I signed up my twin daughters for the Teen Essential Driving Course. After their first class, we were sent an email informing us to start booking our five course drives. There are over 50 kids in their class, so I did expect that some of the "good" spots would be taken. I *did not* expect that there would be less than 10 lesson spots per week AND, wildly, that the less spots are all DURING SCHOOL HOURS. I've sent an email, and parent orientation is next week ... but I'm not sure giving them $1,100 / per kid was a wise thing if the expectation is that they will need to SKIP SCHOOL to complete the course. read more

Everything was so organized and the Zoom teacher (Clay) and driving teacher (Mr Kim) were outstanding! Our other child used a different driving school and DDS is light years ahead!! read more

For Factoria Branch: I took 1 hour class from Bailey Wilson. He was amazing , he shared lot of valuable information and gave me feedback. He taught me parallel parking and backing up around the corner. His technique helped me a lot. He is superb . If you are going for Factoria branch, then book With him. I also passed my test in 1st time. Highly recommended!! read more

done all the driving lessons, knowledge test and driving test here. The staff are wonderful and patient to us. Ballie really did a good job in teaching me how to drive and help me warmup for the driving test! read more

The course was pretty alright, I happened to get lucky and get an amazing teacher (clay) who made class super interesting and when he explained things, he actually went in depth explained the why behind those things as well. When I went to make up sessions, I actually felt a bit bad for the people who had my makeup lesson teacher as an actual teacher cause she was so boring and slow paced and just showed us the questions and the answer. IF YOU'RE IN FACTORIA LOCATION, BOOK WITH BAILEE FOR YOUR INSTRUCTOR, as the instructor I had for all of my drives was def not the greatest guy. I think his name was Steve. I hear Bailee is a chill and funny guy who teaches well. Before you read the next part lemme preface this by saying, as I've read the other reviews, a lot of other instructors dont seem like the greatest guys ever either, as least the guy I had showed up on time even though he made rude remarks (once abt me me being 2 mins late haha). If you want further information on why I dont like the instructor I had: he has a massive ego and has said things like "parents a lot of time purposefully have their kids book their drives with me because I'm such a good experienced instructor" even though he's only been instructing for 6 months, and I quite beg to differ that he is good. Examples, one time he told me to change lanes, so I did my check 1-2-3 and it was all good to go, so I began to change lanes and then in the middle of me changing lanes he yanks the steering wheel back into our lane and goes "did you check your blind spot" and I said "yes" because I did, and HE GOES AND TELLS ME "good because I didn't" like wtf? He shouldn't ' of yanked the steering wheel and he as well should've checked blind spot instead of yank the wheel, and its not like I was making a sharp lane change, I was taking it super steady and keeping speed as I had practiced this with my parent. Another thing he did which contributed to me crying out of frustration the last half of the lesson (mind you on the first lesson he was all about "its okay to mess up, people are human and they make mistakes" before the first drive I ever had but this other stuff happened in like 3-5th lessons) was tell me to turn, and apparently I turned too early even though I turned when I told him to turn and he goes "you aren't listening to me are you" even though he told me to "turn right at this intersection" and he also told me "you arent listening are you" in a different situation during a diff situation but I forgot what it was. One last thing was he was venting to me about another one of his students about how his other student straight up told him "I hate you" well like duh? I dont like him either cause he yanks the steering wheel, talks bad abt other students, and is rude. One thing I did like about him was he graded me easy despite seeming like a harsh grader. Either I'm a great driver due to many hours of practicing with my patents, or hes an easy grader. I think it may be the first one though cause most people who I know, dont pass the final drive first try. Btw if you fail you have to pay $75 for another try. Same thing if you fail mid term AND final. read more

Clay is a fun driving instructor. I feel like I am learning a lot (I will not let Jason win). For an actual review, I really enjoy lessons because they are very engaging. I have not currently experienced many of the issues that other reviewers have, but that may be because I have not yet gone for my in-person lessons. Also apparently they are breaking review guideline rules? Conflicts of interest: Your contributions to Yelp should be unbiased and objective. For example, you shouldn't write reviews of your own business or employer, your friends' or relatives' business, your peers or competitors in your industry, or businesses in your networking group. Businesses should never ask customers to write reviews. Pretty fun tbh. read more

Inconsistent instruction and scoring. And it seems like few instructors stick around for long, except for one who we had to avoid due to unwanted physical contact while driving. read more

I had a appointment on sunday at 3pm, the office at 14777, 40NE Bellevue was closed, at 3.10 a old lady Instructor with a walking stick arrives and gives me 20 minutes warm up and test, I failed for no reason but the School needs younger, friendly teachers. read more

