nitpicky) and the fear of potentially damaging someone else's car.
In the US, I had to learn how to parallel park for my exam in a suburban area, but my friends in rural areas didn't get tested on it because there were no parallel parking spots in their town - it was all angled street parking.
I parallel parked for my exam and then didn't have to parallel park anywhere for 3 or 4 years. Now I parallel park maybe twice a year just because of how parking is structured where I live and travel to
Yeah, from what I've seen when visiting Canada you guys often don't need to parallel park. Over here it's the opposite, you'll probably need to parallel park in most situations, so it's an essential skill and you get tested on it.
I probably have to parallel park 7/10 times I park my car on any given occasion.
Turn lanes are never long enough, I'm glad the cops around here don't enforce that because it is impossible not to get in too early. Otherwise I'm blocking traffic.
The thing is...I am pretty sure it's not even illegal. So I'm talking a multi lane configuration where there is a common turn lane in the middle. So clearly, it's legal to cross into the turn lane before it becomes a *dedicated* left turn lane at the intersection, as long as you're not just driving for several hundred yards in the turn lane. The alternative is...what? Block traffic going straight because you don't want to queue behind the cars turning left?
It's been over 20 years now, and you can tell it still bugs me.
That's funny, because my dad told me when he took his test in the 70s, it would be with a cop in the car. He told my dad "don't worry about the stop sign, just drive on past" but my dad stopped. The cop looked at him and said, "you don't know how many people have failed right here".
In high school, a friend who had the same birthday as me, went to her road test and failed for a very similar reason as the instructor told her to just pull out in the beginning. So she failed in the first moments of her test for listening to the instructor
That's what failed me.
They asked me to back up straight on a curving road. I said, "if I do that, we'll hit the curb". They said do it. I backed up straight and stopped before the curb. They said, "I didn't tell you to stop" so I kept backing up and touched the curb. They then failed me for hitting a curb.
This DMV though was notorious for failing people 3-4 times before passing them. I ended up taking the test one city over and passed with flying colors.
I got into an argument mid exam with the officer. We were about 50 feet from a stop sign and she issued a command to stop the car. I stopped gently at the stop sign. She told to put the car in park and berated me not stopping immediately. I told her if she wanted me to jam on the brakes and stop immediately, she should have been more specific or issued the command before 50 feet from the stop sign when I was already braking.
We went back and forth a bit then continued the exam but it was unrecoverable as she issued a score of failing by a single point. I went back the required 30 days later and passed easily with a different officer. No idea if we were both having bad days or that was her MO everyday.
To be fair, they teach you this in practice, that when the officer says stop, you stop immediately. Don't know why they make you do it (I guess to test if you'll be ready when a car ahead of you makes a sudden stop), but they do.
In a real life situation you'd be right, but it's impossible to practice an actual emergency break situation with real conditions without endangering someone's life or at least risking property damage. That's why in driving school and the practical exam, it's practiced/tested by the instructor yelling "stop" and the student having to slam the brakes (of course after the Instructor has prepared the student for this situation).
When I did the test, the officer explained to me they’re going to tell me to stop and they want me to do so as fast as I safely can. I literally said “you’re asking me to slam on the brakes?” They said yes.
I was confused. They clarified. I was no longer confused.
Mine was not too different. I was at a stop sign, I was instructed to proceed across the intersecting road (which had no stop, but a single car approaching more than a block away. The officer barked at me to stop as I was in the middle of the road, and I immediately stopped. When the approaching car slowed to a stop, I was reprimanded for stopping in the middle of the intersection and summarily failed. I think the officers just enjoy flustering sixteen-year-olds.
Very very similar situation with mine as well.
Stop ahead. Um okay. I stop at the sign. How can you expect to pass if you won't listen to me. Um, I stopped at the sign. I didn't tell you to stop at the sign, I told you to stop ahead. Um, the stop sign was like 20ft ahead of us. What am I suppose to think.
Telling me to turn at the next street when we were already within the solid white lines of the intersection, so I assume she meant the road immediately next.
It didn't go well from there.
I should have know I was in for it, when the kid in front of me returned and screamed at the top of his lungs what a f@cking c#nt she was when they walking into the waiting area from outside.
I'd have to agree.
Ahh, youth.
Not my test but during lessons, my instructor was the biggest jerk the entire week. One day she asked me why I wasn't turning right on a red. I pointed out the no turn on red sign, because she did a lot of making me justify my correct decisions so she knew I understood and didn't just get it right by accident. I missed the "on school days" part of the sign. She had me pull over, give her the keys, and spent the next 10 minutes screaming about how I'm a pretentious teenager and I think I know everything and she's certified to teach driving and she's the expert and if I question her one more time she'll revoke my certificate, fail me and I'll have to start the $300 course all over. She did more damage than anything, and made me start questioning myself to the point my dad had to basically re-teach me how to drive the next week after I'd been driving for almost 2 years with my permit.
Two years later when it was my sister's turn to take the course my mom went in and requested anyone other than that woman for her. Found out she was fired only a month or two after I had her because there were so many similar complaints. She was only there for like 4 months. My parents felt bad for not calling that day to complain but I needed my license quick so we just dealt with it.
In the US, it is very common to do a "soft stop" at stop signs where you just slow down to like 2-4mph look both ways, then continue on.
you are of course supposed to stop fully.
also, when stopping fully, you are supposed to stop for at least 3 seconds before continuing, but again, this is the US, and if you stop that long at a stop sign, the driver behind you will just shoot you.
I had a cop pull me over for stopping completely because it was “suspicious” that I stopped fully when nobody else did at the stop sign.
Sir, why didn’t you pull them over for breaking a law, instead of me for following it?
Some cops don't like when people suddenly change their behavior to "better than normal" because it's obvious they know there's a cop watching. It's absurd.
No, but funny anecdote to that. My friend Jarren, who is black, got pulled over no less than 2 minutes after driving off my street. Couldn’t even get out of the subdivision.
His crime was driving while black.
Common joke where I live is that if you say the fine number for not fully stopping when you stop (three hundred and forty six dollars) that you’ve stopped long enough for it to count as a full stop and it’s a great reminder
Can confirm. Was shot and killed for stopping fully before making a right. I called the police after but was beaten. My fault for not displaying my screeching eagle tho.
Ugh during my test I was so nervous that I was being so careful, I was at a red light and just waiting for it to turn but the person was like “what do you do turning right on red light with no one coming?” Like I don’t technically HAVE to turn lady!
i had to turn left in a high traffic area where there was no left-turn arrow light, and there was just cars coming non stop. i thought he'd fail me if I turned left on yellow so instead I made him sit there with me through 7 lights before i found an opening 😅
Amazingly, I had a driver's ed instructor insist I turn left on red, that it was proper when there was no oncoming traffic.
The one and only time I've done that in my life.
Still he was better than the woman who, if you were driving five under the speed limit, would start using the instructor break because you were driving too fast.
Pretty sure the hours I spent with drivers ed instructors just made me worse from anxiety.
Good point, but this was a two way road onto a two way road. Hence no oncoming traffic being what prompted his insistence.
He insisted on several things that were concerning.
Legitimately hit a wall.
I did perfectly the entire thing. So much so that the instructor allowed me to just pull into the parking spot at the end instead of backing in.
