The course can take five months to complete. But you can do it as quickly or slowly as you want. That’s the great advantage of distance learning.

You can take as long as you want. Unlike other organisations, we don’t set any time limits.

You can find the cost, and enrol online, by clicking here.

There are no other costs or fees.

Yes, you can make five monthly payments. This costs about 20% more. To find out the cost, please click here.

Just return the course within 60 days, and we’ll refund your course fees. Also, if after seeking work at the end of the course, you don’t earn at least the cost of the course inside three months, we’ll also refund your fees.

Yes. You can start today. Or tomorrow. Or next week. Whenever you want.

It’s all done from home.

Yes. We have students in 28 countries. And we have two editions of the course. One is for North America and those who want to pay in US dollars. The other edition is for the UK and Europe, and people who want to pay in sterling. But we welcome payment in any currency.

• There have two types of people you can contact – your tutor and a course advisor. The tutor marks your work, and helps you with any problems. You can fax, email or post assignments to your tutor, whenever you want.
• We don’t give out the tutor’s phone number, because a few people would spend all day talking to their tutors, who would never get any work done.
• But sometimes students get stuck, or have an urgent question. If so, you can phone a course advisor at the Blackford Centre at any time during work hours. If you leave a message out of work hours we’ll call you back the next day. You can contact course advisors as often as you want, and about anything to do with coaching.

• We fix you up with a Buddy, a student with whom you’ll carry out coaching sessions. At different times, you will play the roles of the coach and the client. These sessions give you a good understanding of how real-life coaching sessions work. They are not supervised, but you can report back to your tutor about them and receive feedback.

• Is the course endorsed?

  Yes. Our course has been endorsed under the Quality Licence Scheme.

  This means we have undergone an external quality check to ensure that our organisation and the courses we offer meet certain quality criteria.

  Endorsement involves a robust and rigorous quality audit by external inspectors to ensure quality is consistently met. A regular review of courses is carried out as part of the endorsement process.

  To this end, the learning outcomes of the course have been benchmarked at QLS Level 4 Award against level descriptors published by Ofqual, to indicate the depth of study and level of difficulty involved in successful completion by the learner.

  

  When you successfully complete this course you will receive a Certificate of Achievement and a Learner Unit Summary (which lists the details of all the units you have completed as part of your course).

  Read more about course accreditation here

No. But it will help you set up and run your own business. And we encourage all students to continue their studies after completing the course.

Yes, all tutors are practicing coaches. Some other organisations use college lecturers, which means you don’t get the information from the ‘coal face’.

Yes. We can recommend brokers or insurance companies in the UK and North America who will give you professional liability insurance. If you live in other countries, we can also help.

Yes. Only it’s a lot more fun!

Yes. the course is designed specifically to help you set up and run your own practice. Some courses, even at university, seem to omit this all-important aspect. We give you enough technical knowledge to practice, and we also provide detailed guidance on marketing, operation and finance to run your own business.

• To get a job in a public or private organisation, you’ll need more qualifications than we can offer. Our course is designed to help you work with your own private clients.
• The easiest way to earn a living is to work for yourself. It’s also the most lucrative. So in the course we focus on how you can work from home as a coach.

Yes, the course includes practical guidance on finding clients for your own private practice. You can also get additional help from your tutor or a course advisor.

• No, there is no final exam. The course is based on continuous assessment, through the assignments you send to your tutor.
• And continuous assessment lets you check all the time that you’re on course to succeed.
• So you should look at the assignment as an exciting challenge. No, it’s true! You’ll enjoy them. We promise you!

You do the work again! 80% of students complete the course without ever failing an assignment. But you might misunderstand the question, or produce an insufficiently detailed answer. So the tutor will explain the problem and ask you to send in the assignment again. When you do this, your work will be much better.

Yes. That’s no problem.

Yes. That’s no problem.

Yes. That’s no problem. We make no assumptions about people’s prior knowledge. But you ought to have a deep interest in the subject.

Yes, you can. So, if you want to tackle a particular topic, you can go straight to that module. This is useful if you have a job or a client that requires you to know about a particular subject. You might note that some other organisations supply only one or two modules at a time.

• Don’t worry. We understand. But this course is nothing like your memories of being stuck inside a stuffy classroom on a summer’s day with an old-fashioned teacher droning on.
• For a start, this is a subject that interests you (or you wouldn’t have got this far).
• And getting this deep into the website shows that you can absorb information and concentrate for long periods of time.
• Also, you’ll see that we write clearly and simply. And that’s how we’ve written the course materials. It’s true that some organisations write long and boring pages that make your eyes glaze over. We promise you that our course is nothing like that. You’ll find this course is informative and enjoyable. In fact, many students are almost upset at finishing the course.

We send you the whole course when you enrol. This means you can study any topic you want to. You can also see what topics are coming up. Getting everything in one package makes it easier for you to get an overview of the course. As we mentioned above, some other organisations supply only one or two modules at a time.

• We think this is the best course in the world. Bar none. But please examine other courses before making a decision. Consider these points:
• 1. Is the course comprehensive?
• 2. Will your studies be supported by a tutor?Research shows that people succeed much better on courses that include a personal tutor.
• 3. Is it interactive? That is, do the course materials regularly make you stop and think, and do exercises? Too many courses consist of page after page of boring lecture notes.
• 4. Does it teach you about setting up your own business? College courses are often weak on this point.
• 5. Is it accredited?
• 6. Can you get a refund if you don’t like the course?
• For our course, the answer to all these questions is ‘Yes’. But check out other courses as well before enrolling. We want to you make the choice that’s right for you.

• 1. See if any courses are available at your local college or nearby university.
• 2. Search the internet. But beware: hundreds of dot com entrepreneurs think they can teach coaching.
• 3. See if you can contact a career advisor. Careers advisors know nothing about coaching, as they would be the first to admit. And the careers books they consult will probably suggest getting a three to five-year college degree in your chosen field. Which may (or may not) be a good thing, but it isn’t an option for most of our students (many of whom already have a degree!).

Yes. We show you how.

No state or federal laws stop you setting up and running your own practice.To keep you straight, we also provide detailed advice on forming a company, keeping records, and paying tax.

• Here are some answers we hope will reassure you.
  • We’ve been in operation since 1995; so we’re very established.
  • We publish our physical address at the bottom of each page – and you are welcome to visit us.
  • We’re audited by ABC twice a year (you can phone them to verify they do that).
  • You can read the Reviews of our students on the web site.
  • You can ask us for the contact details of former students who will talk to you about their experiences.
  • We publish an Ethical statement here.
  • We’re registered at Companies House: registration number 352 4886
  • Our VAT number is 729 1528 23
  • Our Licence number granted by the Office of Fair Trading under the Consumer Credit Act 1974 is 606843.
  • Our bank is NatWest, 7 High Street, Wells, Somerset (we have money in the bank and no loans or overdraft).
  • We’re registered with the UK government’s Register of Learning Providers (www.ukrlp.co.uk); Number 10009490.
• And finally, we love what we do; and we wouldn’t do anything to jeopardise it.