I am after a bit of advice, here is a bit of background.
I took my Level 2 with the IAB in 2007 and was prior to the introduction of Level 1, I intended to start studying again in 2010 and purchased new and up to date study books but events and work took over and it didn't happen. I am now in a postion to continue but once again things have moved on so I have had to purchase another more up to date Level 3 study book. I have been bringing myself up to speed and refreshing with the Level 2 (although books are slightly out of date and have a couple of extra chapeters not in my original study material ie coding and payroll). So I am hoping that in the next week or so I will be in the position to proceed with Level 3 and hope to take the exam in January 2013.
I know some people set up in business after Level 2 which I have to say I find hard to believe because I do not have the confidence at this moment to strike out on my own and didn't even when I first passed the Level 2. After Level 3 I want to proceed with computerised book-keeping, I felt that I should complete the manual side before moving on to computerised. Now I know that IAB and Sage have formed an alliance but my understanding that this qualification is a mixture of manual book-keeping, Levels 1 and 2 and training on Sage Line 50. As I have already completed Level 2 (and I have also done Level 1 by going through the study book but not taking an exam) I feel that this is not the right course for me.
Do you have any suggestions what my next step should be with regard to Sage training. I have looked on the Sage website and I would love to learn in classroom environment but there centres are all too far away and very expensive. Suggestions please!
Much as I hate to see another go down that path, it's probably best that everyone at least understands how to use Sag regardless as to whether they actually go on to use it in the real world.
How about one of the Training Link or Sage courses in a boxe?
There are three levelsof study. Box 1 is the basics, box 2 is the core knowledge that you will need. Box three is the more complex stuff.
Note that you can generally get the Sage course in a box cheaper from Amazon than you can from Sage.
As an example of one of the Sage Courses in a box see this link :
There's no way that I would pay £137.50 for it though which is the current price (remember that you will need to buy three of these to complete the course so you would be looking at £412.50 in study materials (that would be for nine books, three certifications and three six month licences of the training version of Line 50)
Now compare £412.50 against any Sage distance learning course that gives you Sage 50 (not instant) to work with for the duration and possibly keep after.
Worth checking the websites of Training Link, Ideal schoold, Premier Training and Eagle to have a look at their current offers.
Hope that helps,
Shaun.
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Shaun
Responses are not meant as a substitute for professional advice. Answers are intended as outline only the advice of a qualified professional with access to all relevant information should be sought before acting on any response given.
Are you saying that with distance learning I can get certification and a copy to keep of Sage 50 at the end as opposed to buying the three box versions which just have limited time copies of the software whilst studying for the certification.
Are you saying that with distance learning I can get certification and a copy to keep of Sage 50 at the end as opposed to buying the three box versions which just have limited time copies of the software whilst studying for the certification.
Ta
Karen
Hi Karen,
think that I was fed a bum steer by a poster the other day. Just been on the Training Link website and it's just the 180 day trial version of line 50 but they're offering the three levels with all three certifications for £245.
See here : http://www.training-link.co.uk/section/16/1/sage_50_accounts
Premier and Ideal offer the full version of Instants with their Sage package to keep but when looking at the figures remember that the Sage price for Instant is only £120 and you would actually get it cheaper from Amazon.
In the real world if you have to use any version of Sage it will invariably be Line 50 (not that there is a great deal of difference between the look and feel of the various versions even if there is a lot more functionality in 50).
My previous post still stands but scratch the words "and possibly keep after" as that seems to have been proven wrong.
Hope that helps. Sure Dave, Brian and Nick will be along in the morning to correct any errors in my post.
kind regards,
Shaun.
p.s. to any training company reading this, this is neither advertising nor attacking any training company. It is a simple statement of information freely available currently on the websites.
p.s.2. To anyone reading this in the future please refer to the websites of the training companies mentioned for their latest deals which change regularly. The best deal today may well be the worst tomorrow and all companies mentioned are excellent training providers.
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Shaun
Responses are not meant as a substitute for professional advice. Answers are intended as outline only the advice of a qualified professional with access to all relevant information should be sought before acting on any response given.
Manual Bookkeeping is by far more important than computerised its just that returns are sent in electronic format nowadays and most choose to do this by using Software and Sage is of course very popular but the confusion is that it comes in various guises. If learning Sage 50 Pro the likelihood is you will be taught using 180 day software, this is for no other reason than the retail price of Sage 50 Pro is over £1k, a fully licensed version would of course make the training for most unaffordable. May I suggest you give the companies suggested by Shaun a call and then your exact requirement can be established?