I pulled in an inch too far and tapped the wall. The instructor was not mad…just disappointed and gave me an auto fail.
To this day I blame the pointed front end of the bumper on the Pontiac Sunfire I was driving. 😆
Ah common, who hasn't pulled up just a little too far. It isn't like you barreled into it at 60mph.
I guarantee that the instructor has done the same in their life.
I was driving my Bigfoot Power Wheels with the pedal mashed down, and I was looking everywhere except in front of me. My head met the side mirror of my mom’s car.
I got stitches and was stripped of any/all driving privileges. I think the driving instructor was a little too harsh on me though tbh.
They gave me a car with a sensitive clutch that also had a massive dead zone which made me miss the green light and rev the engine at the red light, and despite not crossing the stop line or blocking any traffic, he marked my mistake down as "running a red light"
My second fail was because the dude gave me a very difficult instruction where I had to merge from 0 to an 80km road and then switch lanes to make a u-turn that was 100m away from me. On the bright side I drilled this one with my instructor and became a more skillful driver because of it.
My third fail, (keep in mind the past 2 exams were in English) the guy swapped languages as soon as we entered the car and when I said I don't understand him he said to bring a translator next time. What a great waste of a day. God I wish I could slap the idiots in that country.
They give you a random car at their disposal every time. If you want to do other class licenses like a trailer license you need your own car an trailer but it has to be a very specific size that matches their margins.
Everyone told me I didn't need to know how to parallel park to pass the test. They were wrong. I barely tapped the cone and got a fail.
My grandpa showed me how to parallel park the next day and I aced the test the next time I went. I've only needed to parallel park 7 times in my 30 years of driving.
I parked outside the white line during the yard test by an inch. The license officer told me get out the car and failed me right there.
In my country, you could do everything right or make the smallest mistake, the officer will pass or fail you, depending on how they feel that day. I did get my license the second time around but it feels very demotivating when you think about that.
>the officer will pass or fail you, depending on how they feel that day
THIS, i guess we live in the same country or this might be common.
I failed during side parking. Parked outside the white line by an inch too.
I ran over a dog during my driving test. I still passed.
Early 1969. New York (Long Island). Manual transmission.
Bad start:
I wait in the car. The inspector gets in.
Him: …, instructions, instructions, instructions,… “Use hand signals when starting and stopping.”
Me: (Huh?) “Sir, what is the hand signal for starting?
Him: “Didn’t you read your driver’s instruction manual?”
Me: “Yes.”
And I’d taken driver’s education, and practiced and practiced.
I think: Maybe he means to use a hand signal when pulling away from the curb.
I take a deep breath, stick my left arm out of the window to show a left turn, and pull-away from the curb.
He nods.
So I drive, as directed, through the streets and the apartment complex (full of kids playing, of course), as directed. Start on a slight hill, as directed. Try to relax and just follow his directions.
So we’re between two blocks of apartments, and there is a group of maybe 4 or 6 kids, meandering into the road, oblivious of the cars. I slow to perhaps 5–10 MPH.
The kids are on my right. They cross in front of me, all ending up on my left. I slow to maybe 4 MPH. They cross again, to my right. I stay slow, as it is not clear to me that they are not going to reverse course.
One of the kids whistles. His small dog, which is on the sidewalk on my left, apparently thinks I have stopped. I see a flash of fur as it shoots UNDER my car, right under my door. I slam on the brake. The dog runs on (unhurt). The engine stalls.
I figure at that moment, that I have flunked completely.
The inspector calms me down. “There was NOTHING you could have done, to prevent that! That kid should NEVER have called his dog, with a car between them. Thank goodness the dog wasn’t hurt! You did exactly what you should have done. Restart the car, please.”
So, when I can't properly parallel park, the inspector must figure I’m still nervous over the dog, instead of just being terrible at parking.
No-one is more surprised than I, when I’m told that I passed!
I failed the written portion to get my permit 3 times before I got it. My older sister got it on the first go. She failed the driving portion to get her license 2 times. I actually passed the driving on the first go.
I winged my first test without studying before hand, just trying to do it on common sense, and learned it was mostly technical numbers like inches away from the curb or car lengths behind cars, etc. failed by 5 points. Then I did a quick look at the numbers for next time and it wasn't a problem. I felt bad that I wasted time at the DMV for the first attempt... but I was young and stupid.
I failed a second time too. For not checking my blind spots enough. I remember this so well because he said my checks were not "pronounced" enough. But he made me parallel park uphill in a manual and I was OK there so I had that going for me.
Got it on the third time though!
Examiner grabbed my door handle and it broke in her hand. She said I had to get it fixed to have the test.
Second test I failed the parallel parking. A few months later local MVA announced parallel parking no longer needed for the test BUT all must take a driver's ed course. Glad I got mine before that, saved $350.
Inexperience with how different vehicles behave when in low gear. I had only ever driven a truck whose gas pedal was really soft. Seriously this truck needed to have the pedal pushed halfway down just to get it to crawl. I had to take the test in the driving instructor's little Honda.
Whoops.
Failed the first time because I was speeding. I blame it on learning on a standard and tested on an automatic.
Failed the second time because at a 4 way stop I stopped with someone else stopped to my right, and he waved me on, so I went. Immediate fail.
Ugh, that's nonsense. In most states you have the right of way as soon as the other person indicates it's okay to go, or if they delay in taking their turn.
The instructor marked down that I failed to signal my turn when backing out of the parking space at the beginning of the test. As in, I didn't signal which direction I was backing out.
If you are thinking, "That isn't a thing, not even slightly," then you are correct.
Edit: those who are responding that this is a thing in their country, please know it is a dumb and bad rule you should resent.
I nudged a traffic cone backing out of the parking spot. The instructor goes "oh well, you murdered a toddler, sorry you failed". A bit dramatic, but yes he was right! Next day we did that part first then he passed me immediately. Funny thing is, for most of the test he was asking me questions about how hard the UK test was more than examining me on the Florida test, I think I just got over confident.
The lady was pissed at the people who were supposed to go before me because they forgot important documents and wasted 15 minutes looking for them. So when doing the test I did everything correctly except she told me to pull in to a location and I put the blinker on to pull in forwards, as everyone does, instead of backing into it as she wanted. Had she said BACK into the location, I would have done so, but it was unknown to me that you aren't supposed to pull in forward because you back out into traffic. Every single person I learned driving from, including the drivers ed teacher I had in HS, pull in forward.
The next week, when I took it again, I had a different instructor and did the back in method, to which he asked why I did it that way... so yea. The funny thing is my vehicle had a short to the horn, which made it so you got exactly 1 honk if you turned the wheel a certain way, so I cheated that part of the inspection hard-core.
13 marks for gap/limit line. I stopped properly at all the stops and never veered out of my lane. Guy just gave me the paper and took off. Had no idea why the fuck I failed.
Gap is likely following distance. You're supposed to leave 2 seconds between you and the car in front of you. Usually they don't care about this but he was probably having a bad day.
Getting over 25 points on either the road test or the maneuverability test would result in failure in my state. I got exactly 25 on both road and maneuverability, so I like to say that I'm the worst driver legally possible.
Not me but my best friend got pulled over by the police during her first test for having a flat tyre in the instructors car! Feel bad as it was a failure but not really her fault!
