If you're considering a trainer that still provides 'in-centre' days as part of their program, then listen to these hassles encountered by many students:

- Constant driving or public transport - hundreds of miles most times.

- Getting time out of work - most trainers can only give Monday to Friday workshop availability and often group days together in a clump. This is generally difficult for those of us who work for a living, even more so if you include the travel time on top.

- And let's not overlook the lost holiday days. We typically get 4 weeks annual leave. If half is given up to classes, then we haven't got much left for ourselves.

- Training classes invariably become over subscribed.

- A lot of students are trying to maintain a quick pace, but some need a more gentle learning curve and not be forced to adopt an uncomfortable speed for them. This generates tension and bad atmosphere in most cases.

- Many trainees report that the (not inconsiderable) costs of all the travelling back and forth to the training venue and paying for food and accommodation gets very expensive.

- Training privacy can be high on the list of priorities to quite a lot of students. Why would you want to give up any possible promotions, salary hikes or success with your current employer just because you're retraining. If your work discovers you're putting yourself through qualification in another area entirely, what will they think?

- Surely, all of us at some time have avoided posing that question we were dying to ask, just because we wanted to maintain the illusion that we did, in fact, understand?

- For those who have work away from home, you now have to deal with the fact that classes sometimes become impossible to get to - unfortunately however, they've already been paid for.

Why don't you watch on-screen and study with industry specialists one-to-one via videoed modules, doing them at your convenience - not somebody else's. Study at home on your computer or use your laptop to enjoy the sun. Any questions that pop up, just logon to the 24x7 support facility (that we hope you'll insist on with any technical courses.) Classes and lessons can be repeated whenever you feel you need to - repetition aids memory. And note-taking is a thing of the past - everything is already ready to go. Basically: You save on money, time, hassle and altogether avoid polluting our environment.

Don't forget: a course itself or a qualification isn't the end-goal; a job that you want is. A lot of colleges seem to over-emphasise the certificate itself. It's common, for example, to obtain tremendous satisfaction from a year of studying and then find yourself trapped for decades in a career that does nothing for you, as a consequence of not performing some quality research when you should've - at the outset.

Set targets for what you want to earn and how ambitious you are. Sometimes, this affects which qualifications you'll need to attain and what industry will expect from you in return. We advise all students to speak to an experienced advisor before deciding on their study course. This is essential to ensure it contains the commercially required skills for the chosen career.

We can all agree: There really is pretty much no personal job security now; there's really only industry and business security - as any company can drop any single member of staff when it fits the business' trade needs. Security can now only exist through a fast rising market, driven by a shortfall of trained staff. It's this alone that creates just the right background for a secure marketplace - definitely a more pleasing situation.

The computing Industry skills shortfall across the country is standing at approx 26 percent, according to a recent e-Skills survey. To put it another way, this shows that Great Britain can only locate three properly accredited workers for every 4 jobs that exist currently. This one notion alone underpins why the United Kingdom is in need of considerably more trainees to enter the IT sector. Surely, now, more than ever, really is such a perfect time to consider retraining into the IT industry.

Incorporating exams up-front and offering an 'Exam Guarantee' is a common method with a good many training companies. But let's examine why they really do it:

It's very clear we're still paying for it - it's obviously been added into the overall figure from the college. It's definitely not free (it's just marketing companies think we'll fall for anything they say!) For those who want to get a first time pass, then the most successful route is to fund each exam as you take it, focus on it intently and give the task sufficient application.

Shouldn't you be looking to not pay up-front, but at the appropriate time, not to pay any mark-up to a training college, and to do it locally - rather than in some remote centre? Paying upfront for examinations (and interest charges if you're borrowing money) is insane. It's not your job to boost the training company's account with extra money of yours simply to help their cash-flow! Some will be pinning their hopes on the fact that you don't even take them all - then they'll keep the extra money. You should fully understand that re-takes via training course providers with an 'Exam Guarantee' are monitored with tight restrictions. You'll be required to sit pre-tests till you've proven conclusively that you can pass.

With average prices for VUE and Pro-metric exams in the United Kingdom costing around 112 pounds, it makes sense to pay as you go. There's no sense in throwing away maybe a thousand pounds extra at the start of your studies. Consistent and systematic learning, coupled with quality exam simulation software is what will really see you through.

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