AMAZING driving school and the instructors are good, patient and kind, they focus on quality professional instructions. I would like to SPECIALLY thank my instructor Vallare Rogers, Vallare is an amazing instructor, you will gain more and more Confidence with her in each class. If you lack confidence or have issues, I would strongly suggest you to meet VALLARE and take sessions with her. She gives a lot of valuable feedback on improvement and she closely works with you to achieve the skill set required for safe and proficient driving. She is the BESTTT instructor I have met. If you enroll for a class, ask for VALLARE ROGERS!!! She is super flexible, works in many locations, an amazing professional. read more

So the state requires teens to have 6 driving hour practices and one observation drive. But DDS sets it up as 5 one hour drives, 1 observation and a 4 hour in-class "AAA-Zero Error Driving program". If you don't want to sit through that 4 hour class, you have to pay an extra $60 for another drive in order to meet the state criteria. Total B.S. in my book. I was told that the Zero Error class was required by the state. If so, it's not on the state website and if I can pay an extra $60 to get out of it, how does that work with a state requirement?! The practice drives are very, very difficult to schedule because they don't have very many slots available for late afternoon (hello? during school term the kids don't get out until 3-4pm!). And they try to up-sell you on their extra driving courses. read more

My wife never wanted to consider driving, she was very scared and lacked confidence, I enrolled her to Defensive driving school for few classes and she was picking up very good, but lacked confidence or maybe she was too scared. She was assigned to new instructor - Vallare Rogers and after which she loved going to class, she was super confident in driving and to be honest she has gained some excellent SAFE DRIVING skills. Oh Yes! She is now a successful license holder...!! Thanks much Vallare Rogers. Vallare is amazing, flexible and BEST instructor she is available in many defensive driving school centers, Renton, Bellevue Factoria, Mercer Island. When you schedule a class ask for Vallare Rogers. Vallare the BEST read more

Our oldest went through this class, and after a couple months of additional practice with me, was scheduled for his final test to pass the class this morning. The test was scheduled with instructor Carol Howie. We arrived about 7 minutes early. A few minutes after the appointment time, we finally found her. But she said she was booked with another student. I'm pretty sure I spoke with that student briefly when I was looking everywhere for Carol. I assumed that the home office must have double-booked Carol, and only told her of the other student's appointment. But Carol was quite sure *I* must have made a mistake, definitely not the home office. So we went home and called the home office. They said no, Carol was scheduled for our son at that time, and that the other student was scheduled for an hour later, and that Carol must have misread her schedule. As for the other student arriving early, perhaps she was confused about when to change her clocks for daylight savings time? The clock change would be the following morning (Sunday) at 2am. But her phone must change automatically at the right time, so I don't know. If you do take lessons here, I'd suggest avoiding Carol Howie. When we rescheduled, we made sure to schedule it with another instructor. From my brief and rather unpleasant interaction with Carol, I'm not sure she's well suited to a job where she interacts with customers, especially kids. People who leap to the conclusion that the customer is wrong, especially when another likely explanation is so readily available, shouldn't be in customer-facing jobs. But you came here to read about the class in general, not just that incident. They seem very thorough. But somehow my son got through all their classes and tests very successfully with some surprising gaps in his knowledge about right-of-way. Some things I had to teach him after he'd learned all their material and passed all their tests before the final driving test: -- When you're turning left at a green ball (no arrow), you have to wait for anyone else coming straight through from the opposite side. -- When you stop behind someone else at a 4-way stop, that doesn't count as your stop at that intersection; you have to stop again when you get to the front of the line. -- Driveways don't count as uncontrolled intersections; the fact that you "got there" before someone on the road doesn't mean you can drive out in front of them and expect them to stop. This happened at a strip mall, so I can understand the confusion, but still it was a driveway with no traffic controls at that driveway for the cars on the road, therefore no right-of-way for the person entering the road from the driveway. -- Just because you have a stop sign doesn't mean everyone else does. If you have a stop sign and the cross street doesn't, then "getting there first" doesn't mean you can drive out in front of them and expect them to stop. You have to wait for all of the cars on the cross street that doesn't have a stop sign. I had to teach him so much about right-of-way that I don't understand how he could have passed a test on it before I started working with him on it. But he passed all their tests and did very well on them. I rode along with all my son's driving tests. Both instructors (Jim and German) were very engaged with the student and seemed passionate about teaching good driving skills. I thought some of the things they said were a little odd, but it's been a long time since I learned. At times the two contradicted each other, but not over anything very important. When it comes time for our next kid to take driving lessons, I wouldn't rule this company out, but I also wouldn't rule out considering another one. I learned one interesting thing long the way. 39 years ago I was taught, both in my high school driving class and by my parents, that when turning left at a busy intersection, we should proceed to almost the middle of the intersection, then go when the way was clear. Which might mean just after the light turns red, if oncoming cars don't stop until then. But now I learned that in Washington State, if you're still in the intersection when it goes red, you're breaking the law. For some intersections, that can mean waiting a long, long time. For myself, I still proceed to the middle, as I've been doing it for 39 years with no problem, and I think most people do it. But my son follows the law and what he was taught in class -- he waits outside the intersection until the way is clear. We came across an intersection in downtown Bellevue which just cycles between green, yellow, and red balls, with never an arrow. Lots of cars came through from the other side. We sat through three full cycles of lights before the way was clear. read more