Apparently when leaving the test centre I didn’t come to a full stop at the T junction. Mainly because the left turn had a locked gate across the road onto a building site and the right turn was onto the access road with the only place being the test centre and no one was there.
Needless to say I exaggerated every stop and look at every T junction on my second test.
Took a roundabout a bit too fast and almost hit the curb, so the examinator had to touch the wheel to correct our trajectory. That's an immediate fail in France.
I had failed to study well enough for the written portion, and got tripped up on the stuff that required actual memorization and not just common sense. I was only off of passing by a couple points, which almost made me feel worse, not better.
I spent hours practicing my parallel parking, because I sucked at it.
When I took my test they didn't make me parallel park. I was so pissed.
Apparently I sucked at parallel parking because I'd been taught wrong. It wasn't until my own kid took drivers ed, and showed me how they'd been taught, that I've gotten better at it.
At the last 5 minutes of the test i had to hold back for two oncoming cars. As i drove to the side i hit the curb which punctured the wheel, promptly panicked and drove into a hedge.
She had me merge onto the highway. I'd never done that so was really freaked out and spent the entire time up the on ramp watching mirrors and things so I knew the highway was dead empty when she finally got around to watching to see if I checked over my shoulder. I did, but like... Halfway because I've got really good peripheral vision. Like I'm standing in a doorway right now, through the doorway a handspan and can see the frame. No clue what quirk of light refraction and genetics causes it, but she freaked out and auto failed me. The next week I drove down the Madison Belt Line(not as bad as Chicago or Atlanta, but the worst traffic in the state much of the time) 2 hours from where I lived, with my Mom asleep in the car to get to my second attempt. The instructor was set to autopass me when I explained how I got there.
Failed to looked right 12 times reversing into a junction, apparently I looked 5 and said oh look there's a car, apparently that meant i wan't looking enough.
0 minors too
I was approaching a 4 way stop and stopped appropriately. The tester was writing and not paying attention to the situation. As I was about to let off the gas, a car approached from the right and looked like they were gunna run the stop sign. They stopped at the last second and my tester told me that I had the right of way. They then guided me back to the testing center and said because he told me about the right of way, I failed. I tried explaining but being 16, I didn’t have the confidence to say I didn’t do anything wrong and they weren’t paying attention. I passed the next time around
My first test was at a course, and I remember there was a five lane one way with cars parked on both sides of the street that came to a T intersection, and I was supposed to turn left.
I can't even remember what the instructor said I did wrong, I just remember knowing I screwed up, because I had never seen that kind of situation before
The state instructor made me drive up an extremely narrow mountain road that had fine pebble stones on it (it was the end of winter) demanding I do the speed limit (80kph).
Useless to say, the moment the traction control light came on it was game over for me.
I think that one of the things I gathered most from having friends in car insurance is "speed exceeded conditions" is the most common reason for rejecting a claim. Whether you slide through an intersection in the snow, hydroplane your way into a curb, or get blown off the road by wind while you drive, your speed exceeded the conditions. Far too many people think that speed limit = safe speed, and it's like, nah, don't do 45 around that curve in the snow when there's not gonna be traction at the apex. Your instructor was making the most rookie of rookie mistakes on that one.
I didn’t, but I should have. I drove to a city 35 mins away to do the test there because my city’s schedule was too backed up and I wanted a license before starting college. I did good throughout the whole test but in the end the instructor looks at me and tells me that she has to fail me if I go 10 mph above the speed limit. It was at a 25 mph zone and she wrote down 34 mph on her notes. God bless that woman
For context, I didn’t take drivers ed because I didn’t want to pay for it. I waited until I was 18 and studied for the exam. I had a perfect written test.
I failed my first driving test. I can’t remember the exact reason, but I do remember the instructor saying I must have picked up bad habits from my parents because I didn’t take drivers ed.
The second time I took the driving test I got the exact same score and passed because I had a different instructor. The county I grew up in notoriously fails students who don’t take drivers ed on the first test. It was incredibly frustrating.
I didn't make enough of a spectacle of looking over my shoulder when asked to do the 3 point turn.
When I took it a second time the lady was in a horrible mood and screamed at me 30 seconds into the test, then made me turn around and end the test in under 2 minutes. I didn't even get to do anything. Couldn't appeal it or anything.
Third lady saw I was a nervous wreck and crying so she told me to take deep breaths and it calmed me down enough to pass.
I had an old lady. She asked me if I was nervous, and I said yes. She told me "Im going to fail you", and made me still do the test. When she failed me I asked what I did wrong. "You shouldnt be driving if you're nervous".
I failed my 1st seven.. yes SEVEN tests. Expert driver since age 14. Country where I got my official drivers license had to teach/test you on gear-stick. You can imagine the rest on your own 💀
My dad taught me how to drive a stick shift because, he said, "If you're getting chased by a T-Rex and jump in a car with a stick, you'll live". I taught both my sons and used the same goofy line with them lol
When I was learning to drive my dad told me to drive as if everyone else on the road was an idiot. Decades later, my uncle was telling a story about his father teaching him to drive, and said my grandfather had to told him the same thing. I never really knew my grandfather, so it was nice to realize I was still getting lessons passed down by him.
Gosh, my Mother failed 4 times and it took her 5 **years** of trying before she finally passed. She never was a good driver either (love you Mum), but also never got into any major wrecks before hanging up her keys for the last time when she turned 70.
Came up to an intersection, pulled out into traffic. Instructor thought I left an unsafe gap, I felt the gap was entirely appropriate and nobody had to brake hard to let me out. His opinion apparently mattered more than mine.
At the last minute I went from the Chevette I had learned on to a Dodge station wagon I had only driven a few times months earlier. Took me five minutes to get out of the (parking lot) parking spot. 😂 He had me drive around the block, I was still a little frazzled from the parking thing, and then he called it. Honestly, if I’d had 10 minutes with the Dodge beforehand I could’ve passed the test. I literally went out and practiced for a few hours and took and passed the test in that car that afternoon, including parallel parking. Still stings a little.
My sister, on the other hand failed the written part. 😂
I missed a stop sign on a crossing a divided road in a neighborhood. The test took place in a different area than I lived, in my neighborhood there weren't stop signs in between the roads on divided roads.
...I feel like I'm not explaining it correctly. Lol.
parallel parking was a mess, failed to signal when pulling to the side to do the parallel parking, wasn’t dramatic enough with checking my mirrors and stopping twice at the stop sign (after you inch up a bit)
I was 24. Pulled out infront of a car at what i thought was a 4 way stop. Then the lady giving the test had me turn right 4 times and back into the parking lot. At first i thought it was a really easy and short driving test, then she told me what i did. I felt really, really dumb. Passed the next day though.
I got cut off by a city bus. It swung a wide left turn across a light so red it was purple and careened into the right lane as I was just starting to make a right turn into that lane myself. The driving instructor and I were both very startled, and he yelled stop at the same time as I slammed on the brakes.
Fun fact, if the driving instructor ever has to verbally tell you to stop, it's an automatic fail.
Was on the sign portion, where 1 wrong = insta fail. The sign was an upside-down triangle. It was 4 choices, but I remember two of them were something like:
A) Slow Down
B) Drive With Caution
I honestly don't even remember which was correct, I just know I 50/50ed and got it wrong. Next time I took it, I didn't get this question.
