Failed my test at Wanstead after 50+ hours (automatic).
Unfortunately I failed within the first minute. I turned left from the busy test centre road into a back road, which sometimes had parked cars on both sides, so sometimes single track, but not completely the case today. There was an oncoming van, I continued instead of waiting and the examiner braked. I felt like I could have angled the turn more and avoided it, but he braked immediately. That was marked as a dangerous fault, so the test was effectively over at that point.
Final result was 1 dangerous, 3 serious, 4 minors.
Test format was no sat nav initially (verbal directions), then about 20 mins of independent driving on sat nav, then road signs and some more verbal directions.
There were also roadworks so I was taken on unfamiliar roads, and it felt much busier than expected for around 10am, in fact it was the busiest I had ever seen it!
“Breakdown of faults:
Dangerous (1)
Control - Steering:
Happened within the first minute after leaving the test centre. Turned into a narrow road with an oncoming van and didn’t give way early enough. Examiner braked.
Rest is after I had already failed after that dangerous fault:
Serious (3)
Judgement - Meeting:
Narrow road with a large oncoming vehicle (van/HGV). I had tucked in but not enough and didn’t react early, examiner had to tell me to move further in. Crazy traffic, I had tucked in enough for cars but seemingly not the HGV van, so the examiner had to tell me to reverse into a building driveway.
Clearance:
During a turn, I got too close to parked cars on the left. I was a bit too close to it but I felt not enough for it to be judged as a serious fault tbh but what the examiner says goes and honestly so be it.
Move off - Control:
There was an earlier clear passing place but I didn’t use it. I carried on and then tried to squeeze past a van at an angle instead of waiting. I thought it’s fine in that I did get past fine? But apparently not.
Minors (4)
Judgement - Meeting (1):
Less severe hesitation with oncoming traffic.
Signals - Necessary (1):
Missed a signal on a left turn.
Use of mirrors - Signalling (1):
Signalled without checking mirrors first.
Reverse right - Observation (1):
Observation wasn’t fully continuous during the manoeuvre. “
For context, I grew up in London and my parents don’t drive, so I wasn’t exposed to driving growing up. I’m a very theoretical, quite nerdy person in a healthcare career and only recently started learning to drive, so I think I struggle more with practical judgement in real-time situations. Was also sleepless the night before and had a horrible headache so took paracetamol.
My instructor is older so most of my practice was with verbal directions rather than sat nav. We didn’t use any of the unofficial test route apps, although we did drive around the test centre areas. He’s always said my steering is a bit slow and that I’m quite cautious. Interestingly I was fine on roundabouts, it was more the decision-making and moving off in tight situations that caused issues.
It seems like the main problem is not deciding early enough and trying to proceed when it would be safer to wait.
*** If anyone has had a similar pattern of faults, I’d be interested to know what helped fix it quickly without needing a terrible amount more of lessons!! :) ***