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No one is laughing at anyone.

I use 10 on the tele and the strat. Haven't found the sweet spot on the 335 yet, but have been favouring flat wound 12s.

I was picky over training providers ,id rather have gone to private training providers than the whole college crap and you are just a number . I never did give a fk about being failed as long as the was a genuine reason for it and what I did. But also that certain college heald other certs back also ,so nptc Stoneleigh never saw them.. Laugh as much as you want but the isn't many years of experience between me and you .

Thanks for the comments and taking the time to do so. I’m not the finished product, and I’m not capable of everything, but I don’t find many people are that I have met so far. in terms of my ability I would say I’m competent. I am doing decent size sections fells and crown reductions, as I mentioned been asked if I wanna do some crane work coming up, so the boss thinks I’m capable otherwise he would not ask me. I'm based in the South West, our work is mixed we do both commercial work and private work, we have been doing more commercial work recently, the area is quite saturated lots of tree surgeons around here. We are always busy which is nice plenty of work coming in and I know that we’re not the cheapest company around but equally not the most expensive. in terms of my wage per month as a percentage of the companies monthly turn over, I am not told that kind of information and would not be told if I was asked. I’m not wanting to step out of line at all just looking for a non biased opinion and wanna know if I am wrong in thinking I’m not being paid fairly for what I’m doing.

The problem is, training and assessing is a business for these people. Arb companies want to pay their money and get a ticket. A training provider with a lower pass rate will struggle for work. Same with assessors. If they're too tough and look for a reason to fail candidates, the training provider will just use a different more amenable assessor in future. Not saying it's right, but it's definitely a huge factor.

I could quite easily go and target certain colleges and training providers whose Instructors are winging it at best, and fail every one of them, I choose not to. I assess for a small, select group of top quality Instructors, who I know are top of their game, have been for years and are still heavily involved commercially in the industry at a high level. The training, sites and kit are top notch, and the results are generally very positive for the candidates involved, I choose to be involved in this instead.

No. A harder one.

Think i prefer bashlins, tried the velcro type and didnt rate them

Haha , you trying to find an easier awarding body ? 🤣

Depends , I guess if your paye, you get ppe,sick pay, holiday pay, certs paid for , lower testing paid for , saws paid for, insurance covered , guaranteed work, poss use of vehicle, vehicle insurance covered . Versus self employed/ sub contractor which is a pain . Also dependant on what county your in depends on wages , as well as skill set . Its just short of £700 a week before tax and ni . Are u south West or south east UK?

Well this has been as much use as I suspected it might. Perhaps I should have made it a poll. Perhaps I should have asked on Facebook. Perhaps I just shouldn’t have bothered. I was asking in the hope of seeing a trend where a certain assessor/institution failed lots of people, perhaps indicating a reasonable standard.

I'm guessing that's lantra certs,bit like npors -same person trains and asses you? Never had lantra certs or training

My experience is the opposite, assesors tend to hand out certificates without much care if the student is any good at it. Hedger and brush cutter was paid for by rail boss, was 10 minutes talk, couple minutes cutting each, then given the slip of paper, told to turn our phones off and disapear until 4pm, this was at about 8:30am. One of them was 100% green never used outdoor tools before. A week later, he is using hedger above his head, drops and catches it, amputating his finger. It got sewn back on.. Doing my CS31, one of the guys was unsafe, cut through his hinge, he didnt know the different felling cuts and had to be taughg by assesor, and didnt have proper control of a saw. Assesor passed him anyway, knowing he was in work for a local company and should quickly learn. The other guy was unable to safely use a saw and got told to find a different industry. When it came to cs38/39, the first guy had greatly improved and could now use a saw correctly, but was green with climbing, knots etc... he passed. Between the assesor, trainer and the other student, one of them stole my long sling and a carabiner.

What is your wage as a percentage of the monthly turnover? Without knowing that,we are all in the dark.

Spikes, what do you use and what type of fastening do they have around the foot - have you tried other types? I've used Distel's and a few others, all had worn out leather straps, found them a pain to get on and needed a few adjustments before they were secure for climbing. I want to get my own pair with a different type, likely the webbing buckles.

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Please deliver to the driveway of the farmhouse. NOT into the farmyard next door. Please contact before, to ensure no car on driveway.

Jesus wept,

I saw a vid once where they tested lots of different gauge sets . From 13s down to 8s ( I use 9s my self ) and they could not tell any significant difference until you got down to the 8s and then they had to do a back to back with the 13s to be sure .

Not the assessor But the instructor at my sons course should have been failed ! He broke the side cover on my 346 that I had lent Jack for the course . He tried levering it off with a big flat bladed screw driver with the brake still engaged . Wanker . He said in his defense " its not like that on a Stihl "

He was but then retired from being an assessor. So I didnt have a chance to thrash it out with him

So your assessor wasn’t even an assessor?

That's fair point , its not allowed on building sites

We did at nptc Kenilworth, Stoneleigh and we're told he didnt do assements for nptc .we had feedback from other people that he wasn't a great assessor for other reasons