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Driving Test Serious and Dangerous Faults: What Fails You

One serious or dangerous fault ends your test. Here are the most common ones and how to avoid them.

5 min read

A serious or dangerous fault means an immediate fail — regardless of how well you've driven for the rest of the test. Serious means a fault that could have caused danger in the circumstances. Dangerous means actual danger occurred and the examiner had to take action.

The Full Guide

Examples of serious faults: Not checking mirrors before signalling or changing position when another vehicle was present. Not giving way at a junction when another vehicle had to slow. Emerging from a junction without adequate observation. Stalling on a hill and rolling back. Not stopping at a stop line. Going the wrong way on a one-way street. The examiner records these on the DL25 form and explains them in the post-test debrief.

Common Faults

  • Emerging from junctions without adequate observation
  • Not responding to traffic lights in time
  • Not checking mirrors before changing position

What the Examiner Looks For

  • Zero serious or dangerous faults

Quick Tips

  • 1One fail does not define your ability to drive — most drivers pass on attempt 2
  • 2Read your DL25 form carefully and target each specific fault
  • 3Ask your instructor to focus the next lessons entirely on your fail reasons
  • 4Use TestSwap to get your retake date sooner — 10 working days can feel like a long time

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