I am happy to speak on the phone, email or via posts to try and help anyone who has a problem or difficulty that I may be able to assist with. And thanks to those who have taken the trouble to acknowledge that.
All I am doing with Advantage is a handfull of candidates a year which fill in my little gaps. As a result, the candidate receives the same standard of training as anyone who comes direct.
If I was to withdraw my tiny contribution, it wouldn’t make scrap of difference - - except that those few candidates would be sent elsewhere and get inferior training.
I don’t feel I have to continue to defend my stance on this. It’s clear that Advantage is a broker who is not in business for the quick “take the money and run”. I would still prefer the industry not to have brokers and for everyone to go direct - but welcome to the real world.
It is a little sad that Peter is taking any flak at all on this thread. As usual he is being honest and making people aware what he is doing. There are no victims here. The candidates enter into an agreement with Advantage with their eyes wide open, and in fact probably get a better deal than going to some tin pot trainer that may be cheaper. Peter is providing the same service he would to anyone else and Advantage are doing their own reputation no harm by having customers that are ultimately satisifed. WIN WIN WIN
As for the constant critisism of brokers, and I say this from someone that has no dealings with them, we all use brokers as part of everyday life. Do you call the hotel in Spain and arrange a room or use a travel agent (broker) ? Do you use go compare or compare the market etc or phone the insurance company direct (broker) ? Even buying a house is done through a broker.
it is easy being a board member and getting unlimited free advice about every tiny aspect of passing the LGV but not everyone knows about this site. Those people have to make a tough choice about who to book a course with. They have never done it before and will never do it again. Perhaps if the training providers had better websites and spent the thousands on Google Adwords that the brokers do there would not be any brokers. But trainers are good at training and brokers are good at marketing.
So good luck Pete I say. If you dont train enough people by whatever method you find them you will not be around and the many people who benefit from your normally wise words will lose out.
I think good on you Pete for having after nailing the bad brokers on some of these posts, can also step up and say SOME of them do actually do as promised. some of them do try to actually give a service, (and granted exploit a market, but that’s business). He was only trying to give credit where its due after giving bad press on brokers.
I’m sure he’ll correct me if I’m wrong but I think Pete still doesn’t like brokers, the same as we don’t like driving agencies. but to get the work and especially the dreaded first 2 years experience we sometimes have to use them.
I feel I just have to say I agree with the last post by John, and to sort of play ‘devils advocate’ for one minute, point out (as Peter & John correctly did) these brokers are a fact of life (whether you like it or not) and no doubt spend a lot more on advertising than any training school can. I understand some even provide help in getting a job afterwards (although I have no experience of this and don’t know how successful they are in doing so).
Please note I done my Cat C direct in 2004 and am currently doing my C+E direct, so I am not trying to defend anyone, just playing devils advocate!
ok here goes , i did my training with them 2 months ago and here is a breakdown of the good and the bad the truth , i called and the salesman made its sound amazing as salesmen do told me they would get me a job no bother after i passed but im not daft and new this would not be the case class 2 cost me 1598 including medical and theory , bad bits they told me i could pay it monthly i payed a deposit of 300 pounds one week later they emptied my bank account for the rest without permission .bounced my mortgage my bills aswell , when i rang they didnt want to know they just bluffed it . another bad point they told me id get a medical then said i would have to pay it myself i kicked off and they paid it …apart from that i got my theory and passed i then had to wait 6 weeks for my driving i went to gtg glasgow did 4 days then passed they told me i would get 2 days cpc that was november this is booked for feb 2012 , i cant get a job ive tryed but i wont give up , i read forums and reports that they wouldnt come up with training , but they did so there are goods and bads to this company but all of them are , , as for peter on this forum doing a weee back track thats ok he has bills to pay and they send work his way good on him if anyone needs more help i will help if you ask me …
Hi. Please believe me when I say I’m not being sarcastic, bitchy or anything else. Simply curious. Why did you book with them to start with? Had you called any other trainer?
I am just so curious to find out what the broker apparently has that a trainer hasn’t. If you can help with this I would be grateful.
Having looked on the advantage website , it says that all training consists of 5 FULL days , so you get 40 hours training do you ?, sounds like good value to me (if that was the case )
If that was the case id book peters training school thru advantage
i was monday to friday but had my test at 8 .45 on friday morning so no driving before test all in all i reckon i had about 18 hours as there was two of us in cab
Peter Smythe:
I am just so curious to find out what the broker apparently has that a trainer hasn’t. If you can help with this I would be grateful.
craigiej:
they told me i could pay monthly peter thats all i dint have the cash at the time ,
Perhaps any person that has used a broker could give the main reasons they choose them over a trainer directly. I would guess the most likely reasons would be:-
a) You can pay in installments - Not many providers offer this. We take the view that if the banks wont lend them money why not ? and therefore how can we.
b) They appear to have centres local to most people - Few training providers have more than 1 location. Even the best ones
c) They appear to have job contacts afterwards - Not many training companies can help out much in this important area
d) They seem to be a 1 stop shop that takes care of everything - Many trainers just send the forms out and let the customer get on with booking a medical and theory etc
e) People feel reassured by a company that looks large - some training providers have very poor or even no website and do not really instill much confidence in a potential customer
Training providers offer far better value for money and most offer a good professional service but customers often don’t know or feel that prior to making a booking. Brokers tell people what they want to hear. The customer has already decided to do a course, the brokers tell them why they should choose them.
