Access Training News | Trade & Training Blog

At the beginning of 2016, TATA Steel announced its plans to cut 1,050 jobs from Steelworks across the UK, including 750 at the Port Talbot works . The Indian based company was reported to be making losses of £1 million a day in the UK, and this increasingly worsening situation has since escalated into a large-scale disaster in recent months. More...

15Jun2016

How to Survive the Collapse of the Steel Industry

Rhys construction

Sometimes overlooked in favour of other trade professions, the ability to professionally install tiles is a valuable skill that can open up a variety of opportunities if you are a business owner or tradesperson. Tiles are an extremely popular choice of surface in household renovations, particularly in kitchens and bathrooms where they are commonplace and are even growing in popularity. The ability to offer a professional, polished tile installation is the ideal compliment to any current skills you may possess, as well as being a great starting point to a professional trade career or progression into other skilled fields.

As well as being particularly beneficial to tradespeople, learning how to install tiles can also be tremendously useful for homeowners and property developers looking to improve their DIY ability. If you are keen to save money on the cost of hiring professional installers, you may find that our DIY Tiling Course or Essential Tiling Course could prove to be a fantastic investment over time. This grants you with the ability to oversee tiling work according to your own preferences and in your own time, allowing you to purchase and install your tiles without the need to accumulate added labour costs.

Who can our Tiling Courses Benefit?

Plumbers - If you work as a plumber or own your own plumbing business, being able to perform professional tiling jobs could massively benefit the range of work you are able to undertake. This would allow you to add another service to your portfolio when performing bathroom installations, and will enable you to complete a full installation without the need for hiring external assistance.

Landlords/Homeowners - If you are a homeowner looking to renovate your home on a budget, it is well worth learning to how do so from experienced professionals. This will give you a lasting range of skills that you may call upon when you wish to update your home, saving the time and expense of hiring a labourer. It could also greatly benefit landlords looking to save money on their rented properties, by granting them the ability to perform updates and repairs without added expense.

Plasterers/Decorators etc - If you already work in a related field of home renovation but have little to no experience of installing tiles, it can be a great way to enhance your skillset, and thereby expand the range of work you are able to perform.

Total Beginners - If you're looking for a route into a career as a professional tradesperson, tiling makes a great starting point. Not only does it allow you to seek work on a self-employed/hired basis straight away, it also makes a fantastic starting point for those looking to progress into other training courses.

To view our full range of tiling courses, click here.

If you have any further questions about a specific tiling course, or about some of our other training courses, contact the Access Training team today!

07Apr2016

Expand Your Skills With an Access Training Tiling Course

kris

Earlier today, George Clarke, a TV personality best known for presenting Restoration man, and George Clarke’s Amazing places posted a tweet raising awareness of the critical skills shortage we are currently experiencing in the UK Construction Industry.

To say that this tweet received some interesting reply s on how people thought the industry could change to help encourage more people into learning a skilled trade.

"The wage is shocking"

Some people responded by saying that the wages for skilled workers are poor, and that the wage needs to increase to encourage more people to train. This is a common misconception about skilled work. When you are a fully trained electrician, plumber or bricklayer, you could be earning up to £100,000 per year, well above the national average wage of £26,500.

"People are being encouraged to go to university instead of learning a trade"

Other people were voicing concerns over the fact that children are being encouraged to go to university instead of learning a practical trade. However, not everybody wants to attend university. Many people don’t like the idea of carrying on their education for an extra 3 or 4 years, to then leave with an extraordinary amount of debt and not have a guaranteed job at the end of it all.

By informing children that there are other routes to work, and well-paid work, we might add. Is a crucial step that needs to be taken to close the current skill gap. This will only happen if the education system and the construction industry come together to help educate the next generation. This is a topic we have written about in the past, and it is certainly an area leaders of the construction industry are keen to explore to see if more can be done to help raise awareness and educate children, not just at school leaving age, but throughout their time in education about the importance of skilled trade’s people.

"You can't get stable work"

This is another misconception about skilled trade work. Plumbers and Electricians, be it domestic or commercially trained, are always in demand. People are always going to need plumbers and electricians to help them out in an emergency, or need an electrician to wire a newly built house. To increase your chances of winning work over your competitors, you can easily expand your skill set so you can take on more specialist jobs, or a wider variety of work.