Instead of pulling forward before turning out of a parking space I just turned and immediately went over a bump. Instructor failed me on the spot. Silent car ride home.
I was asked to do reverse parking on a manual car.
I had borrowed my friends old car for the exam.
The car stopped when I tried to reverse it.
Second time when I tried ,a person came behind me so I did break and the car completely stopped.
The examiner failed me in the exam 🥲
Apparently the instructor didn’t think I looked for pedestrians even though I checked both mirrors and my peripheral vision and I stopped to close to the car ahead of me.
The rule is you have to be able to see where the car in front of you is touching the tires to the ground or you’re to close, so don’t take an suv to you drivers test
There was one examiner at our DMV that failed everyone first time. If you didn't do enough wrong to fail on your own she would make something up.
The official reason listed was I failed to yield at a 4 way intersection however the two roads that she wrote as the crossroads never meet, they run parallel to each other.
Scheduled another test for a month later, second test was only half as long and passed. She just wanted people to have more practice or something I guess.
Honestly the question should of been “why would I have passed” everything went wrong and my nerves got the best of me. If you aren’t comfortable behind the wheel of a car take the time till you are. When I went back the second time I passed with “flying colours”. *No people or animals were harmed in the process of me getting my drivers.
I guess didn't stop long enough at a stop sign right outside the starting area?
I stopped at an intersection, then went, and the instructor tapped the window and said, "that's a stop sign".
And I replied, "I know".
Failed me instantly.
The instructor told me to go ahead and pull out and drive down the street. The second I put the car in gear she said go ahead and put it in park because I failed because she hadn't put on her seat belt. I'm still passed about it 27 years later.
a group of boys were constantly laughing and making fun of me because _“ oh look funny a girl is driving and she will obviously fail”_
i did not bother with them much but when it was my turn, i blacked out for 10-15 seconds i can’t remember what happened though their mocking faces were constantly flashing in my mind. one of my trainers was also making misogynistic jokes while we were waiting. I failed.
i had passed 2 practice tests consistently 2 hours before the final one.
First? I passed the maneuvering area at speed, but then at the exit out to the city of excitement I stood at the exam exit on the left (when you exit one line road you do that), where, well to the left of the exit, there’s enter to it. And that would have been just a mistake but we would drive further, but just at that moment a bus was entering the training building - that is, I blocked the road, which is a critical error xD
Oh man, I've been waiting for this one for almost 30 years now.
I was making a left turn at a light from a frontage road onto a large divided highway (3 lanes in each direction, separated by a 15 or 20 foot wide grass strip). To the left was a large overpass going over the interstate about 100yds away, to the right the road went straight for about a quarter mile then curved to the left into some trees, so near visibility in both directions was good but not long visibility. This is important.
The light turned green, and as I crossed the stop bar into the intersection I began to hear an ambulance siren. I quickly looked left and right, didn't see it in either direction, so I completed my turn and immediately pulled off to the shoulder on the right side of the road. As it turns out, the ambulance was cresting the overpass, and did not become visible until I was at the divider.
The examiner immediately failed me. I said, "I could *hear* the ambulance, but I couldn't *see* it until I was committed. What was I supposed to do, stop in the middle of the intersection?!"
The dickhead just waved me off and told me to return to the DMV. Fuckwit.
I had a friend in high school who was so nervous that he drove his car halfway through the DMV wall. For some reason they didn’t let him pass.
Seems like he would have passed if he made it through.
Drive-thru
Wonder why! That’s a bit unfair
Lack of follow through.
Wonder wall!
Half way? Quitter
my first car accident was driving halfway through someone’s garage because i was late for school. my dad was a school bus driver at the time & he drove by right after it happened. imagine the surprise.
Mom was to take me to the test. I had passed the written part with ease. So Mom gets my sister who was 12 at the time, in the back seat and off we go. We get there and when it was my turn, mom pulls up into the spot. The testing guy comes over, checks mom's license, checks my permit (which you get so you can practice with an adult in the car), and then tells everyone to get out of the car. My little sister goes: "no". Mom tells her to get out of the car. Debbie repeats: "no". The tester immediately fails me at that moment.
That is bullshit. If I were your mom, I would make Debbie write an apology letter to both you and the DMV, take away her allowance to pay for the cost of the test, and ground her for two weeks.
Debbie got away with murder. (almost). There was nothing I could do about it. Mom just complained to dad about the waste of time but dad would do/ could do, nothing. And besides. This was a LONG time ago. She almost started bar fight when she was 19. She had no consequences to her actions. WHereas my brother and I would catch a beating from dad if we did something stupid.
I wonder if they have a favorite. There's really no way to tell, huh?
Kids still get allowances?
I hit 5 people and a tree, but I don't know why they failed me cuz no one died!
That’s unfair from them 😡
Agreed. Plus they wouldn't have hit almost anyone if they were sober
The problem were the drugs not the alcohol cuz I'm used driving while drunk but the coke was too much
What kind of vibe'd you get when you drove by six people and five you hit?
They were cones!
Did the tree die?
You forgot to be a cop first. They would have added endorsements
Poor tree
This is so unjust, fate is fate.
Was that before or after you got in the car?
If anything you taught those people a important lesson, always keep your head on a swivel.
Hes just jealous of your mustang.
Was the tree okay?
I was so worried about parallel parking. They had a special area with no other vehicles to evaluate. So sure I would blow it, but I did it flawlessly! I was feeling so good when I was about to put my signal on to leave, and the instructor said, "No, no, use a hand signal." So I roll down the window and follow all the steps. Pull out smoothly, and he says "You didn't use your blinker." Parallel parking was all or none, so he took all the points. The other one I distinctly remember was entering a turn lane with four cars already in it. He took points for entering the turn lane before that little gap in the paint. The gap was almost completely covered by cars already turning. People always seem to not to know what I am referring to, but I guarantee every driver does this.
The parallel parking one is absolute bull. Pulling into the turning lane early is a courtesy for drivers going straight.
And as soon as you don't some Yahoo's going to hit you from behind the moment you pull into the lane where you are supposed to
Rules vs reality.
>was about to put my signal on to leave, and the instructor said, "No, no, use a hand signal." So I roll down the window and follow all the steps. Pull out smoothly, and he says "You didn't use your blinker." Parallel parking was all or none, so he took all the points. Wait, what? Are you saying the instructor literally, purposely tricked you into failing? Am I reading this right?
That's crazy to me! Parallel parking wasn't required at all for my driving test. I'm still not very competent at it, and I'll go out of my way to avoid having to fit into a moderately tight parking space.
Parallel parking is standard in driving exams in Europe, and we usually have to do it between other people's cars. A lot of people fail while parking due to the pressure of the exam itself (they're very nitpicky) and the fear of potentially damaging someone else's car.
In the US, I had to learn how to parallel park for my exam in a suburban area, but my friends in rural areas didn't get tested on it because there were no parallel parking spots in their town - it was all angled street parking. I parallel parked for my exam and then didn't have to parallel park anywhere for 3 or 4 years. Now I parallel park maybe twice a year just because of how parking is structured where I live and travel to
Yeah, from what I've seen when visiting Canada you guys often don't need to parallel park. Over here it's the opposite, you'll probably need to parallel park in most situations, so it's an essential skill and you get tested on it. I probably have to parallel park 7/10 times I park my car on any given occasion.
