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From Wednesday 22 June, DVSA is changing its approach to the short notice cancellation of theory and practical tests for candidates with COVID-19.
DVSA will no longer automatically rearrange or refund practical, or theory tests cancelled within the 3-day short notice cancellation window if your pupil tells us they have COVID-19.
Your pupils will need to continue to follow government guidance if they do have COVID-19 symptoms.
Our standard short notice cancellation period was temporarily stopped during the pandemic to allow your pupils who tested positive for COVID-19 to automatically rearrange or refund their practical or theory test.
We are now using our standard short notice cancellation process due to illness, in line with the government’s plan for lifting remaining restrictions for living with COVID-19.
Your pupil will lose their test fee if they cancel or change their theory or practical test in England, Scotland and Wales within the short notice cancellation period unless they:
- are ill or injured – such as if they have COVID-19
- are affected by a bereavement
- need to take an exam
- have had their driving licence stolen
If your pupil needs to change their test within the short notice cancellation period for any of the reasons above they should first rearrange their practical or theory test date on GOV.UK.
They will need to pay again for their rearranged test but will get a refund for their original test booking if their application is successful.
They will then need to follow our standard process for short notice cancellations to apply for a refund of their test fee. They must include evidence with their application.
Details of how to do this and what evidence will be accepted will be published on GOV.UK.
Practical test candidates whose application is successful will be contacted by our customer service centre to rearrange their test for the earliest possible test date.
We are contacting all candidates with a practical or theory test booked to let them know about this change.
If you have booked a test for your pupil, please can you let them know about these changes.
The length of the short notice cancellation period for practical tests is part of a consultation to improve the availability of driving tests. We will let you know if the length of the period changes.
To help stop the exploitation of our booking service by companies profiting from selling practical driving tests we have reduced the number of times an appointment can be changed from 10 to the pre-pandemic limit of 6.
If your pupil need to make more changes after that, they will now have to cancel the test and rebook it.
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