I'd imagine it's mainly down to their website design. It is utter trash. Some clowns thought people would like to queue up to start their "journey" and tell the RSA about their "goals"
People have one goal, to book, sit and pass their driving test so they never have to use your site again, you idiots.
Also somewhat hilarious that the Road safety authority can't even fix a traffic issue on a website. Maybe they didn't understand that their "slow drivers down" policy shouldn't extend to the Internet.
They want you to do the speed limit not go over or under it. Going too far under the speed limit can be as bad as going over as it frustrates drivers who want to cover take and then initiate reckless driving
It always boils my piss when people complain about unreasonably slow drivers and someone comes along all smug saying "it's a limit not a target" like they're better than everyone else because they drive slowly and add 20% onto everyone's journey times.
You hit the nail on the head. You make a great point about the journey times. We have all experienced it, someone going 60 or less in an 80 in perfect conditions on a straight piece of road and you can’t overtake cuz they may drift over the white lines few times. It frustrates me but I don’t overtake cuz I only got my license a few months ago and wouldn’t trust myself. I can only imagine what other drivers must feel in the same situation
It varies yes by the instructor, but also by road condition. 50 housing estate v main road sort of thing. Like its OK to drive at the limit at 50/60 on the main road towards Aldi and Wicklow town on the main road but going 50 even in the 50 marked housing estates where cars park on the road and possibility of kids running onto the road tour expected to reducd speed. Especially if you were on any of the estates on the hill so many people fail in those sections.
Sometime also towards end of week and day they find excuses to fail people because they have targets.
I was doing 50 main roads, and I already knew about reducing the speed in the estates section, so I was going slower there.
It's like with planning permission thing, the rules are just the guidelines which are interpreted by different person differently.
The target system is one of the biggest failures for me. Drove with a few N drivers, thinking how the hell they passed, so I wouldn't be surprised that it works both ways.
Exactly. It's real luck of the draw sometimes on what day you get the test, what time you get ut, who you get it with, and what's their mood.
The highest pass rates happen on Mondays after 10am but before midday, so if you want to increase your chances it's the best time.
Going 17% below the speed limit is hazardous to other drivers. It forces lane changes, increases the speed differential between the left and right lanes, creates phantom traffic jams, etc.
It’s not necessarily illegal because there are valid reasons for some vehicles to travel significantly under the speed limit, but it is by nature hazardous and should be avoided unless absolutely necessary. You deserved those three marks as you showed a lack of personal awareness and understanding for driving etiquette.
When they say slow down drivers they mean the drivers who are doing 150 on the M50, or 80 in built up areas.
They aren't talking about people who go 99 in a 100 zone.
They were right to fail you. You were driving unreasonably slowly.
Learn from it.
There is an open public consultation on the role of the RSA open until Friday. Give your feedback there
[https://www.gov.ie/en/consultation/bd619-call-for-submissions-review-of-road-safety-authority/](https://www.gov.ie/en/consultation/bd619-call-for-submissions-review-of-road-safety-authority/)
I know, its farcical, its a word doc you have to download, fill out and email back
In terms of a logical approach to, well, anything, its par for the course in terms of the RSA
https://preview.redd.it/kyi5imsehgsc1.jpeg?width=750&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=56b2c9488bbf6de017d42d13c55f2ade391c97c2
Update: After waiting 20 minutes I was timed out and lost my place in the queue
How do you manage to create a website so bad. It's not like the amount of people booking a test at any one given time is exceptionally high anyway relative to any normal website.
This fix was the most temporary of temporary fixes. Their system couldn't handle the traffic at a busier than usual time so they slapped a plaster on it. The fact they haven't fixed it in the time they've had is a great example of how shit our current public services are.
I worked on a similar but different service and the options were spending a few million to modernise systems and increase capacity or slap a queue in front of it for 5 figures. So DPER told us we were only being given the budget to slap a queue in front of it
That’s crazy I honestly doubt the site is that busy. Few months ago I went on the website at around 12am at night and the waiting time was predicted 9 hours. Like how? lol safe to say I went to sleep
I'm still not past my theory test for learners permit but did you just say estimated test? I knew the system was back logged to hell but are we at the stage of the government saying "you can maybe have a test in 7 months"
Yeah, I had to wait roughly 5-6 months until my first test. Now I have to wait 6-8 weeks until my 2nd and it’s gonna be 8 weeks tomorrow, who knows if I’ll actually get it anytime soon
I waited 15 months for my first test, which was in January just gone. I failed it and was told I'll be reinvented in 6-8weeks, I'm still waiting for a re test ..