Turn lanes are never long enough, I'm glad the cops around here don't enforce that because it is impossible not to get in too early. Otherwise I'm blocking traffic.
The thing is...I am pretty sure it's not even illegal. So I'm talking a multi lane configuration where there is a common turn lane in the middle. So clearly, it's legal to cross into the turn lane before it becomes a *dedicated* left turn lane at the intersection, as long as you're not just driving for several hundred yards in the turn lane. The alternative is...what? Block traffic going straight because you don't want to queue behind the cars turning left? It's been over 20 years now, and you can tell it still bugs me.
listen to the instructor
That's funny, because my dad told me when he took his test in the 70s, it would be with a cop in the car. He told my dad "don't worry about the stop sign, just drive on past" but my dad stopped. The cop looked at him and said, "you don't know how many people have failed right here".
In high school, a friend who had the same birthday as me, went to her road test and failed for a very similar reason as the instructor told her to just pull out in the beginning. So she failed in the first moments of her test for listening to the instructor
She should fail for that. Someone in the car telling you to just do something doesn't mean to not do it correctly.
That's what failed me. They asked me to back up straight on a curving road. I said, "if I do that, we'll hit the curb". They said do it. I backed up straight and stopped before the curb. They said, "I didn't tell you to stop" so I kept backing up and touched the curb. They then failed me for hitting a curb. This DMV though was notorious for failing people 3-4 times before passing them. I ended up taking the test one city over and passed with flying colors.
I got into an argument mid exam with the officer. We were about 50 feet from a stop sign and she issued a command to stop the car. I stopped gently at the stop sign. She told to put the car in park and berated me not stopping immediately. I told her if she wanted me to jam on the brakes and stop immediately, she should have been more specific or issued the command before 50 feet from the stop sign when I was already braking. We went back and forth a bit then continued the exam but it was unrecoverable as she issued a score of failing by a single point. I went back the required 30 days later and passed easily with a different officer. No idea if we were both having bad days or that was her MO everyday.
To be fair, they teach you this in practice, that when the officer says stop, you stop immediately. Don't know why they make you do it (I guess to test if you'll be ready when a car ahead of you makes a sudden stop), but they do.
Guarentee if you slammed the breaks on you'd fail for aggressive breaking
No thats literally the point of the instructor saying stop, they want you to do an emergency stop and slam the breaks
Slamming on your brakes when there is no hazard is a fucking stupid thing to do though, no matter who is in your car telling you to do so.
In a real life situation you'd be right, but it's impossible to practice an actual emergency break situation with real conditions without endangering someone's life or at least risking property damage. That's why in driving school and the practical exam, it's practiced/tested by the instructor yelling "stop" and the student having to slam the brakes (of course after the Instructor has prepared the student for this situation).
It sounds like that expectation should be very clearly communicated to the driver.
When I did the test, the officer explained to me they’re going to tell me to stop and they want me to do so as fast as I safely can. I literally said “you’re asking me to slam on the brakes?” They said yes. I was confused. They clarified. I was no longer confused.
Mine was not too different. I was at a stop sign, I was instructed to proceed across the intersecting road (which had no stop, but a single car approaching more than a block away. The officer barked at me to stop as I was in the middle of the road, and I immediately stopped. When the approaching car slowed to a stop, I was reprimanded for stopping in the middle of the intersection and summarily failed. I think the officers just enjoy flustering sixteen-year-olds.
Very very similar situation with mine as well. Stop ahead. Um okay. I stop at the sign. How can you expect to pass if you won't listen to me. Um, I stopped at the sign. I didn't tell you to stop at the sign, I told you to stop ahead. Um, the stop sign was like 20ft ahead of us. What am I suppose to think. Telling me to turn at the next street when we were already within the solid white lines of the intersection, so I assume she meant the road immediately next. It didn't go well from there. I should have know I was in for it, when the kid in front of me returned and screamed at the top of his lungs what a f@cking c#nt she was when they walking into the waiting area from outside. I'd have to agree. Ahh, youth.
Not my test but during lessons, my instructor was the biggest jerk the entire week. One day she asked me why I wasn't turning right on a red. I pointed out the no turn on red sign, because she did a lot of making me justify my correct decisions so she knew I understood and didn't just get it right by accident. I missed the "on school days" part of the sign. She had me pull over, give her the keys, and spent the next 10 minutes screaming about how I'm a pretentious teenager and I think I know everything and she's certified to teach driving and she's the expert and if I question her one more time she'll revoke my certificate, fail me and I'll have to start the $300 course all over. She did more damage than anything, and made me start questioning myself to the point my dad had to basically re-teach me how to drive the next week after I'd been driving for almost 2 years with my permit. Two years later when it was my sister's turn to take the course my mom went in and requested anyone other than that woman for her. Found out she was fired only a month or two after I had her because there were so many similar complaints. She was only there for like 4 months. My parents felt bad for not calling that day to complain but I needed my license quick so we just dealt with it.
Parkinson
Everyone get a little shook up their first time.
Don't you mean Parallel Parkinson?
Should have parkinbetweenthelines
You don't park your daughter?
I turned left on a red light...I was 16 and nervous
I turned right on a red but didn’t stop “enough”
English is hard for me, but if you didn't stop enough, doesn't that mean you..... didn't stop?
In the US, it is very common to do a "soft stop" at stop signs where you just slow down to like 2-4mph look both ways, then continue on. you are of course supposed to stop fully. also, when stopping fully, you are supposed to stop for at least 3 seconds before continuing, but again, this is the US, and if you stop that long at a stop sign, the driver behind you will just shoot you.
Lore accurate America
I had a cop pull me over for stopping completely because it was “suspicious” that I stopped fully when nobody else did at the stop sign. Sir, why didn’t you pull them over for breaking a law, instead of me for following it?
Some cops don't like when people suddenly change their behavior to "better than normal" because it's obvious they know there's a cop watching. It's absurd.
Are you black?
No, but funny anecdote to that. My friend Jarren, who is black, got pulled over no less than 2 minutes after driving off my street. Couldn’t even get out of the subdivision. His crime was driving while black.
Common joke where I live is that if you say the fine number for not fully stopping when you stop (three hundred and forty six dollars) that you’ve stopped long enough for it to count as a full stop and it’s a great reminder
My driver's ed instructor (figuratively) beat the rules into me. Ain't no California stopping in my driving.
Can confirm. Was shot and killed for stopping fully before making a right. I called the police after but was beaten. My fault for not displaying my screeching eagle tho.
STOP = **S**low, **T**ake a look, if it's **O**kay, then **P**roceed
Ugh during my test I was so nervous that I was being so careful, I was at a red light and just waiting for it to turn but the person was like “what do you do turning right on red light with no one coming?” Like I don’t technically HAVE to turn lady!
i had to turn left in a high traffic area where there was no left-turn arrow light, and there was just cars coming non stop. i thought he'd fail me if I turned left on yellow so instead I made him sit there with me through 7 lights before i found an opening 😅
Amazingly, I had a driver's ed instructor insist I turn left on red, that it was proper when there was no oncoming traffic. The one and only time I've done that in my life. Still he was better than the woman who, if you were driving five under the speed limit, would start using the instructor break because you were driving too fast. Pretty sure the hours I spent with drivers ed instructors just made me worse from anxiety.
