An apprenticeship runs on three sets of promises: your employer’s, ours and yours. All three go into the training plan you sign. This page tells you what each party owes, so you always know what you are entitled to ask for.
These come from the funding rules and the training plan. They are commitments, and you are allowed to quote them.
At least six hours of your paid working week belong to your training. Busy season, staff shortages, big orders: the hours survive all of it, and if they keep vanishing we step in.
A contract of employment, at least the legal minimum for your age and stage, and real work that matches what you are learning. Sweeping up while others train is a breach, and we treat it as one.
Someone at work whose job includes helping you, plus your employer turning up to progress reviews and acting on what gets agreed there.
Hold us to every line of this. We put it on a public page on purpose.
Before you start, we ask how learning gets into your head and we brief your trainer accordingly. Hands-on people get shown. Readers get it in writing. You will not be taught the way school taught you unless school happened to get it right.
A named person who meets you regularly, tracks your progress, catches problems early and prepares you for the final assessment so thoroughly that nothing in it surprises you.
About your progress, your programme and your options, including the option of leaving. If something is not working we say so early and fix it, and we expect you to do the same.
Shorter list. Still a real one, and worth reading before you sign anything.
The six hours only work if you take them. When work pressure leans on your training time, tell us rather than quietly giving the hours back.
Struggling, bored, flying, thinking of quitting: whatever is true, say it in the room where it can be fixed. Reviews only work on honest information.
Every problem an apprentice has ever had gets easier the earlier it reaches us. Early is the whole ask.
Entitlement is not a dirty word. You are entitled to the hours, the wage, the mentor and the teaching, because three signatures say so.
Know what you are owed
Turn up, be honest, tell us early. If that sounds doable, take the ten minute check and see how the route fits.
