Safety challenges experienced by driver license examiners and related safety measures

Driver license examiners serve as the gatekeepers to the world of driving. These examiners administer driving tests and issue driver licenses to prospective drivers that demonstrate driving competency. Unfortunately, this community of workers is vulnerable to experiencing safety incidents as they test prospective drivers with limited driving proficiency. Understanding the safety challenges these workers experience professionally is fundamental to identifying and adopting relevant safety measures. Towards achieving this goal, interviews were conducted with driver license examiners in North Carolina to compile the safety challenges they professionally experience. Additionally, safety management measures that they adopt regularly and others that they recommend for possible future adoption were gathered. The reported safety challenges include prospective drivers reporting for testing and retesting without sufficient training, the existence of communication and language barriers, pro-spective drivers adopting driving customs learned in other countries, and experiences of entering unclean ve-hicles. Safety measures that the driver license examiners adopt regularly include the use of widely adopted terms and hand gestures to overcome communication challenges, being prepared to take control over the vehicle steering, encouraging prospective drivers to hold the learner's permit and gain additional experience, and others. Suggested safety measures for possible future adoption include empowering examiners to terminate the test when appropriate, enforcing a limited wait time following the issuance of a learner's permit prior to attempting the driving test, and the regular adoption of contactless testing methods popularized during the COVID-19 pandemic. The study findings can be leveraged to enhance the safety of driver license examiners.

Automated summary

Driver license examiners face a range of safety challenges, including inadequately trained test takers, communication and language barriers, adoption of foreign driving customs, and encountering unclean vehicles. They adopt safety measures such as using common terms and hand gestures to overcome communication challenges, being prepared to take control of steering, and encouraging test takers to gain more experience. Suggested safety measures include giving examiners the authority to terminate tests when appropriate, imposing a waiting period after issuing a learner's permit before attempting the driving test, and adopting contactless testing methods.