Currently the industry is is crying out for more Plumbers, Electricians and bricklayers that the chance of you landing a contract shortly after you have completed your course, is incredibly high. Thus making this the perfect time to begin learning a trade.

Here, at Access Training we offer a variety of courses for people who are looking to learn a trade. All of our courses are designed for the complete beginner, and will take you on a journey through to becoming a true industry expert. So if you are interested in becoming a Bricklayer, Electrician or a Plumber, don't hesitate to get in touch!

05Apr2016

Channel 4 Presenter Calls for “More Brickies, Plumbers and Electricians”

dwadmin access training courses

If you're a budding gas engineer, you'll need ensure that you undergo an ACS assessment to obtain the qualifications you require to join the Gas Safe Register; an obligation for all UK installers. This ACS certification demonstrates a level of competence necessary to become Gas Safe registered. Qualified installers will also have to renew their qualifications periodically in order to remain on the register, and to ensure that they are following the latest regulations.

Here at Access Training we provide a number of courses that include an ACS certification, allowing Gas Engineers to practice their trade safely and responsibly. This accreditation can be completed as a stand-alone qualification or as part of our full gas training packages, simply select your required assessment format from the range of options below:

Separate ACS Certifications:

ACS Initial Assessment

This assessment package is able to offer you a choice of the following:

Initial CCN1 only
Initial CCN1 + 1 appliance
Initial CCN1 + 2-4 appliances

ACS Gad Reassessment

If you're an experienced installer looking to renew your qualifications, we will be able to offer you a range of reassessment packages from the following:

CCN 1/CPA 1: Core gas safety - Up to 5 days
CCN 1+4: Core sas safety + 4 appliances (inc CPA1) - Up to 5 days
CENWAT 1: Central heating boilers - Maximum 1 day
CKR 1: Domestic cookers - Maximum 1 day
HTR 1: Gas fires and wall heaters - Maximum 1 day
MET 1: Meters - Maximum 1 day

Full Gas Training Packages:

Professional Gas Engineer Course

This bespoke course allows you to gain the skills and knowledge required to become a professional gas engineer, providing you with opportunities to train in areas including ventilation, appliances, safety legislation, and more! It also includes a guaranteed work placement opportunity, providing you with first-hand experience of the industry and a competitive advantage upon entering the industry.

Premier Gas Engineer Course

This advanced course provides candidates with a thorough knowledge of gas work and theory, while also including electrical wiring and circuit training for the installation of power for gas boilers, along with other similar tasks. As part of this course, you will gain recognized qualifications in both gas and electrical work, allowing you to complete a wider range of operations on completion of the course.

Premier Plumbing Course

This course is ideal for beginners who wish to qualify as a professional plumber and heating engineer in a single course, providing candidates with all the essential qualifications required to enter the trade. Offering a combination of plumbing, gas and electrical accreditations, this programme is ideal for those hoping to seek a wide variety of work.

If you have any further questions about completing the ACS certification with us, or if you would like to find out more about our trade professional courses, please feel free to get in touch.

You can also keep up-to-date with the latest trade news by following us on Twitter!

04Apr2016

ACS Certification With Access Training

dwadmin

While we often discuss the need for skilled tradespeople in the context of the UK skills shortage, it is refreshing to be able to encourage people into the industry for more positive reasons; namely the demand and profit currently being witnessed by UK businesses. Today, BDaily reported that 2016 has been a great year for UK tradespeople so far, with revenue increasing due to the high demand being witnessed by companies, particularly in areas such as house-building.

Thanks to the regular requirement of their services, companies have found that they are not experiencing 'dry patches' without work, and are in-fact, having to extend their waiting lists to keep up with enquiries. Thanks to this demand, employers within these sectors are able to take on more staff, with 24% agreeing that they expect to do so this year. Thanks to these positive predictions, tradespeople are also feeling more contented with their industry prospects and work life, with a whopping 91% reporting this to be true.

