my riding school is awful

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Emily Jones

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I didn’t know which thread to put this in but anyway.
I only started at this riding school a couple months ago and it’s so different to my old one everything is done differently, the riding instructor is very off and usually on her phone, I always ask before doing some things as everyone does things differently but she just seems rude or maybe that’s just how she is.
Some days I’ll have the best time and some I want to quit riding altogether.

It’s £22 a half hour lesson which is fair enough but at the start it was private and now I’m with 4 others and I’m not learning anything. She says it’s to help my riding concentrating on my position and letting the horse have a lead but I’m sure that 4 horses don’t need to help mine out. I honestly just think she’s lazy and makes more money at once! And this isn’t even the weirdest bit... I like to help out as well as ride and it cost MORE MONEY to help her out! It’s £25 for the morning and £27 for the day to muck out and make hay nets and she just fits my lesson around her shedule, I never get to jump, ever even though I know how! I also found out that to loan a horse there (it’s sort of a general loan) it’s £350 A MONTH! You can go whenever you want but doesn’t offer hacks and the girls who lead my lessons ( riding in front) are the ones paying the money, she just fits them in around her time so then she doesn’t pay attention to me in lesson she’s either on her phone or correcting others!

Sorry for the rant but I just don’t know what to do? Im 15 almost 16 by the way and I already know I don’t really enjoy jumping (really bad fall knocked my confidence) and I just don’t like it tbh, I just like to go out for a hack nothing proffesional but don’t even do that now.

So, I need advice is it just me who thinks this is ridiculous or do you think so to? Do you think a share is a better idea for the time being as I have been looking for a full loan but I feel like I’m wasting money on lessons at the moment? The only reason I help is because my mum says before I get a loan she says I need more experience even though she knows I’m capable!
Thanks for reading this anyway if you even got this far!
 
It sounds very cheap to me. Which probably means the instruction isn’t much good.
Why not find a better riding school if you aren’t happy?
 
Thanks for the reply but there aren’t any good ones in my area, this was supposed to be the best! One of the others I went to was £16 lesson (no option for private) and 8 untrained angry ponies, it was a nightmare. Thanks the instructor says she’s BHS qualified but I feel like she might just be bored it’s been open for 30 years and just her by herself teaching lessons!
 
Sorry to hear you are not happy. I would probably go by word of mouth and see if there is anywhere better. You could ask in your local tack shop or if you have any friends who also ride. It may also be worth looking at the regional board for your area on the forum because someone else may have asked the same question and got a few ideas back (don't give your exact location, just the general area).
Good luck in your search.
 
Where in the country are you?

There should be a lesson price list on private, semi private (pairs choosing to ride together) and group. If £22 is the private cost then you should not have others with you. If your RI thinks you would be better in company then she should put you in a group and charge you the group price. I do think group lessons generally are better. My kids never had private lessons until they had their own pony and even then only occasionally to work on something specific. £22 may be the group price and you were on your own at first just because no-one else was around then. So it's not you being cheated now but getting a very good deal at first! But I think you just need to clarify the pricing so you know where you stand.

It is not unusual to pay for pony-care days which does usually does mean a fair bit of mucking out and filling haynets! And later in the season, ragwort picking!! It really depends if you are being taught pony care and stable management as part of something the riding school offers. In which case the prices should be listed with the lesson prices. And while you do some yardwork as part of that you should also be learning new things every time too.

On the other hand casual helping out is not usually charged for. At your age especially.

No matter what you are paying, being ignored while she is on her phone is bad value for money.

If £350 a month to loan includes DIY livery and riding then that sounds like a pretty good option. If that is just the cost of the horse and you need to pay for your livery on top then that would be pretty excessive. Certainly round here anyway.

Keep looking and hopefully you'll find somewhere you are happier. Or you'll settle where you are. Maybe she is bored or maybe she just does not know you are not happy. At my old RS, no comments to one rider just meant they were not doing anything wrong! Can you talk to her about what you want to learn each lesson, ask questions, request feedback etc. It's hard to ignore someone if they are talking to you!
 
My boys have a lesson once a week, we pay £18 each, for an hour, half an hour of getting ponies ready (learning to tack up etc) and half an hour riding (which is usually a bit longer). This is a group of 4/5/6, and usually 2 people instructing (mum and daughter). We moved from another yard which cost £22.50 each for just half an hour. The new cheaper yard gives far better instruction, they are learning to ride properly. Once they are competent they get the chance to share a pony, and get taken to shows every weekend for SJ/AE/HT ETC at all the major show centres (Pyecombe, felbridge etc).
I also got told you can share a horse (hacking etc) for (I think) about £45 a week plus shoes.
Just because it’s more expensive doesn’t mean it’s better.
I believe at this yard it costs
 
Emily Jones said:
It’s £22 a half hour lesson which is fair enough but at the start it was private and now I’m with 4 others and I’m not learning anything.
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Half hour lessons don't seem to me to be worth anything. Once you've spent ten or fifteen minutes warming up and getting the horse in a work frame of mind by doing transitions, you've only got fifteen to twenty minutes left... you're not going to get much improvement in your own strength and stamina, in that time, either.

