I'm delighted with the work Top Driver did with my son, and later, my daughter. They are excellent drivers who are dedicated to the highest standards in the classroom and in the car. We had an easy time scheduling lessons with Top Driver because the customer service is GREAT! "Thinking and learning are not all in our head. On the contrary, the body plays an integral part in all our intellectual processes from our earliest moments in utero right through to old age." -Carla Hannaford, Ph.D, Smart Moves read more

Don't waste your time here. It is not worth the headache. Unprofessional, unfriendly, they make your life difficult for no reason. Use one of the many other driving schools in the area, no other place could be as bad as this. It is a rip off and should go out of business asap. read more

I wish I had checked the other reviews before signing up my daughter. The only reason she went here was because she wanted join a friend who had already signed up. All that the negative reviews say about this place is what we experienced from never being able to get hold of anyone on the phone, to scheduling driving lessons, and more. There are many other driving schools in the area. DON'T USE THIS PLACE, IT'S NOT WORTH THE HASSLE! read more

Wish I had read the reviews! You can't schedule driving lessons! They were all booked up for two months and they only give you 9 from start of class- but my son didn't turn 15 until month 4 And they won't let you take 2 within two weeks The business model is nonsense. The costumer service - email and phone - is abysmal. Unbelievably rude and condescending. SAVE YOURSELF! Do not go here read more

Way too hard to schedule behind the wheel and then when you can't get in within the number of months, they charge you more. Will go back to Adams for my youngest son. read more

No complaints with the instructors. It is virtually impossible to schedule behind the wheel time. The customer service representatives are rude and make no effort to accommodate the impossible scheduling issues. Horrible customer service. If i could give zero stars, I would. read more

DO NOT! If your idea of a good time is to sit in front of your computer, checking in a few times a day, trying to schedule a driving lesson, then this driving school is for you. Otherwise, save yourself some time and go somewhere else. read more

The instructor we had, Mr. Lucas, was excellent. Absolutely no complaints about his teaching or the ability to schedule drives. The issue I did have was with the advertisement to take the road test with their company for $99. They claim on their site and in the flyers that this will bypass the road test requirement at the DMV. When you call to schedule this, however, this is when they disclose that there is a 10% chance that your child will be selected at the DMV to take the road test anyway. There is no refund of the $99 if this happens. I wish this was made apparent in the ads so that parents could make an informed decision before paying the $99. The DMV does NOT charge for the road test. read more

Terrible customer service. Impossible to schedule. They overcharge and then add fees whenever possible. Very disappointed. Do not enroll with TOP DRIVER. You will regret it from the moment you start and you cannot cancel. read more

Classroom Classes ok. Extremely difficult to schedule driving hours. It takes very long to get all the hours in as they are always fully booked. Then after completion of all requirements it takes them very long to send the paperwork to the State (up to 20 business days!!!) Do not recommend Top Driver read more

Do whatever it takes to not use Top Driver. We are 8 months in and still cannot get instructor driving sessions scheduled. When I call, they keep telling me to be patient and keep trying. Because their system requires that I search every location manually, it's a 10 minute search. I'm searching several times a day without success. Such a time waste! The school has obviously taken on way more students than they can handle. I keep meeting parents in the same frustrating position. Really wish I had known this ahead of time. The most frustrating this is that students at the driving school are having no issues at all. The few drives I was able to schedule are an hour and a half away!!! There is no way that these positive reviews are real. This company is abysmal. read more

What a disaster their program is. There are dozens of things wrong with them including their customer service but I guess they are in the business because there is no "repeat" customer. By the time you are desperate to schedule any Behind the Wheel lesson you will accept lessons as far as 30 miles away or else just loose your money for the paid lessons. Their business model is to make sure YOU teach your child everything including all the high risk first few months of actual driving while they will take hundreds of dollars just to give your student lectures in class. read more

Horrible company! Change policy without notification. Scheduling is a complete nightmare! Do not use them!!!!! If I could give them zero stars I would!!! read more

My child is already 16, and I still can't get all his driver lessons scheduled. It has been almost a year!! Don't waste your money or time. No classes ever available, when they release classes once a month, you still can't get anything scheduled. Very disappointing. read more

