A S'pore driving school suspended 6,000 accounts in 2024 for using bots to book lessons

Driving schools in Singapore are finding more ways to tackle automated bots used by students to book practical lessons on their website.

The measures include enhancing security features to detect and reduce system abuse, and suspending bot accounts for up to three months.

The use of bots to book lessons has exacerbated the issue of long waiting times to secure slots to learn how to drive.

Suspensions

Bukit Batok Driving Centre (BBDC), which suspended 6,500 errant accounts between 2022 and 2023, took action against 6,000 in 2024 alone, The Straits Times reported.

ComfortDelGro Driving Centre (CDC) suspended 214 such accounts, while Singapore Safety Driving Centre (SSDC) also suspended an undisclosed number of them.

This problem has persisted for years, as practical driving lesson slots remain difficult to secure.

According to CNA, as of September 2024, new students had to wait two to six months to be able to reserve a slot.

Paying for bot booking services

To obtain their licences earlier, many students have resorted to bot booking services offered on Carousell and Telegram.

ST reported in 2022 that at least seven providers on Carousell had been offering bot booking services for driving lessons for about a year, charging up to S$70 per slot.

A bot is a software that can perform automated tasks much faster and in larger volumes than human users.

It can be designed to track the lesson slots and snap them up once they become available after others students cancel their booking.

Students have been willing to pay up to S$50 per slot for someone to help book a slot on their behalf using bots, according to ST.

Some have seized the opportunity to make a business out of these services themselves.

A 20-year-old student was reported to have hired a programmer to build a bot to book slots for him, and offered the bot booking service to others for between S$50 and S$70.

A Reddit forum user, responding in the September 2024 CNA article, wrote that they had written their own script to help them book lessons.

CDC said they will be exploring the use of multi-factor authentication, AI algorithms, and other methods to prevent students from using bots.

A shortage of instructors

The increase in waiting time to book lessons is partly due to a shortage of instructors in the driving schools.

SSDC told ST that they have struggled to recruit new driving instructors due to the low starting salary.

A driving instructor at any of the three schools is paid between S$2,070 and S$4,500 a month, it was reported.

To boost the number of instructors, the Traffic Police (TP) now allows Singapore driving schools to employ foreign driving instructors for all licence classes as long as they have the necessary qualifications.

TP is also working with driving schools to increase the number of practical test slots.

Even as demand for driving instructors remain, the number of private instructors — 268 in Singapore — has been dwindling as TP have stopped issuing new private driving instructor licences since 1987.

TP have also increased the number of Class 3 practical test slots to address the long waiting time for practical tests.

Students who enrol at the schools wait for about a month, while private candidates can wait close to two months, it was reported.

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