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SINGAPORE — Joylene Chen enrolled at the ComfortDelGro Driving Centre (CDC) in November 2024, thinking she would get a licence to drive an automatic car within six months. Seven months later, the 25-year-old is still far from her goal, but not for the lackToo many bots, too few instructors: Why the long wait for driving lessons in Singapore
SINGAPORE — Joylene Chen enrolled at the ComfortDelGro Driving Centre (CDC) in November 2024, thinking she would get a licence to drive an automatic car within six months. Seven months later, the 25-year-old is still far from her goal, but not for the lack of trying. The finance executive has managed to book only three practical lessons so far — after paying $30 to secure them using a Telegram bot, which is programmed to track available slots in the CDC's booking system. She is not alone. Many other students have also had to resort to using automated bots, or paying someone on local online marketplace Carousell, to snag these lessons. A private driving instructor who declined to be named said that out of desperation, his students sometimes pay others on Carousell $30 to $50 per slot. «This is a very unhealthy practice,» he told The Straits Times. The three driving schools here have long acknowledged the issue, and have suspended for up to three months accounts found to have used bots and scripts. Read more