With the demand for work growing, and employers offering new, exciting opportunities on a regular basis, now is the perfect time to enter into a trade profession. Not only will you have access to a wide range of employers, you will also gain the opportunity to choose from a variety of working environments, from large operations to smaller enterprises in the residential sphere. Right now, there are a fantastic set of work prospects waiting to be taken advantage of, whether you see yourself as a future business owner, a self-employed freelancer or simply a regular trade employee. Whatever your ambitions may be, the best way to gain access to this flourishing field is to gain the best training possible, in order to lay steady foundations for your future career.

At Access Training, we provide a wide range of courses to cover every experience level, from total beginners to trade professionals. Whether you're looking to change your career completely, refresh your skills, or add another skill to your portfolio in order to seek a wider range of work, we have the resources to support you through your transition. (refresh know) We offer a selection of courses in all the key trades, from plumbing and electrical to bricklaying and carpentry, as well as many more!

To explore our full range of courses, click here, or get in touch with us for more information and guidance!

For more industry news updates, follow us on Twitter.

31Mar2016

2016 Shaping up to be a Busy Year for UK Tradespeople

Mark

what qualifications do i need to become an electrician

If you're thinking about becoming an electrician, you might be wondering what qualifications you need to be an electrician. Here at Access Training, we can provide all the right qualifications you’ll need to become an electrician. Read on to find out more.

More...

30Mar2016

What Qualifications Do I Need to Be an Electrician?

kris electrical

Learn a new trade

If you have been feeling unfulfilled in your current career or job position, maybe you have been thinking about a change for a while, but have never got round to actually taking any action.here at Access Training we aim to make it as easy as possible to find and enrol onto your perfect trade training course.

To help make finding your course even easier, we have designed a new course finder feature on our homepage. All you have to do is simply select which trade you are interested in learning and you will be taken to the relevant course page. For instance, if you are interested in beginning a new career as a plumber, click “plumber” on the course finder and it will take you to our “train to become a plumber” page, on which you will find all the courses we have available, along with a detailed description for each course.

At Access Training, we specialise in delivering top quality trade training courses. If you have little to no experience in your chosen trade, then do not worry, or training courses are designed specially to turn the complete novice into an expert in the shortest time possible.

What courses do we offer at Access Training?

Plumber

If you are interested in becoming a professional plumber we can help. For the complete novice, we offer 3 courses all offering varying levels of qualifications. If you would like to be a Domestic Plumber, then our Essential Plumbing Course is perfect for you. You will learn all the fundamental skills and theory that you will need to become a plumber, and upon completion you will be awarded a city and guilds plumbing qualification.

For the more ambitious, we offer more comprehensive plumbing courses, our Professional Plumbing Course where you will learn the basics and work towards your NVQ Level 2 in plumbing and Heating, allowing you to take more advanced work after completion. Finally, our Premier Plumbing Course, which will not only train you as a plumber, but you will also train to be a qualified gas engineer.

Electrical Courses.

Like the plumbing courses above, we offer a range of Electrical courses for all you budding electricians out there. If you are a complete beginner, with little to no knowledge in electrics and would like to learn the basics of electrical work, and gain essential qualifications, then our Essential Electrical course is perfect for you. In this short course you will learn the 17th edition electrical regulations, and Part P Domestic Electrical Installer.

Again, if you would like to take on more advanced work after you become a fully trained electrician, our Professional Electrical Course, upon completion of this course you will be efficient in domestic installation jobs and you will become qualified to inspect and test commercial, domestic or industrial electrical installations. Throughout this course you will also gain 5 industry qualifications.

If you are looking to become an electrician, our Premier Electrical Course, is rivalled by none. Upon completion of the Premier Electrical Course, you will be an expert in both domestic and commercial electrical work, and gain 6 essential industry qualifications including, Part P, 17th edition, PAT testing, Inspection and Testing, Periodic inspection and testing, and Design, Erection and Verification qualifications.

Gas Engineer

Here at Access Training we are incredibly proud of the quality of the courses that we provide to our students, across a range of disciplines. As well as Plumbing and Electrical courses, we also offer a range of Gas Engineering courses. These courses are ideal if you are a plumber looking to develop your skill set or if you are a complete beginner who would like to become a gas engineer.

