Benji's Driving School

Hello, my name is Won Joo. I am a class 1 professional driver. I took 20 hour course from Tony, the sole proprietor and instructor of 'Benji' driving school. I would like to share my reasons why I would NOT recommend this school. While I had the 'gut feeling' that Valley would have the best instructors, due to my having taken the Air Brake certification at the Coquitlam branch, I wanted to save money and sought a less costly alternative. I went into my first road test centre at the Burnaby ICBC branch with confidence knowing how much time and effort I had put into memorising the particulars of the inspection and driving components of the examination. When I received my evaluation, I realised that Tony, had failed to communicate 3 aspects that were significant to the test. 1) Starting to monitor the air pressure at 50 psi from the PRIMARY reservoir and ending the monitoring at 90 psi from the SECONDARY reservoir - Tony had never explained this to me, and instead, he told me to look at a piece of paper with ambiguous diagrams, broken grammar, and arrows related to the air build up time test - not an effective way to instruct a student foreign to the semi truck in cab environment. 2) Ensuring that the truck brakes, the yellow 'button', is 'applied', or pulled out, before stepping out of the vehicle to remove the wheel blocks, to subsequently perform the 'tug test' - Tony had never mentioned this. This is critical. To help new drivers understand why this component is important, it is because the truck may roll away in the event the truck and trailer is stationed on a non level surface such as an incline or decline. 3) Knowing to turn the truck and trailer to the right when the center of the passenger side trailer wheel has just pasted the corner of the sidewalk or pavement. I firmly believe that Tony and many instructors from other driving schools do not know this because I witness professional semi truck drivers make this mistake often. In fact, I witnessed one failure prior to writing this review. This fundamental skill in preventing collision and ENORMOUS liability, was clarified to me when I had decided to get help from John from Langley Valley school, the school I would STRONGLY recommend for new drivers, in spite of their higher fees. I hope this review would help individuals trying to get into the trucking industry, and encourage instructors to self reflect and refine their teachings ways so that students would be more successful in acquiring their licenses, and more importantly, developing SAFER drivers. One last comment - To all the trollers of the web and Benji's reviewers in particular, Please, do not insult the reader's intelligence with your false reviews. I suspect the comments were written my Tony himself with his fake accounts. 'Happy Day'. Right...

Not worth the money, I want my money back. Where is the passion? I wonder about the good reviews — are they for the same person? Tell me about it. I think he did not do his best to ensure you pass the exam. He did not warn you enough of your possible mistake — good luck for the trials and errors to see what mistake you will make in the actual road test — ways to surprise you. And more waiting period for you. When you fail, he cares more when you going to book the next exam so he makes more money. Bro, you need your license to make a living and survive in Vancouver, not everyone has their family as a financial back up, your carelessness will hurt people. All your hard work, time spent and your money gone. More waiting period that you don’t make enough money or you have to make money the hard way. The tutorial session is like $80 an hour for class 4 but I went there at 12 and not even got to 2PM, I already paid $160. You need prove? I started my exam around 2PM. The time length was not right yet he demand payment up front.

If you want to get an advanced driver’s license and to drive a big rig or a bus, do yourself a favor and see Tony, the owner of Benji’s Driving School. I want to keep this brief so here it is, very concise and nothing but the truth so help me God. Tony is really passionate about driving any vehicle, is extremely good at it, and most of all, has the gift of teaching, of sharing his knowledge with his students that soon (as the one writing) become his friends. I did not know Tony but I am glad I took the decision to see him and borrow a bit of his knowledge. Godspeed Tony and thank you.

After driving 5 ton trucks for years I decided to upgrade my licence to class 1 in order to open more driving options for myself, I contacted Tony at Benji's after being referred by a good friend who had recently done his class 3 with him, I signed up for my two day air course and started the next weekend, the course was very informative and I felt at ease because of Tony's great demeanour and sense of humour, a few days after I passed my class 1 learners and air brake written exam I got in touch with Tony and we started the road lessons quickly, I was very intimidated at first with such a big truck and difficult gearbox but quickly became comforatable with Tony's excellent guidance, I passed my road test and air brake practical just this morning and I am on top of the world, Tony is absolutely the best instructor I have ever worked with and I would recommend him to anyone thinking about taking on this challenge. First rate instruction and incredibly affordable prices, his vehicles are excellent and in very good shape ! "Happy Day" !!!!!!!

I work as a driver for a courier company and decided to upgrade my position within the company and get a class 1. I was referred to Tony at Benjis Driving school and everything went very smoothly from my airbrake class to the class 1 driving lessons and passing the test on my first try!! The lessons were great, and he not only thought me to pass the test but also to be a good and safe professional driver. Happy Days!