LOOK ELSEWHERE! Scheduling the in car drives is impossible. They release dates for the next month at noon on a thursday and by 12:30 they are booked and unavailable. Class room instruction is fine but scheduling the drives is a TOTAL NIGHTMARE! read more

Disasterous experience. Daughter only needs one more behind the wheel lesson to qualify for her license (she turns 16 in a few weeks), but there's never any openings. Dozen's of calls to their customer service line to try to schedule to no avail. Tried to speak to supervisors who could intervene but they wouldn't make them available. Next child will take the driving instruction program through her public school as I can't imagine going through this experience again. read more

Top Driver is an amazing driving school with excellent customer service! Both of my children took lessons here. While my son had his classroom instruction with CPS, he did range (aka BTW for Behind the Wheel) lessons at Top Driver. My daughter, on the other hand, signed up for Top Driver classroom instruction as well as BTW. She is the best driver in the house, I swear! While making a mistake in English class may be uncomfortable, making a mistake on the road can kill you! I am so grateful to Top Driver for providing my children with a wonderfully sound foundation for driving for life! I found it easy to book BTW lessons (customer service is so nice!) and my daughter loved her driving teacher who incorporated physical movement to model what skills students need to use when on the road. Having this kind of innovative instruction worked well for my daughter who is typically an introvert as well as being both an athlete and a dancer. Having a safe, mistake making place to learn is essential for developing the skills for driving. The opportunity to get physically involved made it much more engaging for my daughter than the flat, dry approach to driving that is typically associated with most driver's education courses. I recommend Top Driver! It has made my family safer through adherence to the Rules of the Road and an exceptional quality educational experience! read more

I should have read the reviews before enrolling my son in this course. It is nearly impossible to schedule in person driving lessons. The on-line scheduling system releases dates for driving lessons 6 weeks in advance, and they are filled within 30 seconds of the release time. Overall a frustrating experience that I would not recommend. read more

Terrible ... as noted by others, it's impossible to schedule an in-person driving lesson. They need to adjust their business model to either avoid oversubscribing customers, or create a system in which we're not scrambling (completely unsuccessfully) to book appointments. Waste of money, waste of time. read more

Very difficult to schedule in-vehicle lessons but I held off writing a negative review because I understand there are staffing shortages. However, I just called to schedule lessons and their office is closed. It's Wednesday at 4:15 PM and they are supposed to be open until 5 PM. I think the least they could do is have the customer service line open until 5pm. read more

Awful!!!! completely impossible to schedule in-person lessons. Avoid at all costs! Go elsewhere!

If you're looking for a driving school, absolutely DO NOT use Top Driver. They have been a nightmare from the start. Poor communication, nasty instructors, and even worse driving teachers. My daughter was actually told by one that she should just repeat to herself while she drives: I will not kill anyone today. Fast forward to today, when we were never sent a reminder about her drive. The instructor arrived at the wrong pick-up location, and then said he would wait while I drove her to where he was. I dropped her off, she got in the car, and he screamed at her, kicked her out of the car and left her on the side of the road. She was hysterical when I arrived to get her. Top Driver should be ashamed of itself. My oldest did ADDS, and it was a great experience. DO NOT use Top Driver, or perhaps it's just the Wilmette location that's awful. read more

They taught me how to drive safely. The instructors were nice and helpful. I admire the teaching strategies used by the instructors who went out of their way to ensure I had a thorough grasp of each maneuver before moving on to the next one. The availability of lessons was great! My mom scheduled them about 60 days ahead and that ability to plan made things so much easier for me with my hectic basketball schedule. Their customer service is awesome! read more

HORRIBLE!!!!!!! Please think twice before enrolling your child in this school. I purchased the top package for my oldest and wish I had read the reviews first. Online course was slow and kept closing out. The customer service department is a joke! When I called in to see what was required for my child to complete the course I was told that she was all done and received a passing score. Only to find out 3 months later when she completed her final driving lesson that she was not done. They claimed the rep was looking at the wrong account and mistakenly told me that my daughter completed all the course work. How this happened when they require all of the child's information is beyond me. I reluctantly accepted that we had to go back and do the days over but they only gave my daughter a limited time to complete it. After going back into the lessons we realized that the amount of time allowed to complete the remaining days was not enough because the videos moved so slowly some days took several hours which were much more than the 2 hrs per day allowed. When I asked Top Driver to extend the time for my daughter to complete the course I was basically told that I was a liar and that my daughter had not logged in when I emailed proof that she did. They messed up so bad they even sent my daughters completion record to the Secretary of State and then rescinded it when they realized the error. Now they want to refund me for the online portion instead of allowing my daughter to finish the course to cover their butts. We lost 3 months thinking we were done because that is what we were told and now Top Driver does not want to make things right. I have another child starting drivers Ed and I will NOT be going back to Top Driver. Please read all the reviews before purchasing a package. Like everyone else said, you will struggle to book driving lessons as well. read more

