Around mid-summer, we get a lot of people asking if we have any short bookkeeping courses they could complete during a week's leave, and Sage Line 50 courses are in particularly high demand.
We always try to accommodate these potential students even though it gives the centre the feel of a summer migration of accountants and book-keepers enjoying some kind of transhumance. You can almost imagine these earnest professionals coming down from the alpine loftiness of their city offices to graze on the fresh knowledge harvested in our training centres before returning for a winter of serious perusal of balance sheets, Excel-based analysis of projections and calculations and the preparation of final accounts.
Operators of Pitman Training centres, we are best placed to offer such short bookkeeping courses as our methodology is self-paced, meaning there is no need for a timetable, so bookkeepers and accounting professionals alike can drop in as and when they please, a boon on the rare days when the sun appears and warms the green parks around our city centre locations.
Suddenly, the attractions of double entry book-keeping and the nominal ledger are overtaken by the prospect of sunbathing and ice cream in London's Lincolns Inn Fields and Holland Park or the canal banks of Manchester.
The way we teach means it is impossible to miss a class so there is no downside to taking a few hours off for relaxation.
And after all, the duration of our bookkeeping courses ranges from 10 to 30 hours, so it's easy to make up time.
Students new to bookkeeping can begin with a basic bookkeeping course where they will learn the vocabulary of finance, studying the definitions of assets and liabilities, cash accounting and rudimentary balance sheets, or perhaps they'll take a manual payroll course, using the Inland Revenue's tables to calculate wages using real tax codes.
More advanced students may choose a manual bookkeeping course in preparation for subsequent Sage training, putting this ubiquitous software package through its paces en route to producing management accounts.
At the end of their short study period, the reinvigorated students sit their exams before going off on holiday and when they return they learn whether they have achieved a pass, a distinction or a fail.
The successful ones are awarded a nationally recognised Pitman Training certificate as proof of their newly developed skills and one can imagine them re-reading their course materials the evening before returning to work to ensure they are really at the top of their game.
Many will take advantage of our long opening hours including evenings and Saturdays to return to us in the autumn for further study, fitting their training around their working and other commitments.
Those who have previously taken manual bookkeeping courses will progress to Sage Line 50 while those who have already earned their certificates in these subjects will diversify into payroll or Excel training. Many of our bookkeeping and accounting students who have English as a second language will study Effective Business Communication to develop their letter-writing skills while English mother-tongue students will often take our short company law module which explains how to complete the paperwork underpinning the administration process related to Companies House.
But as the winter draws in, the short course seekers drift away, leaving us to focus on our valued diploma students once more, helping these dedicated learners graduate as Accounting Technicians, qualified bookkeepers and ledger clerks.
And months later, when the spring flowers have once again given way to the full bloom of summer, the cycle of short bookkeeping courses in July and August begins again, in a virtual circle of learning.
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Further Information.
To find out more about our bookkeeping courses, call us:
London Notting Hill - 020 7792 5214
London High Holborn - 020 7025 4700
Central Manchester - 0161 923 6814
