Keen Driving School, Beckenham

Keen Driving school has been a great way for me to get back on the road after failing my test four years ago. I was very nervous learning near central London but so far it has been excellent, I am well tutored, fully educated about every aspect and reassured and encouraged that its okay to make mistakes and when my skills need some work, its not the end of the world!

I have full confidence in my instructor, he has over 16 years of teacher road experience and so far lessons have been relaxed, focused and massively informative.

On top of this the school is very adaptable to my needs, I am able to increase or change lesson times quite easily and its super cheap at £21 per lesson - with major discounts for new learners signing up.

When I was Googling for a driving instructor I read the reviews and found plenty of people who'd failed their test more than once and gone through a string of different instructors at the same driving school. There were loads of horror stories, and there were some things I was determined to avoid: another student in the back when I was having a lesson, instructors with a reputation for missing appointments or cutting lessons short so they could make it to their next booking on time, a big school with an equally big turnover of instructors, etc.

I don't suppose I was the easiest student either. I had no driving skills whatsoever so I had no knowledge or experience to build on. I'm pushing 50, so I don't pick up skills as quickly or as easily as the teenagers and 20-somethings who are the typical learner driver. And since driving lessons aren't cheap, I wanted to feel I was making progress straightaway and that I was getting value for money.

And I reckon that's exactly what I got from Keen Driving School. My instructor Neville was professional, thorough and had the patience and determination to instill good driving habits. I passed first time with him and I still can't believe it.

Yes, it took a lot of lessons: 70-odd. But Neville was upfront about that right from the start. He said the average student needs one and a half times the number of lessons as their age, and that's pretty much exactly how it went.

Keen is a top-quality local school. Neville was never late, never cut lessons short (in fact, he made a considerable number longer at no extra cost) and is a great teacher.