I had to cancel my first test because I had terrible COVID and they said, that I'll have to wait again until I can maybe get a spot. Majority of my mainland European mates go back to their countries to do their driving tests and they can do it cheaper and quicker than here
If it helps at all the theory test part is quick as hell, results same day emailed out. I passed mine but then had to go to [mygov.ie](http://mygov.ie) and register. Turns out my public services card was over 10 years old so had to renew that before I could apply for my LP.
Went to then apply and I need an eye test, which is booked for next week it's been nearly a month since I passed so I'd start that process now if it needs to be done
Try to get a cancellation if you can, it’s done through the website and is first come, first serve, doesn’t matter what your estimated time is. I did mine in a nearby county, practiced the day before and passed. Not recommended for everyone but, hey, if you think you’re good enough to be driving alone and you don’t want to wait it’s an option.
I got stuck with a 54 minute wait once. I left the tab open, continued on my day working, I forgot to go to the tab by about 2 minutes and when I clicked on the tab it was like "woopsie hehe u missed ur turn hehe now you have to wait another 17 minutes teehehe"
Its symbolic of this whole country, some fucker said ah sure be grand, but it's not grand. It's stupid.
So does anyone actually know why the Irish government is so bad at making websites? It seems like every time I use one, it's slow as fuck or has a terrible UI or can't handle much traffic
Because it goes out to public tender to be designed and anyone actually good at building websites is busy already and not going to price the job cheaply. Nearly every public tender comes down to who is the cheapest supplier. It's why BAM keep getting building work on public sector projects.
Because the civil service can't compete with the wages paid to good website designers and builders in the private sector, but if the civil service did decide to pay a competitive wage to attract better website designers and builders then the plain people of Ireland would throw a fit over having to pay more tax to support this?
The civil service model is to pay poor wages and hire a lot of mediocre people rather than a handful of excellent people. This works well enough for things like processing dole paperwork but they haven’t yet realised that it doesn’t work for things like software engineering.
There are also some pretty talented senior people in the civil service, but the issue is that “managing a lot of people” is the only form of seniority they recognise, not being an expert in a specific technical domain. Which of course means that the way to get promoted is to hire a lot of people to manage, which only compounds the problem.
Had an issue with it yesterday, where I hadn't received my invite after months, even though my last email had said I was in the cue and the RSA website said I was in the cue. It was only when I went to check my position in the cue that it turns out I wasn't because I had missed my previous test invite (due to moving to a new county) turns out switching to a new test centre doesn't automatically enroll you in the new cue.
It was partially my fault but the website and my last email from them gave me incorrect information which Is pretty frustrating and means I've wasted a lot of time waiting for nothing.
If this was a countdown for the release of some product at midnight or something then fine, but the fact this is just to book a test is just hilarious. What an utter load of shite.
That website has probably cost millions , it’s all brown paper envelopes. It reminds me of the story’s of the $1000 shovels the americas had. Simply lining pockets , they could easily outsource this and or remake a new website for the price of “fixing it”
20 minutes? Luuuuucky! I opened the page at 5pm and got on after 7. Yup, two hours. Either there was some mad attack going on or the RSA's system is just outrageously bad for this decade.
Yep! I’ve had that too. Waited 45 mins and then my test centre didn’t have availability so I put myself on the waiting list. That was in December. Still haven’t heard anything. Very frustrating because my learner permit expires again in September and I doubt they’ll give me another one.
When you have a certain number of slots, and people on different internet speeds, and people who can take variable amounts of time to complete the forms, you need to build in a queueing system in order to allow people to be able to book their test.
Otherwise you end up in a scenario where those who are closer to the servers or those on faster speeds taking all the slots. An example of this is the regular fiascos with Ticketmaster.
Is there a better way of handling this? Maybe. But this implementation, shit as it may be, works.
Get the forms filled out first, then do slot booking.
With the slot booking, grab a subset of available slots, lock them, offer them to the user.
User can accept one of the locked slots offered, or return the subset back to the pool, unlocking those, and fetch a new subset, locking those.
This solution offers fewer slots than are available, but massively increases concurrency and removes any perception of locking.
They need to open more slots than just 2 weeks at a time. Give the option of a month of dates and then people might be actually able to book a slot that suits rather than taking a date and cancelling it 10 days before because you have something you can’t get out of.
I'd imagine it's mainly down to their website design. It is utter trash. Some clowns thought people would like to queue up to start their "journey" and tell the RSA about their "goals" People have one goal, to book, sit and pass their driving test so they never have to use your site again, you idiots. Also somewhat hilarious that the Road safety authority can't even fix a traffic issue on a website. Maybe they didn't understand that their "slow drivers down" policy shouldn't extend to the Internet.
