And these driving
schools owned by the AA have been ordered to refund more than 80,000
customers after overcharging for lessons using illegal “drip” pricing.
The drip pricing is , where customers are not told the full cost
of a service upfront, and it was banned in April last 2025.
Sarah Cardell, the chief
executive of the CMA, said: “If a fee is mandatory, the law is clear: it must
be included in the price from the very start – not added at checkout – so
consumers always know what they need to pay.
“At a time
when people are watching every pound, dripped fees can
tip the balance. And when it comes to something as important – and costly – as learning
to drive, people deserve clarity.”
The CMA launched an
investigation into deceptive drip pricing tactics last year.
The CMA found the AA had
added mandatory booking fees to lessons between April and December last year,
only revealing the full price of booking a lesson after customers had picked
their times and added their personal details.
Customers who were charged
hidden fees by the AA can expect to be written to and refunded. The average
refund is expected to be around £9.
The CMA said in November
that it had written to more than 100 businesses regarding its concerns about
their use of deceptive additional fees and sales tactics. It also launched
investigations into eight businesses, including the AA driving schools, about
deceptive pricing.
A 2023 government study
found that as many as 46pc of online businesses were using some form of hidden
fees, costing consumers an extra £3.5bn per year.
Learner
drivers have been grappling with Waiting
times for Driving Tests of six
months or longer amid a backlog of bookings that is not expected to be cleared
until 2027.
A shortage of instructors
and hundreds of thousands of missed tests during the Covid pandemic left new
drivers paying over the odds to secure tests by relying on third-party websites
to book slots.
The National Audit Office
found in December there was a backlog of about 1.1 million tests dating from
Covid.
The CMA said the AA had admitted
to breaking the law and agreed to settle the case.
An AA spokesman said:
“Although the £3 booking fee was made clear to customers prior to their
purchase, we acknowledge it should have also been displayed at the start of the
online booking journey.
“Having listened to the
regulator, we made immediate changes to our website to make the £3 booking fee
more prominent. We are now refunding all relevant customers.
