The Skills Network Avis 

I just wanted to say thank you to Lee for the time spent assessing my work over the past few months (in relation to a English Level 2 Functional Skills course) and for the valuable feedback (in conjunction with Gloucestershire College).

I feel in a far better place now to sit the Functional Skills exam now.

TOTAL SCAM

Following the previous review, exactly the same, completed the test, sent them ALL my details and i also received a text through WhatsApp that I had to complete the form because of the dead line.

It states the course was government funded.

BEWARE AND STAY WELL CLEAR.

Absolutely awful at communicating. They will chase and hound you to do things on their time when they want. Then when it comes to you getting certificates they will blame everyone apart from themselves saying “it’s with the college” “it’s out of our hands”. But they have been paid so they don’t care. After chasing a couple of times the complaints email address won’t reply. Steer clear!!! They are a total waste of time

I’m absolutely devastated by my experience with this company. Last year, I signed up for what was advertised as a free online course, hoping to better myself and gain new skills. Like many people, life got in the way, and I forgot to complete it. Fast forward to today, and I receive an email saying they’re threatening to involve solicitors, Thomas Higgins Solicitors infact, to demand £100 because I didn’t finish the course. They add I will also need to pay them for debt recovery costs, which means if I can't find £100 before the 12th of February as they demand they will instruct bailiffs.

What makes this worse is that I never realised upfront that failing to complete the course would result in such a hefty penalty. There were no reminders, no warnings – just a sudden, harsh demand for money I don’t have.

I’m already struggling to make ends meet, and now I’m forced to look into payday loans to pay this unjust charge. The stress this has caused is overwhelming, and I feel completely let down by a company I trusted.

This kind of predatory behavior is heartless, especially when they know people signing up for "free" courses are often trying to improve their lives and finances. Instead of helping, they’ve pushed me further into a financial hole.

If you’re considering using this company, please think twice. They don’t care about their customers – only about lining their pockets at any cost.

PLEASE, PLEASE understand the dier consequences if you feel as though there maybe even be one barrier in the near future to you completing one of their courses. Or better yet, avoid entirely.

Absolute waste of time, after searching through a few free course websites I decided to apply here the application process was ok then you have to go through numerous skills questions which takes ages if you get through this stage you are told funding will take a couple of days after 3 weeks of waiting with no response I finally get a generic email saying there is no funding available for me at no stage are you told you might not funding but I can pay for a course, I hope I can find another decent company who I can train with instead please don't waste your time with this one

I do feel that expectations need to be better managed regarding the ‘free courses’ from outset. The initial application process is very slick and feels very professional, but you quickly realise that funding is very limited. Some reviews suggest the whole process is a scam, I would like to think that this is not the case and that this organisation is just trying to compete with many other companies offering the same proposition, but they should disclose more information about the availability of courses at the outset. Ironically I would have been prepared to raise the funds to pay for the course in the first instance, but I now have a lack of trust in the organisation to deliver what I require which is a shame.

I attended the Software Development Skills Bootcamp in 2024. Unfortunately, my experience did not align with the promises made in the course advertising or by the Learning Advisors, who painted a picture of a bright future after completing the programme. The Careers Support Team and Personal Tutor support were also far below expectations, and the course description on their website did not reflect the reality of the programme.

The course content was disappointing, with 95% focused on theory through slide presentations, which tutors merely read aloud, and only 5% dedicated to actual coding — an alarming statistic for a software development course. Communication between the Learning Advisors, Personal Tutors, and Careers Team was disjointed, with no clear understanding of responsibilities. For example, the Learning Advisors claimed the Careers Team would provide individualised job-seeking support, yet it took the Careers Team two months to respond to a single email. When they finally did reply, their response was unprofessional and dismissive, including one instance where they simply asked, "What do you want?" in response to an enquiry I made via WhatsApp after receiving a Skills Network bot message about needing support. Personal Tutor who is supposed to guide you with 1:1 support has no knowledge and experience in coding and the software at all, doing only administrative tasks like asking how is our course.

It is disappointing that such issues persist in a programme funded by government resources through the Department for Education. These funds are intended to help eligible students gain skills and secure employment. However, in my experience, the quality of training provided by this bootcamp was subpar. The guaranteed job interview, a key selling point and a requirement for obtaining the course certificate, was not delivered.

Extremely laborious and intrusive application process only to be told "Sorry, we were unable to secure funding BUT here's some courses you can buy!"

Don't waste your time

A scam to con you out £100. Can't finish a course that is advertised as FREE, expect an email with an invoice to pay in 30 days.