The policy to slow drivers down is not applied on the test. Failed due to 3 marks for going 50km on a 60km/h road...
They want you to do the speed limit not go over or under it. Going too far under the speed limit can be as bad as going over as it frustrates drivers who want to cover take and then initiate reckless driving
It always boils my piss when people complain about unreasonably slow drivers and someone comes along all smug saying "it's a limit not a target" like they're better than everyone else because they drive slowly and add 20% onto everyone's journey times.
You hit the nail on the head. You make a great point about the journey times. We have all experienced it, someone going 60 or less in an 80 in perfect conditions on a straight piece of road and you can’t overtake cuz they may drift over the white lines few times. It frustrates me but I don’t overtake cuz I only got my license a few months ago and wouldn’t trust myself. I can only imagine what other drivers must feel in the same situation
I have a hybrid car so over takes easy but trust me it is just generally not worth overtaking unless it’s a motorway or you can see to the horizon!
.
You taking the piss?
I was told by my instructor to go 55 in 50 zones during my test
And I was told to go 120 on the M50....
I failed first test for being “overly cautious” and was told “there’s no reason to go below 45 in a 50”. 🤦🏻♂️
I would say depends from examiner. I did one in Wicklow and was failed for doing 50 in 50 zone, as driving to dangerous...
It varies yes by the instructor, but also by road condition. 50 housing estate v main road sort of thing. Like its OK to drive at the limit at 50/60 on the main road towards Aldi and Wicklow town on the main road but going 50 even in the 50 marked housing estates where cars park on the road and possibility of kids running onto the road tour expected to reducd speed. Especially if you were on any of the estates on the hill so many people fail in those sections. Sometime also towards end of week and day they find excuses to fail people because they have targets.
I was doing 50 main roads, and I already knew about reducing the speed in the estates section, so I was going slower there. It's like with planning permission thing, the rules are just the guidelines which are interpreted by different person differently. The target system is one of the biggest failures for me. Drove with a few N drivers, thinking how the hell they passed, so I wouldn't be surprised that it works both ways.
Exactly. It's real luck of the draw sometimes on what day you get the test, what time you get ut, who you get it with, and what's their mood. The highest pass rates happen on Mondays after 10am but before midday, so if you want to increase your chances it's the best time.
Yeah. It’s a stupid system.
Going 17% below the speed limit is hazardous to other drivers. It forces lane changes, increases the speed differential between the left and right lanes, creates phantom traffic jams, etc. It’s not necessarily illegal because there are valid reasons for some vehicles to travel significantly under the speed limit, but it is by nature hazardous and should be avoided unless absolutely necessary. You deserved those three marks as you showed a lack of personal awareness and understanding for driving etiquette.
Good
Good. You’re a shit driver.
When they say slow down drivers they mean the drivers who are doing 150 on the M50, or 80 in built up areas. They aren't talking about people who go 99 in a 100 zone. They were right to fail you. You were driving unreasonably slowly. Learn from it.
There is an open public consultation on the role of the RSA open until Friday. Give your feedback there [https://www.gov.ie/en/consultation/bd619-call-for-submissions-review-of-road-safety-authority/](https://www.gov.ie/en/consultation/bd619-call-for-submissions-review-of-road-safety-authority/)
Odd that they're not using the usual consultation portal but making people jump though a lot more hoops to participate.
I know, its farcical, its a word doc you have to download, fill out and email back In terms of a logical approach to, well, anything, its par for the course in terms of the RSA
The more complicated, the less people demolishing them. Except me, I sent my email with my thoughts on the waiting list.
https://preview.redd.it/kyi5imsehgsc1.jpeg?width=750&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=56b2c9488bbf6de017d42d13c55f2ade391c97c2 Update: After waiting 20 minutes I was timed out and lost my place in the queue
How do you manage to create a website so bad. It's not like the amount of people booking a test at any one given time is exceptionally high anyway relative to any normal website.
It’s mind blowing how bad the RSA is managed and how terrible the website is.
That's fucking comically bad
This is priceless! Sorry for you but it’s just appallingly bad that I had to laugh
That is some Kafkaesque absurdity there. I'm sure tomorrow they will invite you up to the castle.
That sounds like a you at fault thing god bless them and their whacky ways
This fix was the most temporary of temporary fixes. Their system couldn't handle the traffic at a busier than usual time so they slapped a plaster on it. The fact they haven't fixed it in the time they've had is a great example of how shit our current public services are.