Do not expect your kid will get a full 60 minutes of in car practice in an one hour driving lesson. Instructors always show up late, end the lesson early and takes long bathroom breaks during the lesson. You get about 30 min in a 60 min class. This place is a huge rip off. This happens frequently with an instructor named Emmanuel del Casal. Stay away from him, stay away from this place. read more

My teen is doing this class. Registering was easy. They have a log in to view the progress. Teacher is passionate about driving, but does have some comments that are less than ok in this day and age. My teen just keeps quiet about it all. You do have multiple people to choose from for the driving portions. I sat in on one and it was ok. The 2nd drive he yelled at my kid when she wasn't perfect at a brand new skill, so we changed the other drives to other teachers. The other drive teacher had a different way of teaching and my kid liked it much better. Can't change the classroom portion though, so counting it down. There is a group project and my kid found the other kids to be non responsive in planning the project which stressed her out. If a kid fails an in class test they bring it home, discuss with you, you sign the paper and they turn it back in for a better grade. They are supposed to change a tire at home for homework. They also need to be driving often to get enough hours during the class time. You sign off on a log. I know people who have used other schools but they all seem about the same. You have to do it, so you do it. It's time consuming during the class portion/drives. My teen is learning a lot about driving and doing well at it when we practice, so I can't complain about the program except maybe the fact it's expensive and the state requires it but that isn't the schools fault. read more

5stars for the school and 5stars for Vallare Rogers! Best instructor. Vallare is very patient, kind and understands your areas of improvement and gives lots of confidence which is very important. Instead of pointing mistakes she gives instructions and tips to help improve in that area. She is an amazing mentor and person. read more

Heaton was an absolute delight to have in the car with me when I renewed my driving license. It has been two years since I had driven in the US, but she was patient, kind, and calm as she directed me during the driving test. I was never stressed or anxious with her. Her feedback at the end of the test was detailed, constructive, and helpful. Overall, I would highly recommend taking your test through Defensive Driving School in Bellevue. It was easy to make an appointment with them, all communication was clear, the emails were helpful, and on the day of the test the staff were incredibly friendly, which calms any nerves. Thanks for your help! read more

The defensive driving school in fActoria definitely taught me a lesson on how I should park my car. Sincerely apologize and thank them for their patience. read more

Does not show any schedules before hand at time of paying money online. After you have paid the fees, you come to know that the test slot is not available till next 20 days! If you call the center, they either don't pick up or not very helpful. Their Issaquah location has a single day (Saturday) available for testing and that is the reason of the such delay in testing. Even the driving test is not thorough. Instructor did not fill the evaluation form after the test. Very odd experience. Your experience will be much better if you go with a different driving school, in my honest opinion. read more

My daughter took her final driving test with German. My son also drove with German - in both cases I was there to observe how I could better coach them when we drove together. German is a very patient teacher who breaks driving down into easy to follow principles. He's logical and takes the time to talk to the kids about what they can do to improve. My daughter and son both really liked working with him and I learned a lot from watching him teach them. read more

A great driving school that educated me well. I want to give a special thanks to Ms.DuBois. She was a very chill and helpful examiner who helped me stay calm and pass my drive test. 10/10 would recommend. read more

You know, you can't expect too much from a driving school, usually focused on making a profit but eh, the instructor in the classroom was nice and super funny! Now when on the road, it was a little bit different, you get yelled at quite a bit for little mistakes, but overall it was okay. They really do make the class fun though. read more

The reason I enjoyed defensive driving school was not so much of the structure or organization because that was fairly mediocre. But James Charvet was a respectful, calm instructor who taught me how to drive without stressing me out. Personally, I recommend James over Jim Freaney because Jim is too emotional and not very good at teaching. I had one drive with him and his constant yelling just made me more insecure about my driving and i drove worse. Luckily, you can choose your instructor and I definitely say Charvet is the way to go. read more

I had my driving lessons with John from DDS. I must say I was initially afraid of driving and after having classes with John gave me enough confidence. I was able to pass my drive test in 1 attempt. Staff is very friendly and you have multiple people to choose from for your classes. read more

The driving school is great. Jim is a good instructor

They did not let us check for availability of time frames before buying a package of lessons. We were told to pay first and then can schedule lessons on line ourselves. Then after we paid, we found out there is only one instructor at this site per day and he is pretty booked with very limited availability, he only has a couple of slots in the middle of regular work hours per week. Then the instructor took the student (who is has an international driving license and is already driving in the city) on the road and instead of teaching the student what we specifically asked for to refine her skills, did a beginner lesson, and then told the student to buy a package of 50 lessons. We then called to find another site with another instructor and they were all booked unless we wanted to go got Kirkland to take lessons. We asked for a refund, and they even charged us a service fee to give us the rest of our money back. read more