Here at Access Training we offer intensive, short-course training in a number of trades and have just over a 95% average pass rate, but one question we’re commonly asked is:

"How can you gain the skills and qualifications in a matter of weeks when an apprenticeship can take up to four years?"

Scepticism is natural, but let us explain how our courses can actually create highly-trained individuals who are enthusiastic about a new career in trade.

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We all want the best for our children, but sometimes academic excellence isn’t always achievable.

Some parents might consider ‘the best’ career to be in medicine, law, dentistry, teaching etc, but that’s not to say that the child wants this future for his or herself. Perhaps your child doesn’t possess the skills and strengths required for that career?

If your child’s strengths suggest that their future ought to take a different direction, inspiring and encouraging them to grow is the healthy way forward.

However, it can be difficult to identify exactly what those strengths are and how they might take shape into a career - perhaps not even the child knows where these hidden skills might lie.

But they are dwelling inside them somewhere, and this article hopes to shed some light on how to get your child onto the right career path. More...

With the Rio Olympics now finished, one can’t help but watch in awe and wonder at the immense scale of such an event. Its worldwide significance is unparalleled - nowhere else on Earth is there to be found an event more significant than the Olympics, with nations around the world uniting to compete in a truly inspiring performance of passion, determination, respect and talent.

The demands for any Olympic hosting nation are extremely high - in 7 years, Brazil have had to complete a staggering amount of preparation for this year’s event, dubbed as ‘the biggest race in Olympic history’ . For a country which has certainly seen its fair share of difficulties in recent years, both politically and socially, and not to mention the recent Zika virus and terrorist threats, the demand could hardly have been higher.

But ultimately, the unsung heroes in making the Olympics a reality were the 90,000 or so tradespeople who were employed to perform a feat just as incredible as any Olympic event: building the Olympics itself. More...

In the UK, a ‘white van man’ is stereotype typically applied to independent tradespeople such as plumbers, electricians or gas engineers. They are often dubbed as being inconsiderate, rude, aggressive, and just generally unpleasant.

It is fair to say that this stereotype has sadly and unfairly tarnished the reputation of tradespeople with the same unfortunate brush. But is it an unfair portrayal? Or are the white van men of Great Britain really just as bad as they’re made out to be?

Here are the most common ‘white van man’ stereotypes that simply aren’t true: More...

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;

• Carpentry courses
• Bricklaying Courses
• Plastering Courses
• Tilling Courses
• Property Developer

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!

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! 

When you finish your chosen courses and become a fully qualified trades-person, your white van and your tools will become your biggest asset! These items do not come cheap and can prove to be quite disruptive to your business if they breakdown, or worse – get stolen.

According to a recent study conducted by ironmongery Direct, 23% tradespeople surveyed have had the unfortunate experience of a van theft, 230 of the 1000 people have experienced theft in the last five years.

Even though it has been reported by the Office for National Statistics that vehicle crime is decreasing, it is not surprising that vans get broken into more than cars, because of the potential of stealing some expensive tools.

Ironmongery Direct also uncovered in their study the regions which received the most break-ins, with the West Midlands coming out on top with a shocking 1,854 van thefts and a total of £6,381,239 stolen in the past 3 years. The region which received the second highest amount of theft is West Yorkshire, with a value of £3,000,925 stolen and 993 vans broken into over the same period.

Meanwhile, tradespeople in Merseyside experienced 653 thefts, 210 in Nottingham and 218 in Northumbria. Surprisingly, the city of London had the lowest amount of van thefts with 2 thefts reported over the last three year period.

As a trades person, your tools and your van are your most valuable assets, so keeping them safe should be your top priority.  Keeping your tools safe could be the difference of you going out to your jobs and earning money, you have to turn jobs down while you spend money getting your tools replaced.

To keep your tools safe, you should;

• take any tools out of your van at the end of your working day,
• park your van in a garage, so that thieves cannot access it,
• install anti-theft boxes in your van with anti-drill locks
• make your van harder to break into – install slam locks, dead locks
• Don’t leave your van unlocked – ever! Opportunistic thieves are always on the lookout!
• Make sure you have tagged all your tools, and
• Place a “No tools are lift in this van” deterrent sticker on the back of your van

Despite all this talk of break-ins, learning a trade can be a very rewarding career. No longer are you confined to the office walls between the hours of 9 and 5:30, doing a job that doesn't motivate you, and the only time you get to go outside is on your half an hour lunch!

Once you have become fully qualified in your chosen area, you can pick up the jobs which you want to do. Fancy a long lunch break, or even the afternoon off? Why not?! As a skilled trades-person, you have the ability to choose when hours you want to work.

Maybe your struggling to get by on £23,000 salary, as a qualified you could be earning up to £30K+ a year! Especially now, as there is currently huge demand for skilled workers, and not enough people to fill the gap! Essentially, if you are willing to put in the long hours, you will be rewarded with a very healthy salary.  Just remember to keep your tools safe!!

If all this talk about theft hasn't deterred you from wanting to learn a trade, click on the links below for more information about the courses that we offer.

• Electrician Courses 
• Plumbing courses 
• Gas Courses
• Carpentry Courses 
• Plastering Courses 
• Tiling Courses
• Bricklaying Courses 
• Painting & Decorating Courses 

A recent survey conducted by Retail Company Screw fix, shows that two out of five tradespeople were giving more quotes for work than a year ago, and more than half of the trades people who took part in the survey said that their business was better than the previous year, in particular, plumbers, electricians and carpenters are extremely optimistic about their business outlook during 2016.

In 2015, the skilled trade industry experienced an increase in demand towards the end of the year, fortunately this trend has continued into 2016, with one in seven tradespeople stating that they have too much work on their books.Most of the tradespeople surveyed said that they expected business to remain at the same level, or improve over the next 12 months.

If you are a regular reader of our blog posts, you will notice that we write about the current skills shortage crisis that we are currently experiencing in the UK regularly. The skills shortage is a huge issue that we are currently facing. Currently in the construction industry alone there is a shortage of 35,000 people, this figure naturally increases when domestic tradespeople are added into the equation.

With the increase in demand, it is apparent that – even though good for plumbers, electricians, gas engineers and carpenters, because it means that there is no shortage of work, potential customers will soon start to run into difficulties being able to find a trades person when they need them the most.

If these projections are correct, then 2016 could mean that many tradespeople may start having to work long hours to keep up with the demand. This means that now is the perfect time for people who are thinking about learning or retraining as a skilled trades person or adding taking courses to develop their existing skill set.

Here at Access Training, we have developed alongside City & Guilds, and other awarding bodies, a wide range of fully comprehensive courses that are suitable for people who have no prior industry experience. Our courses will teach you the very basics, through to the more advanced techniques used by trade professionals. 

To find out more about our plumbing, carpentry or electrical courses, contact us today!

According to the latest figures, the UK's construction workforce has shrunk by 12.9% since 2008. This is particularly strange due to the abundance of work currently available to contractors, which would suggest that the industry in busier than ever, with workers often having to turn down work because they already have an existing contract or promise of work with another employer. In spite of the surge in demand, however, the amount of workers in the industry fell dramatically last year, with 16,000 less people in the profession between 2014 and 2015.