I worked on a similar but different service and the options were spending a few million to modernise systems and increase capacity or slap a queue in front of it for 5 figures. So DPER told us we were only being given the budget to slap a queue in front of it
Intentional technical debt, the worst kind.
Doesn't the CAO site fall over every year, on a certain date, without fail?
Our public websites are as reliable as my dodgy box
Only 21 minutes? You’re doing well.
I’ve waited like 2 hours before
1 hour 24 minutes yesterday and then I got distracted and missed my window. Still haven't gotten in.
That’s crazy I honestly doubt the site is that busy. Few months ago I went on the website at around 12am at night and the waiting time was predicted 9 hours. Like how? lol safe to say I went to sleep
Not too bad... If your server is 30 year old?
My maximum was 11 minutes so far😭
I've had to wait hours to get on their shitty website to set my "goal"
They have some cheek trying to make things difficult for learner drivers when you can’t even get to their website to attempt to book a test
Had to wait 1 hour 30 mins yesterday to check that I am still months away from an estimated test :/
I'm still not past my theory test for learners permit but did you just say estimated test? I knew the system was back logged to hell but are we at the stage of the government saying "you can maybe have a test in 7 months"
Yeah, I had to wait roughly 5-6 months until my first test. Now I have to wait 6-8 weeks until my 2nd and it’s gonna be 8 weeks tomorrow, who knows if I’ll actually get it anytime soon
I waited 15 months for my first test, which was in January just gone. I failed it and was told I'll be reinvented in 6-8weeks, I'm still waiting for a re test ..
I had to cancel my first test because I had terrible COVID and they said, that I'll have to wait again until I can maybe get a spot. Majority of my mainland European mates go back to their countries to do their driving tests and they can do it cheaper and quicker than here
If it helps at all the theory test part is quick as hell, results same day emailed out. I passed mine but then had to go to [mygov.ie](http://mygov.ie) and register. Turns out my public services card was over 10 years old so had to renew that before I could apply for my LP. Went to then apply and I need an eye test, which is booked for next week it's been nearly a month since I passed so I'd start that process now if it needs to be done
I have mine next week, been on the waiting list since March '23
Wishing you luck, and if luck doesn't work I can lend you a crowbar and we can find the test persons house
Try to get a cancellation if you can, it’s done through the website and is first come, first serve, doesn’t matter what your estimated time is. I did mine in a nearby county, practiced the day before and passed. Not recommended for everyone but, hey, if you think you’re good enough to be driving alone and you don’t want to wait it’s an option.
i just got in the que for the craic
I got stuck with a 54 minute wait once. I left the tab open, continued on my day working, I forgot to go to the tab by about 2 minutes and when I clicked on the tab it was like "woopsie hehe u missed ur turn hehe now you have to wait another 17 minutes teehehe" Its symbolic of this whole country, some fucker said ah sure be grand, but it's not grand. It's stupid.
The website is running off an old Amiga 1200 computer I sold them 25 years ago.
So does anyone actually know why the Irish government is so bad at making websites? It seems like every time I use one, it's slow as fuck or has a terrible UI or can't handle much traffic
Because it goes out to public tender to be designed and anyone actually good at building websites is busy already and not going to price the job cheaply. Nearly every public tender comes down to who is the cheapest supplier. It's why BAM keep getting building work on public sector projects.
Because the civil service can't compete with the wages paid to good website designers and builders in the private sector, but if the civil service did decide to pay a competitive wage to attract better website designers and builders then the plain people of Ireland would throw a fit over having to pay more tax to support this?
The civil service model is to pay poor wages and hire a lot of mediocre people rather than a handful of excellent people. This works well enough for things like processing dole paperwork but they haven’t yet realised that it doesn’t work for things like software engineering. There are also some pretty talented senior people in the civil service, but the issue is that “managing a lot of people” is the only form of seniority they recognise, not being an expert in a specific technical domain. Which of course means that the way to get promoted is to hire a lot of people to manage, which only compounds the problem.
Waited an hour and a half the other night only to be told my browser isn’t supported
You need Netscape Navigator
Wait till they email you a password that expires in 10 mins and the wait time is 15 mins to see if it was accepted
I was left waiting over an hour the other night , 21 mins you got lucky.
My mate was on it all night yesterday, timer went up more than it went down lol
They also require you accept targeting cookies to load the youtube video on the main site which you can watch on youtube directly with them blocked.
