You and the vehicle
Unit 1 sounds administrative, and in one sense it is, but it’s also the gate everything else in this series sits behind. None of the client-centred coaching covered in the units ahead matters if you’re not legally entitled to be delivering it, in that car, on that day. The Standard splits this into two elements: confirming your own status as an instructor, and confirming the vehicle is fit for purpose.
Element 6.1.1: Your Status as an Instructor
To charge anyone for driving instruction, you must either be on the ADI register or hold a trainee driving instructor licence, and you must display your ADI badge or trainee licence while giving paid instruction. That’s the baseline, but the bigger, ongoing requirement is remaining a “fit and proper” person, which DVSA assesses on an individual basis rather than against a fixed checklist.
Certain motoring convictions make that assessment difficult to pass: driving while disqualified, drink or drug driving, dangerous or careless driving, failing to stop after an accident, driving without insurance, handheld phone use, and excessive speeding all feature, and many of them carry six or more penalty points on their own. DVSA has refused or removed instructors who’ve picked up five or more points within three years under the totting-up rules, well short of the twelve-point threshold that triggers a driving ban.
The reporting obligations don’t end at qualification. You must write to the Registrar within seven days of any caution or conviction, motoring or otherwise, and update your registration within seven days if your name or address changes. DVSA can also call you in for a standards check at any point to confirm you’ve kept your instruction up to standard, and failing to meet it, failing to attend, or refusing to take one can all lead to removal from the register.
Element 6.1.2: The Vehicle
The car you train in has to be roadworthy, correctly insured for instructional use, and fitted with dual controls, meeting the same underlying rules that apply to any car used for the driving test itself. This is the kind of check that’s easy to assume is permanently settled once an instructor is established, insurance renewed automatically, dual controls fitted years ago and never thought about again, which is exactly why the Standard treats it as something to actively confirm rather than something to take for granted.
Why This Matters for Teaching
It’s tempting to treat Unit 1 as a one-off box ticked during qualification and then forgotten, background paperwork rather than something worth revisiting. The Standard doesn’t see it that way, and neither should you. The obligations recur, a caution reported late, a lapsed insurance detail, a standards check missed, and any one of them can undo an instructor’s ability to teach at all, regardless of how good the coaching in every other unit of this series turns out to be.
Next in the series: Unit 2, Designing a Learning Programme Around the Client, covering individual learning plans and adapting a syllabus to the person in front of you.
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