I qualified and worked as a (self employed) driving instructor with BSM 20 years ago.

To be a registered Driving Instructor you need to have held a licence for 4 years, the reason they say 3 and a half is it will take you at least 6 months to qualify, by which time you will have 4 years driving experience.

Remember when they advertise "xxx For 40 hours work" that you won't get 40 hours continous work, the working hours will be spread over a much longer time in the day or days.

Some one working when I did, used to proof read manuscripts in the waiting times between lessons.

I gave up after less than a year for many reasons, some of;

Car too small (Metro, and me over 6ft)
Hours spread out too much, sometimes only working 2 hours in a day.
BSM at that time only guaranteed 25 hours, they were more into Instructor training than New driver training.
I realised I prefered working with tools (still do now) than sitting all day and looking smart.


However I did enjoy the time I did, the people I taught and especially what I learnt from the training.

.