Curious re driving lessons

[rockingthekasbah]

My 18 year old needs to learn to drive, no question. I wonder how many of you finance lessons vs. making them
pay themselves? My parent paid for me, just wondered what the standard was these days

I paid for both of mine. They couldn’t possibly afford £40 an hour.

We're paying - it's £40/hour and he earns £50/week in his Saturday job so there's no way he could pay himself.

I think the AA is now £50 an hour. Agree DS could not pay but there is a part of that feels he should have some skin in the game

We had good intentions to get DD to pay towards them.

However we have a younger child with SEN who is not going to be able to get a job to fund lessons, so we decided it's not fair to ask DD to spend her earnings on lessons. Plus she has worked so hard all summer for a pittance, and we felt she would get a lot of empowerment & confidence out of spending what she'd earned than from handing it all over for lessons. The driving test situation is ridiculous at the moment, it's so hard on them if they fail a test and can't get another for 5 months. And this is not their fault.

If we couldn't stretch to lessons then obviously she'd have to pay for them. But while we can manage them, we're paying.

£40 an hour?! My parents paid for my first block of ten lessons which were discounted by 10% then I funded the rest of my lessons from my Saturday job. So expensive these days, but well worth it.

Why? Your parents paid for you. You didn’t have ‘skin in the game’

I think it is also a modern life skill. I’m pleased that most responses are what they are right now…

Dd17 is having driving lessons for her Xmas present. No way could she afford them but I think it's an important life skill so we will pay.

I would add you can also help them out massively by giving them your time, going out out and practising with them.

I saved up over a decade so I could pay for DS's lessons. Managed to squirrel away over £2k so he could learn. Also paid for pass plus once he passed.

My eldest paid half of hers. My youngest gets we paid most of. My middle two don’t drive yet.

@Aspidistree Would love to but sadly unable to do that currently

@DorothyWainwright what is pass plus please

My son is having lessons now, £36 an hour but we paid for a block of ten at £350. I don’t think he’ll need any more as his instructor says he is ready- mainly because OH has done loads of practice with him. He did the same for our DD two years ago, and we also paid for her to have proper lessons- I think she might have had twenty lessons. But yeah. We paid for them because we’re keen for them to get driving, and if we wait for them to pay for their own lessons it will all take a lot longer.

Our issue now is trying to book a bloody driving test 😫

@HelloHattie and so?

We paid for all my dc’s lessons. Cost a fortune! But my parents paid for me and my in-laws for dh.

rock it's about £200 and an extra 6hrs of lessons that fine tunes their driving once passed.
Not all instructors offer it and some councils offer a discount on it. I think they have to take it within two years of passing their main test.

@DorothyWainwright thank you for that.

I taught mine myself- is that an option?

@DrivesNowDriving Sadly not at the moment, but thank you for the suggestion

Dd is paying out of money that relatives have gifted her (small inheritance) we will pay her insurance for the first year as that is a huge amount of money. I said she needed a job to pay for fuel and MOT, but so far we have paid fuel too (she has a car she is practicing in). We are taking her to practice a few times a week.

We paid for the first ten lessons, DS has saved up for the rest. He's got them at £32 an hour by block booking. He does have two jobs, one he is paid £12.21 an hour for even though he is 17. He has been picking up extra shifts during the holidays.

You could ask him to pay for his theory or practical test if you want to force him to pay something?

Mine started contributing once they passed. Insurance and petrol is expensive.

Our parents didn’t pay for ours, but we have paid for all 3 dcs lessons, bought them cars and paid their insurance. We had the money so we paid for it. If we didn’t have the money then they would have had to pay themselves.

I paid for all of DD’s - £35 per week for about 6 months. It’s a life skill and I have the means to fund it so didn’t think twice about paying. I purposefully downsized my car so that she could share it and I also pay for the insurance.

17th birthday present for DD.