If you were paying the equivalent of £44 for one-to-one instruction, and now the same for a group lesson, then you' might being ripped off. Or you might have been getting a good deal: it might be that you were paying the group rate, but for a few weeks you were the only person enrolled for that lesson. Find out what the others in the group are paying.

I can't see the rates for under 18s where I ride, but you'd be paying somewhere in the region of €50 (so equivalent to around £44) for a full hour of riding in a group of around eight. There is the option of smaller class sizes, but these aren't available for every time slot, and are about 15% more expensive.

When I write that this is for a full hour of riding, it really is that: we are supposed to arrive half an hour before the lesson to prepare the horse, have a full hour in the saddle, then we're expected to allow half an hour to clean up the horse and tack afterwards

Talking to my daughter who is no longer at the same yard as me (she changed last year to another in the same town), and with other people, that's about the standard way of organising things in our town...

We rarely hack out during class time, now, since a re-organisation of the school (and change of management), but last Sunday we had a two hour long ride through the forest for €25, so the equivalent of about £22.

Emily Jones said:
I like to help out as well as ride and it cost MORE MONEY to help her out! It’s £25 for the morning and £27 for the day to muck out and make hay nets and she just fits my lesson around her shedule, I never get to jump, ever even though I know how!
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I would NEVER expect to be charged for doing manual work around the yard! If you give your time for free to get some experience of working around horses, that's OK. You should also be getting advice and instruction about how to do stuff like check the horses for small injuries like rubs, scrapes, checking for ticks, checking around the stable for damage where a horse has kicked against the masonry or chewed the woodwork, spotting changes in behaviour that could be signs of discomfort or illness.


Emily Jones said:
Sorry for the rant but I just don’t know what to do? Im 15 almost 16 by the way and I already know I don’t really enjoy jumping (really bad fall knocked my confidence) and I just don’t like it tbh, I just like to go out for a hack nothing proffesional but don’t even do that now.
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Maybe the yard is taking advantage of your young age to push you around.

My advice is to shop around all the yards that are within your travelling distance and would fit your routine... Not easy at fifteen, I know, having to rely on lifts from parents or using a bus or bicycle. Get printed prices, and get a contract that states what you're supposed to get for the price you pay.
 
ihatework said:
It sounds very cheap to me. Which probably means the instruction isn’t much good.
Why not find a better riding school if you aren’t happy?
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Gosh I am so out of touch with UK prices. I pay 50 euros + mileage for a John Lyons trainer to visit, he will work with two horses, we used to use him for pre-backing training and long reining. Fifty euros to an Olympic rider to school our mare sessions about 40mins. Thirty euros to a Pro rider for both training and competing.
 
When I was very young we paid for a loan at a riding school, paid separately for lessons and still worked for free 2 days a week plus 2 evenings, leading, tacking up, mucking out etc, the most I got was a £2 tip from one of the kids dads who I used to lead for the lesson.
Now I work at riding schools I find some pay their helpers with lessons but they work very hard all day for it! Some don't and the helpers do it for the love of it!
You may feel you are being taken advantage of but the helpers places where I work are always full, the girls have a great day together and don't want to be anywhere else!
I think its worth looking around at what else is out there but you could try speaking to them first and seeing if you can get a bit more of what you want before you leave?
 
If you are not happy then i would switch schools. Regardless of the price it is supposed to be a hobby, something we do for fun and it sounds like your not having any! Or at least speak to the manager and see if there's anything that can be done if there isn't many options about where you are. At our riding school our lessons are £19 for half an hour private or £19 for the hours group lesson, however if it is quiet and people dont turn up for the group and there is only 1 rider we then just do a half an hour private. We are based in the north west so prices up here tend to be cheaper. We do loads of hacking out especially in today's weather but we are very lucky to have such fantastic hacking on our doorstep.
 
Rollin said:
Gosh I am so out of touch with UK prices. I pay 50 euros + mileage for a John Lyons trainer to visit, he will work with two horses, we used to use him for pre-backing training and long reining. Fifty euros to an Olympic rider to school our mare sessions about 40mins. Thirty euros to a Pro rider for both training and competing.
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You aren’t comparing like for like though. This is a riding school with additional overheads, not just the instruction.
 
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