Response below states "cancellation fee". I didnt cancel, I was unable to complete due to ill health. Big difference!

A balanced and convenient way of learning! I researched courses I could do in my spare time to better understand and grow my knowledge in digital marketing. The course material gave me an overview of digital marketing and how it works and how it affects businesses. I found the skills network to be very good at providing feedback very fast and I completed my qualification a lot quicker than scheduled. Having that flexibility meant I could work as and when and get assignments done before deadlines. The only thing I would say is that it did take me a long time to be allocated a funding partner.

My experience with The Skills Network has been amazing. So far I studied 2 ( Digital Marketing and Understanding Autism).I currently study Cyber Security- all level 2.

The topics of each course are very interesting and helpful. Each course offered me new knowledge and set of skills which I can use later in life.
The side of each college were extremely helpful and always there to offer support where needed.

The Skills Network team are helpful and always managed to sort any problems or enquiries with fast replies.

I can't say I had any issues as my experience is extremely good.

Worst company ever worked for. Toxic is an understatement.

I'm currently doing a level 2 qualification in digital marketing that was created by The Skills Network. The content is repetitive and of poor quality, and I don't feel the value I'm getting is worth the time it takes to complete the assessments (which are really tedious).

Here's an example of some of the content provided in the section on SEO:

There are many advantages to increased visibility for a business. These include:
More success for the business
More money for the business
Increase in customers buying your products/services

Instead of endlessly repeating obvious, mindless stuff like this, there should be some practical application of the theory being taught.

In the assessment I am basically just being asked to answer the same question over and over, worded slightly differently.

I don't want to pay £100 to leave the course so I am sticking at it but I find it depressing that government funding is being used to pay for training like this.

Not a good experience at all. Lots of tests, ID uploads and emails. Was promised a fully funded L2 counselling course and told my chances were good in my local government area, then suddenly received an email saying they can’t fund the course after all but I could just buy one from them (no thanks!) Now I can’t login to my account to see any of my saved data.

Having been made redundant this seemed like my chance to upskill without having to spend hundreds of pounds. Now, like some of the other reviewers on here, I’m wondering if it’s just a scam.

I'm very concerned that I've signed up to a course that hasnt given me any start dates and looking at the reviews seem like a scam. To top it off someone was asking more information and a copy of my passport via email claiming they was from this company with the email response of:
Many thanks for your email.

I have contacted The Skills Network to follow up your enrollment and will update you on a response.

In the meantime, please feel free to follow up using any of the following details.

This in itself seems contradicting.

Also looking on the government website:
Organisation search
Search for an organisation
The Skills Network
Search
No results
No search results found. Try searching for something different.
I will continue searching and report if i find it being involved in illegal activity using my details

I took a Level 2 course, fully expecting that the course would be quick and easy to complete, given the very basic nature of the content and the fact that the course is only Level 2. How mistaken I was.

The course content is indeed extremely basic, but it has been inordinately stretched so as to fill reams and reams of repetitive, dull and pretty much pointless videos and templates. Once you have signed up, you cannot opt out - which is what I certainly would have done within minutes of seeing how dreadful the content is and how time-consuming the assessments are.

The learning material of the entire course would probably cover no more than a couple of pages of A4 if written clearly and non-repetitively. I would guess that it could be adequately comprehended by most reasonably educated people within less than half an hour. The course content therefore does not justify the amount of time you have to devote to it nor the level of stress involved in submitting the assessments within the narrow timeframes imposed.

The assessments are comprised of a series of questions to answer and a table to complete. Many of the questions are very badly worded and hence highly confusing, and the tables are nothing short of nonsensical. Moreover, no mark scheme is provided and it is therefore impossible for the learner to gauge how much to write in response. Given the basic nature of the material, it is clearly common sense to simply write short, succinct answers to the questions but, as I discovered, this is not received well by the assessor. My first three assessments were returned with the request that several answers be resubmitted within seven days. It consequently became apparent that in order to pass the assessments, a great deal of pointless waffling was required. This was an enormous waste of my time and entirely contrary to the usual expectations of assessors. If I didn’t have two degrees and proven academic ability, I would have found the whole experience deeply demoralising and discouraging. As it was, I was fortunately able to recognise the feedback for what it was: gratuitously negative, disingenuous, and unprofessional. My assessor even possessed such lack of personal insight that she “recommended” to me in her feedback that I improve my writing skills, despite being unable herself to demonstrate more than a rudimentary grasp of grammar and punctuation, and not even that at times.

