Poll - JobCentre Plus 'Courses': Useful or Waste of Time?

dickydonkin

I was offered a place on a NVQ assessors course via my jobcentre which I thought would give me a reasonable chance of employment.

At the college, one had to undergo (as did all of the other attendees) a maths and English assessment before I could progress onto the course.

Without being disrespectful, there were people there who were sent by their respective jobcentres who really should not have been there as many fell at the first hurdle - and one of the prerequisites of the course was to have had at least 3 years in their field of experience.

Many attendees commented on the 'standard' of some of the candidates - some of who were just not interested and were sent by the jobcentre when they had no chance of getting onto the course - let alone completing it! What a waste of taxpayers money.

I completed the practical aspect of the course, however, I needed candidates to assess in my subject to gain my NVQ Assessors A1 qualification - unfortunately, the college could not find any - 18 months down the line I am still waiting for my first candidate to assess.

Again, a waste of my time and taxpayers money - but no doubt the college will have got their fee - despite the course not being completed.

BTW - I was not the only one in a similar situation, however, those who were undertaking an assessors course in health & social care seemed to be in demand.

November5th

My advisor told me about the two day a4e course yesterday. It is clear I need no help in job seeking or cv writing and I would only go on it if forced but that it would take two days out of my legitimate job seeking. He backed off.

dark_lady

NO TOILETS. So what happens when people being moved from sickness benefits to JSA get forced on these courses and theres no toilets. If it were me i would have phoned the Environmental Health at the council right in front of them. They treat people like animals then have the nerve to wonder why they behave like them.

jay_1978

Ground work courses ( Which I am on ) are totally useless. I can see the point if you have never worked in your life and are not used to getting into a routine but for someone like myself. I have experience in working so its useless, They send you on placements and the company you are at have no vacancies so you won't get a job with them, If it was a case of knuckle down do your placement and work hard and they will employ you Then I think it would be worth it.

Edinburgh65

Yup Dark Lady, there don't seem to be any toilet facilities in any of the Edinburgh Jobcentres. I was signing on at the largest one, and the advisor told me that they'd had to close the toilets there, because too many people were taking drugs in them.

I do think that the DWP must be breaching people's basic human rights, by requiring them to be in a building with no toilets for lengthy periods of time. It used to take me an hour to get from my house to the Jobcentre, so I used to try not to drink any more than one cup of coffee before setting out. I do wonder how people with health problems manage to get round this issue, if it is the same nation wide.

November5th

Edinburgh65 wrote: »

Yup Dark Lady, there don't seem to be any toilet facilities in any of the Edinburgh Jobcentres. I was signing on at the largest one, and the advisor told me that they'd had to close the toilets there, because too many people were taking drugs in them.

I do think that the DWP must be breaching people's basic human rights, by requiring them to be in a building with no toilets for lengthy periods of time. It used to take me an hour to get from my house to the Jobcentre, so I used to try not to drink any more than one cup of coffee before setting out. I do wonder how people with health problems manage to get round this issue, if it is the same nation wide.

Has anyone noticed they have removed all the clocks as well?

FleetFanatic

I'm on one of these so called 'courses'.

Except it isn't actually a course. I have to go once a fortnight, for 2 hours, during which time I must apply for 6 jobs that can be witnessed by this outside agency, via means of showing an email confirmation, etc. So I spend an hour travelling on top of this, only to do the same job hunting that I do at home. For the record, I am applying for an average of 20 jobs a week, and find myself 'saving some' specifically so I can apply for them during those 2 hours. They proclaim themselves as a training company, but I've seen little evidence of it so far.

Now, there's 20 of us in the session I go to. There's also a session in the morning. 20 in each apparently. That's 40 people, multiplied by 5 days, multiplied by 2 weeks. That's 400 people a fortnight. Multiply this across the country & you can see how much money is being wasted on these so called training companies. But hey, the government is happy as whilst on this 'course' we aren't included in the jobless figures.

I reckon unemployment is nearer 4 to 5 million, as opposed to what the government's official figures state.

BenS1

I went to one of these "back to work" sessions when I first signed on, which was by a provider. 3 months down the line, I had to go on one again, except this time 2 DWP staff were doing presentations. They did their presentation, and then we had to sit through another session by the same provider. Fortunately, one of the provider staff, recognised me and told the DWP staff I didn't need to sit through it as I had done it already.

I too, learnt that I could seperate steps from my job search (I ussually fill in one side a fortnight, even through I do apply for many more.). If anything, they show that your not the only one looking for work.

vburns85

I have attended 2 course's down here in Southampton they all had there good and bad point's, the good points being that I was learning something new to try and help me get work the 1st being BTEC Level 1 in construction (Brickwork) where I done some brickwork, drawings etc... but the problem here is that it has now gone tits up as I passed in October 2010 and was told they were compyling a portfolio for me and would send it through the post, have still not recieved this tried contacting the company (Crescent Training) and it has been taken over by CDG spoke to the manager who reckons that Crescent never had the accreditation to give me certificates in this so now I'm left with 13 weeks of nothing gained, I have since spoken to my Jobcentre (the manager) and he has advised me to write a letter of complaint as he said CDG reckon they arent liable as Crescent went into liquidisation and as far as tehy are concerned its not their problem.

The second course I went on I finished last week it was a 2 week course at Brockenhurst college where it was to get my forklift license, I had to attend for 2 weeks to do CV building and other employability related thing's but I didnt really mind doing this as I am now booked in for 13-16 march to take a 3 day training course and test. The only problem I had with this was that alot of the things covered was what I have done before like they MADE me do a 3 day computer course which was a lower qualification than what I already have which I think is a waste of time for them as well as me.

All in all I think if it helps the person get the qualifications someone needs to get a job then I'm all for it but not silly courses that will do diddly squat for that person!

littlestar1981

Jowo wrote: »

My understanding is that these courses tend to brief and kick in quite some time after the applicant has received JSA.

I haven't even received a letter yet confirming I'm on JSA and I'm booked on a one hour return to work session lasting one hour... this is booked for tomorrow. The advisor in the first JC said this is after 6 weeks, but when I went for my first appointment on Monday she said no I had to book in now.

Apparently it's to remind you of your responsibilities while on JSA and what help there is to find work... you told me all about that on Friday when I went to confirm everything on my claim form was correct, then you told me all that again when I went for my first appointment/signing on Monday (3 days later), do you really think it's necessary for me to be told the same information all over again 3 days later!?!?!

So, just to summarise that.. I applied for JSA one week ago and by the end of tomorrow I'll have made 3 (expensive) trips to the JC to be told the same things by a different person each time. They need to make more effective use of their time I think.

So yes, useless, before I've even been on it. I claimed JSA just for 2 weeks 18 months ago... I've had to claim again starting this week, and OMG in those 18 months the staff in my local JC have gone from human beings to... I can't even find a horrid enough word.