Learner drivers arriving to their test unaccompanied and a tester’s “energy” making a person feel “uncomfortable” were among the complaints made to the Road Safety Authority (RSA) about its driving test service last year.
Another complaint submitted to the State agency that provides driver testing and licensing told of how a resident’s housing estate was becoming “intolerable” as it was being used by testers and learner drivers.
The complaint, which was among a sample released by the RSA under the Freedom of Information Act, said the area was experiencing “up to 12 cars per hour practising on our corner, seven days a week”.
“Up to three cars can be lined up at any one time waiting to use the corner for reversing,” the complaint said.
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“It is becoming intolerable. I totally understand that students need to practise but the volume of cars is simply too much and is impacting on our use of the road, including accessing the driveway, turning down our road, children playing on bikes, scooters, etc.”
The complainant added it was “impacting on our privacy”, that it had been “a very quiet estate” until last year and asked if the estate could be used less frequently.
Last year, the RSA received 2,024 complaints in relation to the driving test service – equating to under 1 per cent of the 253,850 tests carried out in 2024.
There have been 1,952 complaints received in 2025 up to the end of November, according to the RSA.
The authority said the nature of complaints received “vary significantly” and could relate to a range of issues regarding the operation of the driver testing service, waiting times, test centres and online issues. Other complaints related to learner drivers feeling that their test was not conducted fairly, that a driving fault was unwarranted or their test wasn’t conducted because they failed to meet certain conditions.
Among the sample complaints released was a person who said they “witnessed two drivers today arriving for their test with no accompanying driver and yet went in, did their test and passed”.
“Is this not against the law?” they asked. The complainant said they were accompanying a learner driver to their test that day.
A separate complaint from a learner driver said they were told by an examiner their “English was not good enough” despite living and working in Ireland for three years.
The person said maybe their “perception was off” but that the tester made them feel “uncomfortable” and had failed on the traffic signs element of the exam.
Another complaint outlined how a learner driver had failed their test three times and acknowledged they had made “a few errors” during their first test which were “accurately reflected in the test report”.
“However, in my second and third tests, I believe the examiner’s conduct was unprofessional and the faults listed in the reports were either incorrectly assessed or not present at all,” they said.
The RSA said all complaints are reviewed in full by the driver testing team and responses issued out to complainants.
Separately, among the most frequent reasons listed by the RSA for an unsuccessful test was moving off, reaction to hazards, roundabouts, controlling the clutch and gears and progression on the straight.
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