Tellingly, the page featuring the assessment outcomes lists organisations such as the Samaritans in case you need help. This leads me to suspect that the Skills Network is aware that its assessment procedures are liable to cause emotional distress, especially given that there is a financial penalty for not completing the courses, and the target group of learners is adults who are not in employment and therefore cannot afford to pay the penalty. My personal feeling is that the course I took actually sets people up to fail; very few people would be incapable of understanding such basic material, but the number of assessments, the lack of transparency as to how to successfully answer the questions, and the ludicrous amount of time and perseverance required to press on and finish, are simply not justified by the course content and would surely push the limits of many. I was actually reminded of Enid Blyton’s character, Dame Slap, in “The Faraway Tree”, who demanded answers to preposterous riddles that admitted no true answers. I honestly cannot understand for the life of me why the government would fund such a course. In fact, I am seriously considering raising my concerns with my MP and the Education and Skills Funding Agency, and would encourage others to do so also.

The emails I received from the Skills Network are peppered with informal interjections, words and phrases, such as “woohoo”, “hey” and “catch you soon”. I imagine they are trying to create the impression that they are friendly and approachable, but such language simply seems to me to be patronising and unprofessional. Such a casual tone also belies their power to subject to a financial penalty anybody who, quite understandably, would wish to change their mind and withdraw from whichever course they had regrettably signed up to.

In short, on the basis of my experience, I do not recommend doing any courses through the Skills Network. I have taken some excellent free courses through Future Learn, and others are available through the Open University; these are created by academics and experts in the fields in question, are highly informative and engaging, and you can do them at your own pace, with no financial penalties attached whatsoever. You receive certificates upon completion, free of charge, which can be uploaded to social media. Last but not least, they are truly worth doing!

Be aware, as soon as you have signed up (with no going back) you will get the course outline with very tight deadlines for assessments and if you give the course the attention it needs you will struggle to meet these deadlines, especially if you have work and family commitments. You only know this once you have joined. I’ve studied for years and was surprised at the tight turnarounds.
I reached out with problems meeting already tight deadlines as my work hours increased and I have other commitments. The first response was unhelpful, however to be fair a different representative was most helpful and extended the deadlines.
I struggled to meet the new dates but pulled out all the stops and submitted my work. My assessor required me to re submit two questions which deflated me after all that effort especially as I was unsure as to why, or at least why my mark couldn’t have just been lower rather than creating even more work.
My assessor also said that I needed to read around the subject and use other sources etc. My point was that I could not give the course the time the assessors demand so I have opted to withdraw with one unit to go. Had the assessor accepted my responses with constructive feedback I would have been able to complete the course but the re submission request has just added to the stress I was already experiencing.
I have asked to repay the £100 in instalments as I am struggling to pay. I assume it was all in the terms and conditions but as other reviewers have said, it is not made clear that you will have to pay to withdraw, and that the assessors make life difficult for you to pass?
I have two degrees and a post graduate degree so I am not unused to completing assignments, but I found the online content nigh on impossible to navigate at times, links don’t work or are out of date and the whole site was rather confusing. I personally would not use again and preferred my other similar free Level 2 course with a different provider, which had much better designed content, more generous deadlines and more supportive assessors.

Awful course. I have made several attempts to complete it as I can’t afford to pay the £100 withdrawal fee but the feedback I received is so incredibly discouraging I have lost the will to continue.
The course I was doing is Event planning and I understood all the material and I believe that all my answers made sense but the feedback truly made me feel like a complete idiot. The only way I know to describe this experience is as if you’re doing a math equation and you get the right answer but you didn’t use the same method as the tutor therefore you are wrong.
In addition to that I have made them aware that I am a stay at home mum with a 3 year old and a 6 month old and I regularly take my father to his hospital appointments so I don’t have that much time and did not realise how incredibly time consuming and stressful this course would be but they don’t seem to care.
Personally I would not recommend this course unless you have a LOT of time on your hands and do not get easily discouraged. Definitely not something you should sign up for if you have a full time job or other commitments.

A great course that is well-structured and insightful. This course has given me a greater understanding of the core skills and different approaches in counselling as well as a better understanding of how my own beliefs, values, and principles, and how it is important to be aware of these so that you can suspend them in a helping relationship. The support and feedback that I received from my tutor Mark Murphy were beneficial and crucial in my continuous professional and personal development. Thanks Mark!

I wanted to know that are they scammers? They said the course is completely free i have to repay the amount to the gov when i get the job. They have not mentioned how much money they borrowed from the government or the financial partners. I asked them several time no response. Even I send my copy of my passport now I’m scared.