I am a Cerco graduate and would only recommend their services if you go into it with your eyes open.

I come from a recruitment background, specifically in IT and have seen IT Professionals earning avergae earnings close to that claimed, however as is mentioned previosly, this is after many years of experience, several certifications, and a lot of financial investment later. There is certainly no IT Support positions earning this much.

That said however, I would not have got into IT without it.

Whilst the course is not difficult there is some really interesting points within the course material and gives you a starting point for entry into IT. Because I had previously not had hands on experience in IT and had no IT certifications this was invaluable and i believe they are the reason that I got my first IT job.

Their recruitment service, however, is not great. I did a 2 day contract for them and was paid but at a really low rate and then received no further contact from them regarding permanent opportunities. I strongly suggest not relying on the recruitment team if you complete this course, but I managed to find a permanent position, with a better salary than I was willing to drop to working for a national organisation.

This was almost 2 years ago and since then I have gained a lot of experience and am using this initial certification to launch my IT career.

Overall: I recommend the course as a first step for getting into IT but would certainly do the recruitment yourself and do not expect the average salary on day 1.

Mike

Thanks so much for detailing your experience. Shame about the £5k, particularly as it appears to be your hard work and not Cerco’s that’s got you to where you are now.

Cheers,

David

Just my feelings about Cerco.

I wanted a change of career (or even just a proper career), having suffered from severe depression, and having managed to “get out of the rut”, I decided against going back into Public service work (previously having been a Post office transport manager), and decided to take the “Cerco Challenge”.
I paid the 5k for a fast track course, having many PC builds already under my belt, and achieved a 100% pass in both practical and theory, and was presented with the Cerco CCSN certificate.
I then was informed that I would be placed into work as soon as Cerco found me a placement near me (I lived at the time in the village of Selsey on Sea, West Sussex, and the waiting for a placement seemed to go on and on, In the end , I got fed up and started applying locally, and was lucky enough to find a small industrial/military computer assemble, confuguration firm in Chichester, and am still happily working with them after nearly 3 years, but Cerco eventually found me a placement withing a Service centre company based in Stevenage, but working from home around the south coast.
I attended the interview for this position, but would have been earning less than with Kontron UK (my present company), and subsequently refused Cerco’s offer, and with that, they stated that I would not be found any further jobs from them.
During the interview for the Cerco contract, we (there were about 30 or so Cerco guys / gals), were given a test to confirm out suitability for the task in hand (changing hardware from Server racks in Banks at weekend’s) and the answers of the test were told to us to fill in. This smelled heavily of a scam to me.
Also, Cerco not only make the 5 grand per time from the student fee’s, but also earn far more from the contractee’s than they pay out, therefore , I cannot help but feel slightly “ripped off” from the whole affair.
I should have paid for my MCSE in India, but by working hard, and for a good company, now have resonable job security, satisfaction and have gained my compTIA A+, Network+ and an embedded hardware certification, all with Kontron UK, and enjoy occasional travel to Germany (Munich) to boot.

Kindest regards,

Martin Schwanke (Portchester near Portsmouth UK).

Thanks for your comments. I have no personal experience of Cerco and based this article on their advertising, the ASA report and the numerous forums I have visited. I suspect Cerco have a few large companies with IT call centres that they feed staff to, and that’s how they place most of their trainees in employment. This type of job does not pay £37,000!

There are plenty of good quality training courses out there. If you have good IT literacy already, there are plenty of options for the same price or less than Cerco charge. I can’t comment on the similarities of the name, but as you mention Cisco…

http://www.ncat.co.uk/cisco-training.htm - these guys do 4 courses over 16 days for £3499. Cisco certified professionals do get paid well.
http://www.ptr.co.uk/redhat-certification-course.html#dates - if you fancy an adventure, what about Red Hat certification? Less jobs around, but again, great pay. These guys have courses from £1700.

Those are just two companies I found with a bit of Googling, so I can’t vouch for their training abilities and I’m not recommending them.

http://www.koenig-solutions.com - these guys do everything. Microsoft, Cisco, Red Hat, Citrix, Java, Oracle, CompTIA. I can vouch for them as a colleague of mine did his MCSE and MCSA with them. The only downside is that they are in India. But, the course includes accommodation, is very fast, and much much cheaper than the UK. You just have to pay for your flights. You can pay more for better accommodation if you like. But for £5000, you could pay for your flights and get fully Microsoft certified - getting a job on £23k - £35k shouldn’t be too difficult with that behind you.

Don’t give up!

Regards,

David

I stand by my assertion that the average IT professional does not earn £37k per year, and I could call up pretty much all the IT support guys I know and confirm that they earn less than that. Statistics can be made to support pretty much any viewpoint, but I don’t believe it is fair to intimate that ours is an easy industry to get into and make loads of money in. Again, the ASA adjudicated against Cerco’s claims of being able to place most of their trainees into the workplace. It is not necessarily the case that someone who pays thousands for Cerco training would be assured of employment.

Anyone looking to get into IT as a career should consider whether they have the aptitude for it, and test this with free / cheaper locally run courses before committing to large expenditure on a qualification that is not universally recognised. For the price of the Cerco training, one can travel to India, and complete a MCSE or MCSA course in a relatively short period of time. This is universally recognised and will open employment doors, but without on-the-job experience, don’t expect to be paid £37k, because you just won’t get that much.

Where Cerco IT Training differs from the rest is when you come to one of our Open Days [a pre-requisite] for being taken onto the Course, or you check our Brochure or Website, we explain how Cerco takes you from being an Entry Level Engineer all the way through to becoming an IT Professional by way of a mix of additional Courses and paid work in the industry, this is the Cerco Fast Track Career Path Programme.
Moreover if you work for Cerco IT Recruitment on Contract Work, again at full market pay rates, they will pay for your additional Courses which include Network+, Server+, Cisco CCNA Module 1, Convergence + and finally Security+.
These Courses are all one week Courses and the normal market rate for taking each one of these Courses is �1000, so the Package of Courses amounts to a sum of 5k which are FREE to our Contractors.

For those preferring to take a Permanent Job role at any stage of The Fast Track Career Path, we will discount the remaining Courses by 35%
Cerco’s motto is “Learn Work & Earn” and we believe that there is no finer way of becoming an IT Professional whose average salary is �37k than by way of The Cerco Fast Track Career Path Programme.

We welcome anyone interested in becoming an IT Professional to come to an Open Day, be tested for their suitability to be trained on the CCSN Course and for a career in IT.

Please don’t knock us or compare us to others, till you read what we say about how we believe you can command that salary, it’s clearly seen in all our Marketing Material and to be heard at our Open Days.

I look forward to welcoming you at some future date at Cerco IT.

Steven M. Emden
Managing Director Cerco IT Training & Cerco IT Recruitment Ltd.