Greene King Pub Partners NCPLH BIIAB Licensee Course

When working in the Licensed Trade it is pretty vital that you attend a Personal Licence Holders course to be able to serve and sell alcohol to the public. Whether you work in a pub, supermarket or restaurant, the designated premises supervisor must be licenced. So, I felt it was about time I attended a course to ensure a proper qualification, to enable me to apply for a Personal Licence. I choose the BIIAB Level 2 National Certificate for Personal Licence Holders course run by Greene King Pub Partners at their training centre in Bury St. Edmunds, Suffolk. When applying I was very encouraged by the professional approach, which gave me detailed instructions regarding course content, preparation and route to the venue. I was also sent a BIIAB handbook containing detailed information to ensure all areas of the Personal Licence Certification were covered. The training co-ordinator suggested in her letter to read through the book prior to the 1-day course and exam.

The 1-day course itself was bitterly disappointing, though, because the tutor decided that everyone should have read through the handbook (some of the candidates hadn't) and therefore continued with ploughing through 130 'mock' exam questions to see who gave the correct answer and who didn't. The style of tutoring was very poor; the tutor poking fun out of people's circumstances, names or age. In fact he was a thoroughly dislikable character. Patronising and authoritarian. Once the questions were completed, we had lunch and if we had any queries or questions we could do so during lunch. Revision was 15 minutes after lunch and the actual exam after that, 15 minutes early. Any questions raised were dealt with with the shortest possible answer, and at no time were candidates encouraged to engage in a discussion. To save time, I suppose.

I am self-employed and £153.00 for a 1-day course at this caliber is truly poor value for money. I could have easily read through the handbook a few times (I only read through it once) and just sat an exam to get the same result. Although I am confident I have passed the exam, it is by no means due to the 1-day course tutoring.