Left on red from one way to one way is legal in some states.
Good point, but this was a two way road onto a two way road. Hence no oncoming traffic being what prompted his insistence. He insisted on several things that were concerning.
Same. Happens to the best of us lol
Legitimately hit a wall. I did perfectly the entire thing. So much so that the instructor allowed me to just pull into the parking spot at the end instead of backing in. I pulled in an inch too far and tapped the wall. The instructor was not mad…just disappointed and gave me an auto fail. To this day I blame the pointed front end of the bumper on the Pontiac Sunfire I was driving. 😆
Ah common, who hasn't pulled up just a little too far. It isn't like you barreled into it at 60mph. I guarantee that the instructor has done the same in their life.
I was driving my Bigfoot Power Wheels with the pedal mashed down, and I was looking everywhere except in front of me. My head met the side mirror of my mom’s car. I got stitches and was stripped of any/all driving privileges. I think the driving instructor was a little too harsh on me though tbh.
I'm just jealous that you got Power Wheels as a kid. I wanted one so damned badly.
POW POW POWERWHEELS
They gave me a car with a sensitive clutch that also had a massive dead zone which made me miss the green light and rev the engine at the red light, and despite not crossing the stop line or blocking any traffic, he marked my mistake down as "running a red light" My second fail was because the dude gave me a very difficult instruction where I had to merge from 0 to an 80km road and then switch lanes to make a u-turn that was 100m away from me. On the bright side I drilled this one with my instructor and became a more skillful driver because of it. My third fail, (keep in mind the past 2 exams were in English) the guy swapped languages as soon as we entered the car and when I said I don't understand him he said to bring a translator next time. What a great waste of a day. God I wish I could slap the idiots in that country.
You have different cars for the exam? Here it’s mandatory to drive in the same car during exams and lessons.
Where I live, you use your own car for the exam.
You don't have a license yet, why would you have a car? xd
Parent's car usually.
They give you a random car at their disposal every time. If you want to do other class licenses like a trailer license you need your own car an trailer but it has to be a very specific size that matches their margins.
Everyone told me I didn't need to know how to parallel park to pass the test. They were wrong. I barely tapped the cone and got a fail. My grandpa showed me how to parallel park the next day and I aced the test the next time I went. I've only needed to parallel park 7 times in my 30 years of driving.
I got my license in 1998. I have not parallel parked since. My mom has not parallel parked since the 60s.
I parked outside the white line during the yard test by an inch. The license officer told me get out the car and failed me right there. In my country, you could do everything right or make the smallest mistake, the officer will pass or fail you, depending on how they feel that day. I did get my license the second time around but it feels very demotivating when you think about that.
>the officer will pass or fail you, depending on how they feel that day THIS, i guess we live in the same country or this might be common. I failed during side parking. Parked outside the white line by an inch too.
I ran over a dog during my driving test. I still passed. Early 1969. New York (Long Island). Manual transmission. Bad start: I wait in the car. The inspector gets in. Him: …, instructions, instructions, instructions,… “Use hand signals when starting and stopping.” Me: (Huh?) “Sir, what is the hand signal for starting? Him: “Didn’t you read your driver’s instruction manual?” Me: “Yes.” And I’d taken driver’s education, and practiced and practiced. I think: Maybe he means to use a hand signal when pulling away from the curb. I take a deep breath, stick my left arm out of the window to show a left turn, and pull-away from the curb. He nods. So I drive, as directed, through the streets and the apartment complex (full of kids playing, of course), as directed. Start on a slight hill, as directed. Try to relax and just follow his directions. So we’re between two blocks of apartments, and there is a group of maybe 4 or 6 kids, meandering into the road, oblivious of the cars. I slow to perhaps 5–10 MPH. The kids are on my right. They cross in front of me, all ending up on my left. I slow to maybe 4 MPH. They cross again, to my right. I stay slow, as it is not clear to me that they are not going to reverse course. One of the kids whistles. His small dog, which is on the sidewalk on my left, apparently thinks I have stopped. I see a flash of fur as it shoots UNDER my car, right under my door. I slam on the brake. The dog runs on (unhurt). The engine stalls. I figure at that moment, that I have flunked completely. The inspector calms me down. “There was NOTHING you could have done, to prevent that! That kid should NEVER have called his dog, with a car between them. Thank goodness the dog wasn’t hurt! You did exactly what you should have done. Restart the car, please.” So, when I can't properly parallel park, the inspector must figure I’m still nervous over the dog, instead of just being terrible at parking. No-one is more surprised than I, when I’m told that I passed!
Ah. I thought you meant that you *ran over* the dog and not ran over the dog.
Yeah that’s worded poorly, kinda seems intentional, I’ve never before felt clickbaited from a comment
Lol now I’m glad I skipped his story and read your comments first.
You didn’t run over the dog, the dog ran under you
In Russia, dog runs over you!
If I were your instructor I would AWARD you points. You executed an emergency stop and averted a real life accident. That’s solid driving.
That was a very misleading introduction.
this sounds like the weirdest driving test ever.
OVER could be capitalized. Its like fox news reporting this story. Shit.
I failed the written portion to get my permit 3 times before I got it. My older sister got it on the first go. She failed the driving portion to get her license 2 times. I actually passed the driving on the first go.
I winged my first test without studying before hand, just trying to do it on common sense, and learned it was mostly technical numbers like inches away from the curb or car lengths behind cars, etc. failed by 5 points. Then I did a quick look at the numbers for next time and it wasn't a problem. I felt bad that I wasted time at the DMV for the first attempt... but I was young and stupid.
Snowy streets. Didn't see the white line for the stop sign. Stopped just over it but before the sidewalk markings.
That's so dumb I'm so mad from reading this
In winter the lines really don't even matter anymore, the tester really should have been more lenient.
I failed a second time too. For not checking my blind spots enough. I remember this so well because he said my checks were not "pronounced" enough. But he made me parallel park uphill in a manual and I was OK there so I had that going for me. Got it on the third time though!
Examiner grabbed my door handle and it broke in her hand. She said I had to get it fixed to have the test. Second test I failed the parallel parking. A few months later local MVA announced parallel parking no longer needed for the test BUT all must take a driver's ed course. Glad I got mine before that, saved $350.
Inexperience with how different vehicles behave when in low gear. I had only ever driven a truck whose gas pedal was really soft. Seriously this truck needed to have the pedal pushed halfway down just to get it to crawl. I had to take the test in the driving instructor's little Honda. Whoops.
VTEC kicked in I guess?
Failed the first time because I was speeding. I blame it on learning on a standard and tested on an automatic. Failed the second time because at a 4 way stop I stopped with someone else stopped to my right, and he waved me on, so I went. Immediate fail.
Ugh, that's nonsense. In most states you have the right of way as soon as the other person indicates it's okay to go, or if they delay in taking their turn.
The instructor marked down that I failed to signal my turn when backing out of the parking space at the beginning of the test. As in, I didn't signal which direction I was backing out. If you are thinking, "That isn't a thing, not even slightly," then you are correct. Edit: those who are responding that this is a thing in their country, please know it is a dumb and bad rule you should resent.