Good luck and let us (BKN) know how you get on, for the meantime welcome to the forum and best of luck with your continued studies.
Fact is people are individuals and as such have individual requirements, the majority is not the rule and individual needs have to be catered for!!!!! The majority of home based Bookkeepers would not require Sage Instant Accounts if they have multi clients. I am the Training Link stats man, and from our point of view based on our collated stats 15% of students who purchase our Sage 50 Pro training (no such thing as Sage Line 50 anymore has been rebranded over 12 months ago) are people who have been trained on instants? So again its about individual needs and not common consensus. Perception is reality!!!!
Dave
-- Edited by TRAINING LINK on Wednesday 12th of September 2012 08:19:34 PM
I have to disagree that in the real world you will come accross Line 50. A lot of clients that i picked up have instants becuase they know Sage, they or their partner were going to do the bookkeeping and then got bored/hard, or their accountant told them that is what you needed.
Most small business can't run to the cost of line 50, and get no real benefit from it. I am not biased against line 50, we are about to launch a Sage Line 50 course, but I think bookkeepers are atleast as likely, or more than likely to encounter Instants rather than Line 50.
Also I dont think that someone doing an Instants course would have problem doing bookkeeping for 75% of companies who use line 50.
I dont have any facts to back these up but this my experience from being in practice myself and for working for a large(ish) firm of chartered accountants.
Nick
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Nick
Nick Craggs FMAAT ACA AAT Distance Learning Manager
I think that we are sort of in agreement although we seem to be coming at this from different angles.
People on here are (for the most part) learning to be book-keepers rather than end users so really they need to learn the more complex version of the software that they are likely to be using.
There are thousands of business owners for whom Sage instants is brilliant but isn't it designed to be single client where line 50 is designed around multi client (even if Sage bleed you dry if you want to use that functionality).
My experience is that larger business tend to use SAP and Major Plc's use their own bespoke systems.
As you say many smaller businesses use Instant and if the bookkeeper works on their system then that is fine but surely if a bookkeeping practice wanted Sage (mine doesn't) shouldn't they be using line 50 for it's own software... Unless of course they only ever expect to have one client.
I think that Premier are right to be thinking about two courses with one aimed at end users and the other at financial professionals.
The only issue that I'm seeing there though is that the training companies are competing on price as the quality of all the afore mentioned is quite similar how is anyone going to make any money out of this.... Or should I maybe be looking at whether you are all setting up thousands of new business bank accounts to get the give away software. lol.
kind regards,
Shaun.
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Shaun
Responses are not meant as a substitute for professional advice. Answers are intended as outline only the advice of a qualified professional with access to all relevant information should be sought before acting on any response given.
Premier and Ideal offer the full version of Instants with their Sage package to keep but when looking at the figures remember that the Sage price for Instant is only £120 and you would actually get it cheaper from Amazon.
Morning Shaun,
Ideal have been offering Sage 50 Accounts training for some 6 months now, where fully licensed software supplied for the students continued use. On speaking to prospective and current students there is a real mix of those wishing to set out on their own as bookkeepers, work within a business as a bookkeeper, or simply trying to up-skill in order to safeguard their current employment. Therefore, depending on their requirements and goals would depend on which option would be more suitable for them.
We see that around 70% of students still undertake the Instant training, meaning they get a real feel for the Sage software, but at the same time keep their options open for when they complete their study, without their training costs being too high.
I know youre not a big Sage fan but around 99% of our own enquirers are looking specifically for Sage training as this is still seen as the most widely used. Re the costs, yes, initial set up may seem expensive, but you are not then linked into annual license fees, some of which are £400-£500 per year, making long-term costs much higher.
Ideal have been offering Sage 50 Accounts training for some 6 months now
Morning Brian,
just picking up on the first point, your shop window to the world isn't making that clear as on the website if one goes to Sage Certification the only course offered is SC100 (instant) for £399 inclusive of the software.
From the sound of it you already offer 50 and Premier is in the process but as peoples initial scan of various training bodies offerings will only show TL as offering the 50 training you may be losing some students who scan your site, don't find what they are looking for and move on.
My appologies if the Sage 50 certification is somewhere else on the site but just think of me as your typical punter glancing at the site and if I were after Sage then the certification link is where I would go first.
