Autocraft Driving School

They are also known as Action Driving School. It’s a pain in the ass; the school director is a prissy old man who takes delight in punishing the students and making things painful. I know it’s cheap as dirt on Groupon and that’s probably the only reason U shld take it.

This driving school was convinient for me. They were flexible with scheduling and were punctual. The instructors are well experienced and make it easy to learn.

Autocraft had its share of (bad) moments, but the end result depends on who is teaching. Dino was a great instructor, he was very chill and laid-​back. He’d just let you do your own thing which is very important when learning how to drive; you’ll never learn how to drive if the instructor is grabbing the wheel all the damn time. Obviously if you f’ed up he would tell you what you did wrong, but he’d be cool about it. You could also tell he cared about the success of his students, that’s what’s really important
tl;dr version: Dino is great :)

I really liked this driving school. The staff was really nice and my instructor, Dino was awesome! I passed my road test on the first try after 8 lessons with him and I’m a new driver. He had a great way of teaching driving and I really learned a lot from him. He doesn’t yell if you do something wrong, he just explains it to you better until you get it right. I would recommend anyone going to this school, request Dino as your instructor.

My experience with this driving school was really good ! I took 4 lessons with Dino. He knows his stuff which is great. He was so patient with me and he had a couple of tricks up his sleeve for parallel parking which I always had diffuliculty in. I just took my road test today and passed cause of those lessons ! Every student he teaches, pass so that’s a two thumbs up. He’s highly encouraging. The 5hr class instructor was nice as well so I encourage you to take this school and get lessons w dino if you wanna pass with no problem (:

I was stuck at LGA trying to get off a flight I call them at 5pm telling them. I have a 6pm appt. but they haven’t let us off the flight yet (traveled for work) the man is like SORRY you should had canceled. I try to tell him I swore i was going to make it I have been in the air and timed everything correctly It not my fault my flight has been on the tarmac for this long. can you please do something for me. he is like no my policy is more important you lose a class and was being a D**k.
they need people skills and someone who speaks clearly on the phone. I barely understaood him but i felt it was unfair and he could had made some sort of compromise with the situation I had.
I dont recommend.

I bought a package deal from this school for 9 classes, plus the 5-​hour class and a road test appointment. The classes have actually been quite helpful, which is why I’m giving them an extra star. My instructor isn’t necessarily the nicest guy, and he’s a little distracting (i.e. yelling at me to hit my turn signal when I’ve already done it; reaching over me to honk the horn and curse when someone behind me gets impatient), but the important thing is that he got the message across.
The front desk, though… it’s kinda hard to judge them, since it’s not always the same person. The first few times I’ve called, I got a very nice woman who went out of her way to help me schedule lessons and switch instructors when necessary. But THEN there’s the one woman who can’t speak even a little clearly, has monumental trouble understanding basic phrases and gives you an answer to a COMPLETELY different question, and forgets that she’s the company’s PR and treats you like a fucking incompetent child. I had to cancel a lesson last minute one time — I already knew that rescheduling wasn’t necessarily allowed, but I figured I’d go through the motions and give it a shot. The worst they can do is say, «No, sorry,» right? The woman first gives me a snappy ultimatum, as if I’d done her some grievous injury in asking to reschedule. When I say I can’t do the lesson, all I get is, «You lose it, sorry, bye bye, *click*» I’m not the sort of person to be offended and cry every single time about the smallest disservice (otherwise, the instructor would have driven me off a long time ago), but when there’s an unnecessary level of hostility like that, it makes you wonder what the fuck is going on.
The Sparknotes to my emotional, tear-​jerking drama is this: instructors, while not the nicest dudes, teach you what you need to know and prepare you effectively for the test. Front desk, on the other hand, isn’t helpful, gives answers to questions that aren’t asked, and will rip you a new asshole when she feels like it. Just take your money and find a place with good teachers AND good PR.

My experience with the school was very good. The staff was friendly and my instructor Edwin was great. He went through all the details required for clearing the driving test very patiently with me. He gave me great practice and good pointers for the road test. He was also very motivating and never got edgy or irritated even when I made mistakes. The school was also punctual with appointment times, helped in rescheduling lessons any number of times if informed 24 hrs in advace (which is their policy) and setting up my road test. All in all i had a good experience with them and I would definitely recommend this driving school

This review is long overdue but it’s better late than never and I want to tell everyone to AVOID THIS DRIVING SCHOOL. Although on their website it seems like they give you an excellent deal at a good price, it still isn’t worth it. Let me tell ya why it isn’t worth it: the employers are extremely unprofessional.
My dad and I made an appointment to sit down and schedule when I wanted to practice. First off, when we were sitting down with what seemed to be their secretary (she was a heavy set woman), she was rude and was on her cell phone. And while she was filing my paperwork, my dad leaned over to see what she was doing and she rudely said, «sit down.» Like lady my dad just wants to know what you’re doing with all our IDs and everything.
I was assigned an instructor with a full head of hair, thick mustache and heavy accent (I won’t say his name). Let me say that there were more downs than ups. He was aggressive and scolded every mistake I made; a few times I came home crying and other times I did not want to continue my driving lessons with him. He made tasteless jokes about me ending up in the cemetery with my sucky driving. He spoke way too much and it was extremely distracting and sometimes I got too frustrated with him. Yet looking back I guess that’s how my instructor was, and to be fair he was kind and compassionate half the time. But meh. You need to have a consistent driving instructor and he was not consistent with his moods.
I had to reschedule a driving lesson and the same secretary said «we will contact you about reschedule». A week and a half with no call. I had to call again and ask. Seriously?
After my ⁴⁄₅^th lesson (I signed up for 9), I took the 5 hour class. The reason why I’m mentioning this is because after signing my signature, the guy clearly said «We will call you to tell you when your road test is». They didn’t call for 3weeks. When I got fed up with waiting, I called and asked when is my road test. It was THAT MONDAY. I was absolutely furious. I began to lose it and I demanded they move my test. I had to wait another fxckin month.
But I passed my test. I guess that’s all that matters.
I will never recommend autocraft to anyone.

I agree totally with the post above. The same thing happened to me. The instructor covered 3-​point turns and parallel parking on my LAST TWO LESSONS (OF 12!!!). But it gets better. He suggest i get more lessons (which i did) only to STILL no cover them properly. After driving other cars i can tell you the cars at autocraft are far from the best and may leave you heavy footed (had to adjust to this when i changed schools). I would recommend this school to someone that ALREADY knows how to drive and just need to refresh themselves (they do have the best prices in queens), but for instruction GO ELSEWHERE.

Staff is nice and helpful, and their cars aren’t too bad.
However, the instructor they sent me was a different story… he was extremely distracting during driving, didn’t teach me a whole lot even in 7 lessons with him (in fact, when I went to take the road test I felt completely lost and nervous as hell because I didn’t know what I was doing, not good). He didn’t go through parallel parking/​broken U-​turns until I had 2 lessons left. He was a very nice guy and always early for lessons, but not a good teacher at all.
I’ve heard wonderful reviews about their other instructors though, so if I were to go back to this school, I would request a different instructor.

The staff continues to be very helpful and communicative.
I stand by my description of my particular driving teacher as ‘professional’ but I don’t know that I would call her ‘nice’ — she can be quite harsh… but I appreciate the honesty. I think with something important like learning to drive I would rather know the honest truth about my skills (or lack thereof) than have things sugar-​coated.
Definitely a good driving school.