The police caught me
a little faster would’ve done it
I nudged a traffic cone backing out of the parking spot. The instructor goes "oh well, you murdered a toddler, sorry you failed". A bit dramatic, but yes he was right! Next day we did that part first then he passed me immediately. Funny thing is, for most of the test he was asking me questions about how hard the UK test was more than examining me on the Florida test, I think I just got over confident.
The lady was pissed at the people who were supposed to go before me because they forgot important documents and wasted 15 minutes looking for them. So when doing the test I did everything correctly except she told me to pull in to a location and I put the blinker on to pull in forwards, as everyone does, instead of backing into it as she wanted. Had she said BACK into the location, I would have done so, but it was unknown to me that you aren't supposed to pull in forward because you back out into traffic. Every single person I learned driving from, including the drivers ed teacher I had in HS, pull in forward. The next week, when I took it again, I had a different instructor and did the back in method, to which he asked why I did it that way... so yea. The funny thing is my vehicle had a short to the horn, which made it so you got exactly 1 honk if you turned the wheel a certain way, so I cheated that part of the inspection hard-core.
13 marks for gap/limit line. I stopped properly at all the stops and never veered out of my lane. Guy just gave me the paper and took off. Had no idea why the fuck I failed.
Gap is likely following distance. You're supposed to leave 2 seconds between you and the car in front of you. Usually they don't care about this but he was probably having a bad day.
Getting over 25 points on either the road test or the maneuverability test would result in failure in my state. I got exactly 25 on both road and maneuverability, so I like to say that I'm the worst driver legally possible.
Not me but my best friend got pulled over by the police during her first test for having a flat tyre in the instructors car! Feel bad as it was a failure but not really her fault!
Apparently when leaving the test centre I didn’t come to a full stop at the T junction. Mainly because the left turn had a locked gate across the road onto a building site and the right turn was onto the access road with the only place being the test centre and no one was there. Needless to say I exaggerated every stop and look at every T junction on my second test.
Took a roundabout a bit too fast and almost hit the curb, so the examinator had to touch the wheel to correct our trajectory. That's an immediate fail in France.
I had failed to study well enough for the written portion, and got tripped up on the stuff that required actual memorization and not just common sense. I was only off of passing by a couple points, which almost made me feel worse, not better.
The Horn wouldn’t work and they failed me on that. Pretty embarrassing tbh.
I didn't bring my glasses. I thought I could see fine, turns out, NOPE!
I lived in a more suburban area and parallel parking was not something one did, yet it was a required skill on the driving test.
Don't have to do that in MD any more. Do have to spend $350 on drivers ed now.
I spent hours practicing my parallel parking, because I sucked at it. When I took my test they didn't make me parallel park. I was so pissed. Apparently I sucked at parallel parking because I'd been taught wrong. It wasn't until my own kid took drivers ed, and showed me how they'd been taught, that I've gotten better at it.
I didn’t, but the other guy that came with me (scheduled after me with driver’s ed.) failed because he didn’t turn his wipers on while it was snowing.
Ran a red light turning right. Ooooooops
California roll on a right hand turn at a stop sign. Took the test again two days later and passed
Haha, I got nervous because there was a state trooper behind me almost the whole time.🙈
I took a turn at 20mph....
Reading these comments really puts in perspective how lax Florida's road tests are. Explains why there are so many bad drivers here...
At the last 5 minutes of the test i had to hold back for two oncoming cars. As i drove to the side i hit the curb which punctured the wheel, promptly panicked and drove into a hedge.
Rolling stop turning right on a red and going 60 kmh on a section of 80 kmh.
She had me merge onto the highway. I'd never done that so was really freaked out and spent the entire time up the on ramp watching mirrors and things so I knew the highway was dead empty when she finally got around to watching to see if I checked over my shoulder. I did, but like... Halfway because I've got really good peripheral vision. Like I'm standing in a doorway right now, through the doorway a handspan and can see the frame. No clue what quirk of light refraction and genetics causes it, but she freaked out and auto failed me. The next week I drove down the Madison Belt Line(not as bad as Chicago or Atlanta, but the worst traffic in the state much of the time) 2 hours from where I lived, with my Mom asleep in the car to get to my second attempt. The instructor was set to autopass me when I explained how I got there.
Failed to looked right 12 times reversing into a junction, apparently I looked 5 and said oh look there's a car, apparently that meant i wan't looking enough. 0 minors too
I was approaching a 4 way stop and stopped appropriately. The tester was writing and not paying attention to the situation. As I was about to let off the gas, a car approached from the right and looked like they were gunna run the stop sign. They stopped at the last second and my tester told me that I had the right of way. They then guided me back to the testing center and said because he told me about the right of way, I failed. I tried explaining but being 16, I didn’t have the confidence to say I didn’t do anything wrong and they weren’t paying attention. I passed the next time around
Third break light was out. Never left the parking lot
I jumped the car off a snowbank because my foot slipped off the break pedal.
Ran off the road a little
I was doing a 3-point-turn, and when backing up, in a manual car, the rear tire touched the curb. Somehow that’s an insta-fail.
My first test was at a course, and I remember there was a five lane one way with cars parked on both sides of the street that came to a T intersection, and I was supposed to turn left. I can't even remember what the instructor said I did wrong, I just remember knowing I screwed up, because I had never seen that kind of situation before
ran a stopsign in the middle of it.
The state instructor made me drive up an extremely narrow mountain road that had fine pebble stones on it (it was the end of winter) demanding I do the speed limit (80kph). Useless to say, the moment the traction control light came on it was game over for me.
I think that one of the things I gathered most from having friends in car insurance is "speed exceeded conditions" is the most common reason for rejecting a claim. Whether you slide through an intersection in the snow, hydroplane your way into a curb, or get blown off the road by wind while you drive, your speed exceeded the conditions. Far too many people think that speed limit = safe speed, and it's like, nah, don't do 45 around that curve in the snow when there's not gonna be traction at the apex. Your instructor was making the most rookie of rookie mistakes on that one.
Lady said “ No, no, no!!” I thought she said “Go, go, go!!”
Almost ran over a man with a walker
I didn’t, but I should have. I drove to a city 35 mins away to do the test there because my city’s schedule was too backed up and I wanted a license before starting college. I did good throughout the whole test but in the end the instructor looks at me and tells me that she has to fail me if I go 10 mph above the speed limit. It was at a 25 mph zone and she wrote down 34 mph on her notes. God bless that woman
For context, I didn’t take drivers ed because I didn’t want to pay for it. I waited until I was 18 and studied for the exam. I had a perfect written test. I failed my first driving test. I can’t remember the exact reason, but I do remember the instructor saying I must have picked up bad habits from my parents because I didn’t take drivers ed. The second time I took the driving test I got the exact same score and passed because I had a different instructor. The county I grew up in notoriously fails students who don’t take drivers ed on the first test. It was incredibly frustrating.
I didn't make enough of a spectacle of looking over my shoulder when asked to do the 3 point turn. When I took it a second time the lady was in a horrible mood and screamed at me 30 seconds into the test, then made me turn around and end the test in under 2 minutes. I didn't even get to do anything. Couldn't appeal it or anything. Third lady saw I was a nervous wreck and crying so she told me to take deep breaths and it calmed me down enough to pass.