Perhaps some trainers should form a kind of syndicate with only 1 in each part of the county and attempt to address some of the points above. By offering a minimum agreed standard and by centralising some of the admin and advertising costs they might break the brokers hold on the system.
Perhaps some trainers should form a kind of syndicate with only 1 in each part of the county and attempt to address some of the points above. By offering a minimum agreed standard and by centralising some of the admin and advertising costs they might break the brokers hold on the system.
I was very enthusiastic about such a scheme recently. It died a death as trainers wouldn’t invest in it. So , in a sense, some trainers only have themselves to blame.
LGVTrainer:
Perhaps some trainers should form a kind of syndicate with only 1 in each part of the county and attempt to address some of the points above. By offering a minimum agreed standard and by centralising some of the admin and advertising costs they might break the brokers hold on the system.
LGVTrainer:
Training providers offer far better value for money and most offer a good professional service but customers often don’t know or feel that prior to making a booking. Brokers tell people what they want to hear. The customer has already decided to do a course, the brokers tell them why they should choose them.
When you advertise that there are (allegedly) 30,000 vacancies paying £500pw begging to be filled by qualified drivers, then it appears to me that they’re aiming to attract people who haven’t necessarily thought of LGV driving as a career yet.
As has been said before, I feel that brokers & especially the dodgy ones, act as a kind of ‘Darwinism’ filter. Anyone who can easily allow themselves to be ripped off by as much as £2-£3k really shouldn’t be left in solo charge of a 44ton vehicle with a £1/2 million payload !
So from the guy that has organised his training through advantage he has been lied to by the salesman to get his money. All these brokers do is tell people what they want to hear so by the looks of it advantage are no better than the others.
I feel that Peter should stick to his principals and not sell out. If they put a few through then you will not miss it and then make the brokers life a little harder.
One day the brokers will go because it is clear that the only way they can make money is by ripping people off.
I would go as far as saying that a trainer supplying these brokers is only one step away from the broker in moral standards. At the end of the day is it not aiding and abetting in the scam?
Chas:
As has been said before, I feel that brokers & especially the dodgy ones, act as a kind of ‘Darwinism’ filter. Anyone who can easily allow themselves to be ripped off by as much as £2-£3k really shouldn’t be left in solo charge of a 44ton vehicle with a £1/2 million payload !
Chas:
As has been said before, I feel that brokers & especially the dodgy ones, act as a kind of ‘Darwinism’ filter. Anyone who can easily allow themselves to be ripped off by as much as £2-£3k really shouldn’t be left in solo charge of a 44ton vehicle with a £1/2 million payload !
People don’t know. They lose their jobs, they have some small redundancy payment, they do their best to try to get back into work and they trust the national newspaper in which the broker advertises.
burnie1:
I feel that Peter should stick to his principals and not sell out. If they put a few through then you will not miss it and then make the brokers life a little harder.
Would you take work from a broker if your company was going through a quiet time ?
( if fact,any trainer can feel free to answer this )
OK. Let’s turn this thing on it’s head. As suggested, I started dealing with Advantage when the recession kicked in - - we have bills to pay and principles (important as they are) don’t pay the rent.
It’s well documented that I’m not keen on brokers.
I prefer not to have odd gaps in my schedules. Running a DSA Accredited Centre with a fleet of new trucks and fully qualified instructors and having tests at our private test centre all comes at a cost.
This is a question for the Mods. Is there a way that these odd gaps could be offered to Trucknet members at a good price? If that were the case then I wouldn’t need to use a broker to fill the gaps and Trucknet members would get a special deal for short notice bookings. That’s surely a win/win? Remember, we’re only talking a handfull of gaps a year. Or maybe that crosses the advertising line.
.bounced my mortgage my bills aswell , when i rang they didnt want to know they just bluffed it . another bad point they told me id get a medical then said i would have to pay it myself i kicked off and they paid it …apart from that i got my theory and passed i then had to wait 6 weeks for my driving i went to gtg glasgow did 4 days then passed 
they told me i would get 2 days cpc that was november this is booked for feb 2012 , i cant get a job ive tryed but i wont give up , i read forums and reports that they wouldnt come up with training , but they did so there are goods and bads to this company but all of them are , 
, as for peter on this forum doing a weee back track thats ok he has bills to pay and they send work his way good on him 
, so you get 40 hours training do you ?, sounds like good value to me (if that was the case 
)