Originally Posted by
Buongiorno
I can certainly concur with your assessment of Dauntless replies being "rude". Dauntless was VERY rude regarding my inquiry as I received more of a lecture on etiquette than I did a response to my questions. I initially contacted them because I was favorably impressed with their beautiful website, but thankfully I had not yet spent any money with this company. As a result of the Dauntless unacceptable attitude, I would NEVER recommend Dauntless to anyone. Moreover, they have no telephone support whatsoever and the only way to communicate with them is through a web portal. You cannot actually speak to anyone at Dauntless.
I do however recommend Sheppard Air highly, as they are always courteous, helpful, and available 24/7 by e-mail and phone. Since thankfully avoiding Dauntless, I have instead taken 6 FAA written exams with Sheppard Air and have passed them all first try with the lowest score being 85; and that was for Instrument Rating Airplane. I have been very pleased with Sheppard Air in every respect.
Yes yes... I had a similar experience recently. I studied for my Instrument written using Sheppard and got a 95%
then I studied for the commercial written using Dauntless.
I took the practice test 4 times and scored, 96%, 92%, 98% and 99%
then I went and took the exam and got an 80%!!!
I literally was sitting there taking the test thinking... am I in the right test? did I somehow get the wrong test?
The questions... whole groups of questions... were completely new to me... there were whole subjects I'd not ever covered at all in the Dauntless study..
It was literally the OPPOSITE of the sheppard experience... even after having studied the material so thoroughly and performing so well on the practice tests... I barely passed.
I wrote to the Dauntless folks letting them know and simply telling them what had happened... and I got the EXACT response you talk about here... a defensive and accusatory response telling me I must have done it wrong basically....
I'm going to copy below the note I wrote to them and their response for you to see:
My note:
Hi Tim,
I have now taken the Commercial written and and terribly conflicted with how to proceed. I had been planning a rave review on Dauntless and have been filming as I went through my study. I think I''d mentioned before that I''d studied with Sheppard for the IFR and got a 95%. Well this time I studied with Dauntless and felt like I was totally prepared. I took the practice test 4 times and scored, 96%, 92%, 98% and 99%... and made sure I covered every single category and test question thoroughly.
However, when I got in to the actual test, I immediately started having this awful feeling like I was taking the wrong test. There were not only lots of questions I''d never seen... in fact I''d say at least 80% of the questions I''d never seen... but there were whole categories of questions that were not well covered in my study. I managed an 80%, but that was hugely disappointing considering how well I was scoring on the Dauntless practice tests. When I got home, I looked up some of the test questions and confirmed that there was, in fact, nowhere in the Dauntless prep where those topics were covered.
I was working under the assumption that Dauntless, like Sheppard, contains the actual questions from the tests. I absolutely love the way Dauntless presents the information and feel like Dauntless is superior in every way... EXCEPT that the material you learn with Dauntless isn''t the ACTUAL material you will be tested on and I can''t in good conscience recommend to others that they use the Dauntless system after the experience I had with this particular exam.
I''m conflicted because I really do believe you have created a great system and I want you to do well as a business... I love your log book too... but I am Vlogging about my journey through commercial aviation the undeniable conclusion here is that, in its current form, Sheppard just has a better system for preparing you to pass your written.
I did record that video, talking about my thoughts on all of this... but I wanted to have a conversation with you before I put it out there... I wanted to ask you if you think Dauntless has any interest in updating the question bank to be more in line with the actual test questions the FAA is presenting. I think it''s fair for someone who scored as high as I did on 4 consecutive practice tests to expect better than an 80 on the real test and for there to be no major surprises when you really sit down in the room.
The difference was stark. When I took the IFR test after studying with Sheppard, I blew through it and had almost no surprises. This time, after studying with Dauntless, I literally kept checking to be sure I was taking the correct exam because so much of the material was brand new to me.
I look forward to hearing your thoughts
Cheers
----- THEIR RESPONSE ---------
Please give us specifics about the content you feel we haven''t covered.
Nobody publishes ''actual'' questions. Sheppard lies that they do. Our test banks (and those of our other competitors) are very similar; we both publish actual and ''realistic'' questions. The FAA has been very, very, very clear that they want people to fail who just ''learn the questions.'' The FAA regularly changes the wording, wrong answers, etc in order to make people who ''learn the questions'' fail. This is the correct and proper thing.
"I wanted to ask you if you think Dauntless has any interest in updating the question bank to be more in line with the actual test questions the FAA is presenting. "
This is over the top to put it mildly and, frankly, ridiculous. We had four or five other feedbacks from other users taking the comm airplane test in the last week all scored well (the lowest was a mid 80s). Either you saw a bunch of experimental/ungraded questions or you''re highly overpuffing the exact differences in wording and content that the FAA has intentionally put in in order to prevent "question learners" from succeeding.
There is no great mystery to the FAA commercial or any other learning content. Its published by the FAA along with sample questions and other materials. Our question matches that and we work with several flight schools every week to make sure we''re on course. We are.
Please be more specific when you say ''brand new material.'' honestly, i''m highly, highly skeptical of your report (we''ve heard this sort of tall tale several times before from users over the years - each and every time when we have investigated it, the student was underprepared and or exaggerating / rationalizing their performance.)
Not trying to be harsh on you, but your message, lacking substance, is a red flag for "not this **** again". Again, specifics matter - give us specifics, and we''ll be happy to look into it.
Respectfully
Tim
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I responded with some specifics on the wording and topics I was referring to, as closely as I could remember... giving them a few examples
Their response
Hi Russell,
We checked with the FAA. the two questions you mentioned were experimental questions the FAA was trialling from the emergency procedures section of the airplane flying handbook and were not graded on your exam.
Good luck
Steve
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... which of course doesn't account for how I missed so many questions... enough to get an 80%
And keep in mind... I got 95% on the IFR written after studying with Sheppard... and the IFR written is WAY more difficult
So yeah... I wanted to love Dauntless.... but it's clear from this experience that no matter how well you learn the material they present, there's no guarantee that you will have covered the actual material that's going to be on the test
and it's also clear that they have a SERIOUS customer service issue and an inability to listen to their customers who are actually out there taking the test. With that attitude it doesn't surprise me that they are so out of touch with the ACTUAL material that's being presented on the commercial written.