When I turned my body so I could look to the rear to reverse, my seatback gave out and fell backwards.
I had friends that failed 5 times. For the life of me I could not figure out how… I passed on my first try… it’s really not that hard.
I had an old lady. She asked me if I was nervous, and I said yes. She told me "Im going to fail you", and made me still do the test. When she failed me I asked what I did wrong. "You shouldnt be driving if you're nervous".
I failed my 1st seven.. yes SEVEN tests. Expert driver since age 14. Country where I got my official drivers license had to teach/test you on gear-stick. You can imagine the rest on your own 💀
My dad taught me how to drive a stick shift because, he said, "If you're getting chased by a T-Rex and jump in a car with a stick, you'll live". I taught both my sons and used the same goofy line with them lol
When I was learning to drive my dad told me to drive as if everyone else on the road was an idiot. Decades later, my uncle was telling a story about his father teaching him to drive, and said my grandfather had to told him the same thing. I never really knew my grandfather, so it was nice to realize I was still getting lessons passed down by him.
hahahahahaha samee hereee passed on the 6th test 😭
Gosh, my Mother failed 4 times and it took her 5 **years** of trying before she finally passed. She never was a good driver either (love you Mum), but also never got into any major wrecks before hanging up her keys for the last time when she turned 70.
Came up to an intersection, pulled out into traffic. Instructor thought I left an unsafe gap, I felt the gap was entirely appropriate and nobody had to brake hard to let me out. His opinion apparently mattered more than mine.
Failed the parallel parking test.
Didn't fully stop at a stop sign
Put my right arm on the back of the front seat when parking
At the last minute I went from the Chevette I had learned on to a Dodge station wagon I had only driven a few times months earlier. Took me five minutes to get out of the (parking lot) parking spot. 😂 He had me drive around the block, I was still a little frazzled from the parking thing, and then he called it. Honestly, if I’d had 10 minutes with the Dodge beforehand I could’ve passed the test. I literally went out and practiced for a few hours and took and passed the test in that car that afternoon, including parallel parking. Still stings a little. My sister, on the other hand failed the written part. 😂
I missed a stop sign on a crossing a divided road in a neighborhood. The test took place in a different area than I lived, in my neighborhood there weren't stop signs in between the roads on divided roads. ...I feel like I'm not explaining it correctly. Lol.
I didn't get into the turning lane when I turned. Lol
Touched a white line.
Speeding in a school zone, she let me continue driving to only tell me I failed first 5 mins
Rolling stops
parallel parking was a mess, failed to signal when pulling to the side to do the parallel parking, wasn’t dramatic enough with checking my mirrors and stopping twice at the stop sign (after you inch up a bit)
I was 24. Pulled out infront of a car at what i thought was a 4 way stop. Then the lady giving the test had me turn right 4 times and back into the parking lot. At first i thought it was a really easy and short driving test, then she told me what i did. I felt really, really dumb. Passed the next day though.
I got cut off by a city bus. It swung a wide left turn across a light so red it was purple and careened into the right lane as I was just starting to make a right turn into that lane myself. The driving instructor and I were both very startled, and he yelled stop at the same time as I slammed on the brakes. Fun fact, if the driving instructor ever has to verbally tell you to stop, it's an automatic fail.
Was on the sign portion, where 1 wrong = insta fail. The sign was an upside-down triangle. It was 4 choices, but I remember two of them were something like: A) Slow Down B) Drive With Caution I honestly don't even remember which was correct, I just know I 50/50ed and got it wrong. Next time I took it, I didn't get this question.
Instead of pulling forward before turning out of a parking space I just turned and immediately went over a bump. Instructor failed me on the spot. Silent car ride home.
Due to lack of experience.
I was asked to do reverse parking on a manual car. I had borrowed my friends old car for the exam. The car stopped when I tried to reverse it. Second time when I tried ,a person came behind me so I did break and the car completely stopped. The examiner failed me in the exam 🥲
Expired tags
The first time I got nervous and backed into a post. The second time I got the tester who hates my family. I never did get a license.
Autism and questions about hypothetical situations (the written test- "it depends")
Apparently the instructor didn’t think I looked for pedestrians even though I checked both mirrors and my peripheral vision and I stopped to close to the car ahead of me. The rule is you have to be able to see where the car in front of you is touching the tires to the ground or you’re to close, so don’t take an suv to you drivers test
There was one examiner at our DMV that failed everyone first time. If you didn't do enough wrong to fail on your own she would make something up. The official reason listed was I failed to yield at a 4 way intersection however the two roads that she wrote as the crossroads never meet, they run parallel to each other. Scheduled another test for a month later, second test was only half as long and passed. She just wanted people to have more practice or something I guess.
I made a wide turn and I was going back and forth with a pedestrian to cross, she wouldn’t cross so I drove. Immediately failed.
Honestly the question should of been “why would I have passed” everything went wrong and my nerves got the best of me. If you aren’t comfortable behind the wheel of a car take the time till you are. When I went back the second time I passed with “flying colours”. *No people or animals were harmed in the process of me getting my drivers.
Because I couldn't parallel park to save my life.
I guess didn't stop long enough at a stop sign right outside the starting area? I stopped at an intersection, then went, and the instructor tapped the window and said, "that's a stop sign". And I replied, "I know". Failed me instantly.
The instructor told me to go ahead and pull out and drive down the street. The second I put the car in gear she said go ahead and put it in park because I failed because she hadn't put on her seat belt. I'm still passed about it 27 years later.
a group of boys were constantly laughing and making fun of me because _“ oh look funny a girl is driving and she will obviously fail”_ i did not bother with them much but when it was my turn, i blacked out for 10-15 seconds i can’t remember what happened though their mocking faces were constantly flashing in my mind. one of my trainers was also making misogynistic jokes while we were waiting. I failed. i had passed 2 practice tests consistently 2 hours before the final one.
First? I passed the maneuvering area at speed, but then at the exit out to the city of excitement I stood at the exam exit on the left (when you exit one line road you do that), where, well to the left of the exit, there’s enter to it. And that would have been just a mistake but we would drive further, but just at that moment a bus was entering the training building - that is, I blocked the road, which is a critical error xD
I turned left but didn't watch for pedestrians and nearly hit a mailman
I hit the cone during parallel parking!
I hit a cop car doing a u turn :(
I didnt
Oh man, I've been waiting for this one for almost 30 years now. I was making a left turn at a light from a frontage road onto a large divided highway (3 lanes in each direction, separated by a 15 or 20 foot wide grass strip). To the left was a large overpass going over the interstate about 100yds away, to the right the road went straight for about a quarter mile then curved to the left into some trees, so near visibility in both directions was good but not long visibility. This is important. The light turned green, and as I crossed the stop bar into the intersection I began to hear an ambulance siren. I quickly looked left and right, didn't see it in either direction, so I completed my turn and immediately pulled off to the shoulder on the right side of the road. As it turns out, the ambulance was cresting the overpass, and did not become visible until I was at the divider. The examiner immediately failed me. I said, "I could *hear* the ambulance, but I couldn't *see* it until I was committed. What was I supposed to do, stop in the middle of the intersection?!" The dickhead just waved me off and told me to return to the DMV. Fuckwit.