I would not recommend going thru TOP DRIVER at all. Paid for the gold package and here it's almost a year later and still have 3 classes of driving and observation to be completed. They are extremely short staffed and overbooked were you can't complete classes in a timely manner especially for the fees that have to be paid. In addition trying to charge anywhere between $75-$200 to reinstate when it goes past the completion date which is out of your control with their lack of inability to provide classes. I have called numerous times to try and schedule classes and work something out but was only offered last minute classes were my daughter would have to call off of work or during the day when she was in school to have to call off of school which I didn't know upon entering this class that would be expected of you. Don't be surprised when you call customer service that their very rude and disrespectful or you find yourself calling numerous times because they don't return phone calls in a timely manner or not at all. Don't waste your money or be scammed out of your money to a company that does not fulfill their service. read more

I would never recommend this program. It is literally impossible to schedule in person driving lessons via the portal they have in place. Nothing is ever available and if you call or email customer service, they just tell you to find a different location. Well, they are all connected so that does not help. I was unable to schedule in person driving lessons for over 2 months. I was told they have a shortage of drivers and that everyone is trying to cram their in person driving lessons into one time so there is no availability. They told me I have to pay an additional $150 to reinstate my son's account and schedule the remaining 4 in person driving lessons. The customer service reps, particularly Yvonne, are extremely unfriendly, not helpful and are definitely not in the business of solutions. I asked to speak with a manager and was told I have to send an email to the customer service email. I highly encourage you to read reviews of Top Driver before you think about signing up. There are plenty of other driving schools in the area. read more

I scheduled a behind the wheel session for my daughter who became ill the morning of her 6:45pm evening lesson. I called promptly the morning of her lesson to let Top Driver know that she would not be able to attend the lesson. They proceeded to tell me that because of the cancellation within less than a 24 hour window they would have to charge me $40 (in absence of a doctors note.) It's all about the money. The kids are secondary. read more

My major issue is that It is impossible to schedule behind the wheel lessons. They have an on line scheduling system and classes fill up immediately. My son wasn't able to get take all his classes within the time frame. I contacted the office and they told me I had to pay an additional $150 to extend the time period. Another friend called to complain and she was told they had issues keeping instructors, so they extended her son's time frame. When I mentioned this they said that was an issue at the Glenview office, not the Wilmette office. FYI - you can take in car lessons at any of their facilities, so a shortage at one facility impacts all facilities. My son finished classroom lessons in March. He was able to make-up two classes without any issues, but now they are telling us he never attended the classes and he needs to make-up these classes, after paying another extension fee. FYI - My two daughters took lessons with another company and we didn't have any issues. read more

This is the worst. i am currently a student here, and our teacher is making us act out these things that do not relate to the topic in any way, shape or form. i am currently sitting in a class, and we're an hour in. we have done only 2 questions, this is an immense waste of money. please take your business somewhere read more

Great learning environment. I found the teachers to be very engaged. They really cared about me and my learning. I know I received a solid, and comprehensive education (I have recently earned my driver's license) because I am such a great driver that I am able to give my mom tips on how to improve her driving as well. The lessons were never boring because of the wonderful teacher that I had. read more

Classroom sessions ok- usual boring stuff. Actual behind the wheel lessons are ok but it is very difficult to schedule them and they will not pick up at ETHS, only New Trier. Often they will only pick up and drop off from the Wilmette location, which is only open during actual classroom time so there's no place to wait. My daughter attended the other big driving school and scheduling lessons was very easy with pickup at school and drop off at home. Cannot recommend Top Driver. It will take us about 4 months to get 8 lessons scheduled. read more

Don't bother there are so many other schools out there and you do not need the hassle especially with a new driver.Poorly organized and very late. The 1-800 customer service is horrific. Try Adams or Viking. read more