It is now against the law for anyone but a learner driver to book and manage their own driving test. This includes the use of unofficial test booking and cancellation finder services for making bookings for someone else.
The Driver and Vehicle Standards Agency (DVSA) has introduced the new rules for car driving test bookings today (Tuesday, May 12, 2026). It is an attempt to get a handle on record waiting times and a huge backlog of learners waiting for tests.
With many people paying over the odds to third-party touts to secure a test, this is a crackdown on this exploitation. It’s also now a breach of DVSA’s terms and conditions for the booking service for third parties to change, swap or cancel driving tests.
“Our priority is to stop learners being exploited by third parties, put them in control of their driving test and make the process fairer by clamping down on businesses that resell tests at inflated prices,” said Beverley Warmington, DVSA Chief Executive.
“These new measures help bring a halt to a system where the use of bots and third parties increases the amount some learners pay for a test and blocks test availability for many others. These measures will help free up appointments for genuine learners.”
Learners should now only ever pay £62 on weekdays and £75 on evenings, weekends and bank holidays for a driving test
The news follows a reduction in the number of changes that can be made to a test from 6 to 2, which came into force on 31 March 2026. From June 9, 2026, further restrictions will limit learners moving their test to only the 3 nearest driving test centres.
There are now more driving tests taking place than ever before, with 1,998,608 car driving tests taken in the past year, between April 2025 and March 2026—an increase of 8.6% from the previous year.
On top of new laws, DVSA has also focused its energies on recruiting more driving examiners (there are currently 1,604 full-time driving examiners, the highest since March 2018) to help provide more tests.