There is quite a wide range of driving school apps available for driving instructors. There tend to be more apps available for apple devices than android devices. This is somewhat surprising for several reasons. Firstly there are more people in the UK who use android phones and tablets than Apple devices. Secondly each time the Apple operating system (iOS) is updated it seems to have a knock on effect of causing numerous driving school apps to stop working. So if you are in the process of purchasing a new phone or tablet that you want for driving school use then you should look at the apps available and see what it going to suit you best.
Do You Need Driving Instructor Apps?
It’s always worth asking whether you need dedicated apps for your driving school at all. There are plenty of standard apps that can be used quite adequately for driving school use. For instance many driving instructors use the stock android calendar app for keeping a record of their driving lesson appointments. You can set up different calendars so you can choose to either display just your driving lessons or driving lessons and other appointments in the same interface. There’s nothing worse than checking your driving lesson app, booking a pupil in and then finding you’ve got a non-driving school appointment that clashes!
Similarly you can use your standard photo viewer to display diagrams to show your pupils or can use Excel spreadsheets for record keeping.
What functions do driving school apps provide:
Broadly speaking you can use driving school apps for the following:
- Diary management
- Lesson management, pupil records
- Finance management
- Driving lesson diagrams and instructional aids
- Communication with pupils
Some apps will cover all these items, some just a few. One of the lost widely used apps is Neil Beaver’s Robosoul collection of apps. These are all available on iOS (Apple) but at the time of writing only some are available in the more popular android format.
Why do driving instructor apps cost so much?
With approximately 40,000 instructors the market for driving school apps is comparatively small. This means overall profit margins are small and the incentive to build good quality driving school apps is low. It also means that there are very few truly free driving instructor app options. We are conditioned to expecting to be able to access apps for free even if there is a more fully featured version at a cost. This is not a viable option for most driving school app developers.
With hundreds of thousands of theory tests taken every year, theory test apps can be quite cheap. There is an economy of scale that is not present within the driving instruction industry.
Getting an app for your driving school
Many forward thinking driving instructors are looking at the idea of getting a dedicated app for their driving school. However such an option can cost thousands of pounds in development. it is unlikely that you will be able to access an off the shelf option that you can just label with your own driving school name. Even if such a thing existed it is unlikely that it would have the exact features you need. A dedicated driving school app with your own branding is really only viable for large national driving schools with a big budget!
Low cost android theory app for your pupils.