If you are interested in learning the fundamentals of Gas Engineering, or you are looking for a refresh course, then our Essential Gas Course is the perfect course for you. Here you will learn the basics such as, practical skills, understanding installations, how to repair, service and maintain gas boilers, and much more!

If you want to become a fully qualified gas engineer, we offer our Professional Gas Course which will equip you with all the advanced knowledge you need to succeed in this field. We will also help you work towards your ACS Certificate. Our Premier Gas Course will not only train you to become a fully qualified Gas engineer, you will also be able to install and maintain electrical appliances.

We also offer a range of construction courses, here at access training, including;

If you are interested in enrolling onto any of our courses, or would like any information about the courses we offer, please get in touch!

29Mar2016

How to Learn a New Trade with Access Training

dwadmin access training news

A UK engineer has created innovative new software to help plumbers with dyslexia, after he noticed a need for the product when aiding plumbers with heat-loss calculations. The software, called Heat Engineer, is designed to enable plumbers to work out calculations of heat-loss quickly and efficiently, without the need for external help.

Although this is hugely beneficial for plumbing as whole, the fact that it can be adapted especially for people who suffer from dyslexia means that it will not only improve and simplify the day-to-day lives of current tradespeople, but will also pave a more inviting pathway for the plumbers of the future. To help combat the difficulties experienced by plumbers with dyslexia, the app allows them to change the colour, size and font of the text, as well as other elements, allowing them to adapt it to fit their particular needs. This is a massive step forward not only for plumbing-specific technology, but for apps in general, as it directly combats a common difficulty that isn't often awarded much attention in mainstream culture.

Another encouraging aspect of this development, is that it has the potential to draw more people to the profession, due to the fact that they will not feel intimidated or held-back by their struggles with dyslexia. In fact, individuals with the problem can often find themselves thriving in a hands-on career such as plumbing, which means that the industry's talent pool will also be all the better for it.

At Access Training, we aim to take on a variety of candidates regardless of their background or experience level, an approach we believe is essential in ensuring that we create a compassionate and diverse pool of trade professionals. Our experienced tutors have years of professional experience, and are able to offer a flexible programme of work to suit the candidate's individual needs. Due to our student to tutor ratio, you will also be given the opportunity to have one-on-one supervision and guidance, which is ideal for candidates how may find some of the written aspects of the courses more complicated.

If you would like to become a plumber, and feel that Access Training's courses could be for you, then please feel free to get in touch with us today! As we mentioned previously, we are dedicated to providing a flexible service, and would be happy to discuss any concerns or requirements you may have.

For the latest updates in the world of trade professions and about our courses, follow us on Twitter!

24Mar2016

New Software for Plumbers Suffering With Dyslexia

nathan

In the UK we are in the midst of uncertain times. Are we going to stay in the EU? What impact will it have on the trade industry if we leave the EU? Plus other factors including the slowdown in growth of china’s economy and the falling costs in oil prices due to the increase of oil being produced by the US.

There are many theories suggesting that if the UK leaves the EU, then our construction industry will begin struggling because here in the UK, we rely heavily on people from Eastern Europe to come and work on our construction sites. In fact we mentioned in a past blog post that many sites will not be able to meet their deadlines, or even function without Eastern European people.

However, a recent survey conducted by Construction News, states that over 2016 53 per cent of companies who took part in the survey were planning on actually increasing their work force. The remaining 47 per cent said that they were planning on maintaining their current workforce levels. Surprisingly none of the companies that participated in the survey anticipated a reduction in their current workforce.

The current forecast for the construction industry is that there will be steady growth over the next few years. Our government has clearly stayed committed to building new homes, building new developments, and revamping tired looking city centres, coupled with high levels of domestic demand for tradespeople, the future is certainly looking positive for the tradespeople of the UK.

Because we are experiencing a national skills shortage, people will be recruiting more this year to help fill the gap, whether there UK leaves the EU or not. So, in our minds, and the minds of all of our students here at access training, there has never been a better time to change your career and train to become a Plumber, Electrician, Bricklayer or a Carpenter.

If you are interested in learning more about our trade courses, feel free to contact us today!

23Mar2016