I'll do the second part of the answer in a seperate post to stop this one getting too cluttered.
kind regards,
Shaun.
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Shaun
Responses are not meant as a substitute for professional advice. Answers are intended as outline only the advice of a qualified professional with access to all relevant information should be sought before acting on any response given.
Just to add my tuppence worth to the debate - I really get frustrated when bookkeepers are trained in just Sage rather than other bookkeeping systems. There are so many great software systems out there, many of which are better than Sage in my opinion.
It can often narrow the abilities of the bookkeeper if they are only able to use one system and not adapt.
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Phil Hendy, The Accountancy Mentor
Are you thinking of setting up your own practice or have you set up and need some help?
If so a mentor may be the way forward - feel free to get in touch and see how I can assist you.
I agree with you but it is the responsibility of each individual bookkeeper to get experience/training on other software packages. Were not forcing our training on anyone and simply meeting the demand thats there for Sage training.
It is an interesting point though in that does the availability of training materials create the demand or the demand create the courses?
If all training companies only ran courses for other software such as QB or VT then would the accountancy software demographic remain as it is today?
People use the software because that is what they have been trained in.
In many ways I think that the training companies are as much of a market setter as the banks for giving away Sage to new businesses.
Real chicken and egg type scenario there.
Bet you never realised that you were a trend setter did you Brian, lol.
Hope you have a good weekend too,
All the best,
Shaun.
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Shaun
Responses are not meant as a substitute for professional advice. Answers are intended as outline only the advice of a qualified professional with access to all relevant information should be sought before acting on any response given.
It is an interesting point though in that does the availability of training materials create the demand or the demand create the courses?
If all training companies only ran courses for other software such as QB or VT then would the accountancy software demographic remain as it is today?
People use the software because that is what they have been trained in.
In many ways I think that the training companies are as much of a market setter as the banks for giving away Sage to new businesses.
Real chicken and egg type scenario there.
Bet you never realised that you were a trend setter did you Brian, lol.
Hope you have a good weekend too,
All the best,
Shaun.
Shaun, summed up well, what I was going to say back in response.
The 'demand' is only there because you have insisted on training in Sage. I suspect Sage have a deal somewhere with some of the main organising bodies.
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Phil Hendy, The Accountancy Mentor
Are you thinking of setting up your own practice or have you set up and need some help?
If so a mentor may be the way forward - feel free to get in touch and see how I can assist you.
I'm pretty sure that countering that is going to be the thrust of the Intuit roadshow Tim.
How many businesses are there out there that wanted some other accounting software or just to use Excel but their accountants told them that they had to use Sage and then sold them a copy.
must be a fair few training courses sold that start with a poor new business owner leaving the bank or their new accountants office with some new software in their mit that they don't have a clue how to use.
Get the accountants on side and market share will follow.
And, whilst the re-seller program is a nice carrot the Sage client tax licensing is going to hand the UK market to Intuit on a platter (and of course Intuit also have re-seller programs).
Shaun.
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Shaun
Responses are not meant as a substitute for professional advice. Answers are intended as outline only the advice of a qualified professional with access to all relevant information should be sought before acting on any response given.
Hi Shaun, I'm all for competition, so good luck to Intuit.
Last time I saw the bank manager he tried to interest me in Clearly Bookkeeping - seems a nice bloke but I suppose he has to sell it. He didn't seem surprised that I turned him down and from memory he was quoting £50ish p/a per client. I just told him that bookkeeping doesn't change much and our mainstay software last cost £35 for an upgrade in 1998. I should be re-selling the software we use!
I guess the best solution is if VT have a re-seller discount program.
Thanks Amanda for your comments and link to my website a massive thank you required.
I am still able to obtain the Sage study bundle at £ 235 if you would like to go down this route.
Alternatives are: Sage online study (see my website for online training) the price is still £48 for the full study of 2009 version with assessments on completion. this is 12 months online usage. In future there is an additional whats new 2012 show and do but not quite ready yet.
Private or classroom training. Classroom is either via sage, various around the country - pick yr course and email me for booking. My own run courses are in west Drayton (UB7) or around this area - please email for details Or I can come to you for 1 to 1 - or find a few friends - price on application
So just to confirm - training via myself is from £ 48 (no VAT) for online training. Larger companies price around £399 mainly due to the additional support they can offer, although I do offer email support with this.
thanks again Amanda
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Donna Curling - Complete Book-Keeping Ltd (CBKLtd) - 07939 101900