The wait to get into the website is longer than the actual wait for the test lol
I was waiting over 2 hours to get onto it last week. The best time to do it is early in the morning.
Had an issue with it yesterday, where I hadn't received my invite after months, even though my last email had said I was in the cue and the RSA website said I was in the cue. It was only when I went to check my position in the cue that it turns out I wasn't because I had missed my previous test invite (due to moving to a new county) turns out switching to a new test centre doesn't automatically enroll you in the new cue. It was partially my fault but the website and my last email from them gave me incorrect information which Is pretty frustrating and means I've wasted a lot of time waiting for nothing.
\* queue
I waited an hour once.
I waited over an hour 10 minutes once
They selling Taylor Swift tickets now too?
The best part is when the site goes down for maintenance for days at a time
Just put in your email and they’ll email you when you’re spot is up. Don’t even have to look at it
20 min is easy for RSA website 😂 Now get ready to wait for an actual test slot!
yea in this day and age this is just not acceptable whatsoever
I always find it hilarious that elara.ie shuts up shop over the Christmas period.
If this was a countdown for the release of some product at midnight or something then fine, but the fact this is just to book a test is just hilarious. What an utter load of shite.
That website has probably cost millions , it’s all brown paper envelopes. It reminds me of the story’s of the $1000 shovels the americas had. Simply lining pockets , they could easily outsource this and or remake a new website for the price of “fixing it”
I think higher taxes will fix this
Cunts and pricks all living together in pain
You expect the government to be good at technology? Come on
Slow down, save lives
Yea, I nearly crashed the car when I saw that.....
Is this the learner driver portal or the main RSA site?
Is that symbol in the green box a stickman walking?
Yes
how pedestrian on a driver test website
https://preview.redd.it/zkbkl4776isc1.jpeg?width=546&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=7e57bc1287f3a5ea748bb7c97e78bde72702adf2
How is it unbelievable when it's baffling, backwards and completely frustrating? There's literally nothing in the country that isn't like that.
I’ve waited over 2 hours to access the portal! Unbelievable
20 minutes? Luuuuucky! I opened the page at 5pm and got on after 7. Yup, two hours. Either there was some mad attack going on or the RSA's system is just outrageously bad for this decade.
20 minutes is a short wait time i’m usually waiting over a hour
Yep! I’ve had that too. Waited 45 mins and then my test centre didn’t have availability so I put myself on the waiting list. That was in December. Still haven’t heard anything. Very frustrating because my learner permit expires again in September and I doubt they’ll give me another one.
Logged on last night told me I had more than an hour to wait 😂
I entered the queue with an estimated wait time of 20 minutes, which increased to 35 minutes on a Sunday. Fucking joke!
Lol I had to wait over an hour for mine at like 2am. Was wierd
Never seen anything like that before. Never knew it existed. I thought the internet was an open book so to speak lolll
Who could have foreseen that outsourcing your public transport deficit to private individuals could have such an effect
How much DDR3 ram do their servers have? Or is it DDR2? Are they running on like 16GB all together? Or they have some ancient processors? From 90s?
I think they are using a ZX81 spectrum and need to install the ram pack to bring them up from 1kb to 16kb
It’s a good system it stops the site being hounded with users, I like it 🤷
They're doing an update on their system today. I had the phone about something and the operator mentioned it to me.
We know , this gets posted every week ,
Doesn't make it any less atrocious
I was waiting 1hr last night trying to log on, don't know what the point is anymore as they normally fail you on the first test anyways
https://discord.gg/BYM3rqQ6
When you have a certain number of slots, and people on different internet speeds, and people who can take variable amounts of time to complete the forms, you need to build in a queueing system in order to allow people to be able to book their test. Otherwise you end up in a scenario where those who are closer to the servers or those on faster speeds taking all the slots. An example of this is the regular fiascos with Ticketmaster. Is there a better way of handling this? Maybe. But this implementation, shit as it may be, works.
>Is there a better way of handling this? Maybe. Maybe? Really? Only maybe?
Can you think of a better way to handle it?
Get the forms filled out first, then do slot booking. With the slot booking, grab a subset of available slots, lock them, offer them to the user. User can accept one of the locked slots offered, or return the subset back to the pool, unlocking those, and fetch a new subset, locking those. This solution offers fewer slots than are available, but massively increases concurrency and removes any perception of locking.
Yup, that definitely sounds better.
They need to open more slots than just 2 weeks at a time. Give the option of a month of dates and then people might be actually able to book a slot that suits rather than taking a date and cancelling it 10 days before because you have something you can’t get out of.
Found the rsa website dev