Book Keeping Award

Another in our range of mini-Diplomas, our Essential Book-Keeping Award will equip you with great skills in a condensed time-scale. A ‘mini-diploma’ in its own right, you’ll learn computerised accounts as well as manual book-keeping to cover part of the OCR and IAB Level 2 examination requirements.

Whether you're looking to gain some book-keeping abilities for your own use or want to work in a company's accounts department or for a small business, this fast-track book-keeping programme requires an aptitude for figures and attention to detail. Like all our training, it's also highly practical, containing work-based scenarios and examples.

So if you have aptitude and desire to work with figures, on completion of the Award, you can be confident that you've covered the essentials of book-keeping for a first role, plus for those of you already working, it will provide a more fully-rounded skills set with which to open new opportunities with your existing employer.

The course takes 70 hours - you can start when you like and our flexiable learning system means you can fit your studying around your existing work and home commitments. There will also be a course advisor on hand to help, should you need additional support.

Core subject areas covered include:

- Book-Keeping Level 2 - Module 1 (Manual book-keeping)

- Sage 50 Accounts

- Microsoft Excel

On completing the course, you will have earned a highly regarded Pitman Training Award - a 'mini-diploma', which will help your CV stand out from the rest. This is because Pitman Training is highly regarded by employers; yet again top business professionals in the UK have voted Pitman Training to be the UK's top independent training brand, through achieving Business Superbrand status.

This Award can take a little as 3 weeks to complete, although you do have up to 6 months to finish.

Workbooks, course materials and exams are included in the cost. 
Tutor support is available to students.

Book-keeping Level 2 – Module 1

People with strong book-keeping skills are always in demand. This course is designed to give you an advantage over others with less experience, teaching you double-entry book-keeping.

Our book-keeping training is covered by eight lessons and unlike some book-keeping courses, our flexible, self-study methods mean you’re in charge of your progress.

The course covers, among many other aspects of manual book-keeping, the double entry system, the basics of VAT, checking invoices for accuracy, day books, general ledger, purchase ledger and sales ledger, petty cash books and balancing ledger accounts. The book-keeping course leaves you with a handy workbook as a reference guide and also covers part of the OCR and IAB Level 2 book-keeping examination requirements.

Sage 50 Accounts

Sage is one of the UK’s most popular and in-demand business accounting packages. You’ll need a good knowledge of manual book-keeping to take this course, also covered by this Award.

Comprising thirteen lessons, you’ll learn the skills you need to get a good job in an accounts department or to work for yourself by offering accounting administration services to local firms. It will also give you the opportunity to gain the IAB Level 2 Award in Computerised Book-Keeping.

Topics covered include: an overview of the Sage program; entering opening balances, preparing and printing a trial balance, setting up opening assets, liabilities and capital balances, entering budgets, producing routine reports; checking data, entering supplier invoices, posting error corrections, amending records; invoicing, generating customer letters, entering new products, checking communication history; banking and payments, producing statements, petty cash, payroll reconciliation; audit trails, correcting basic entry errors, reconciling debtors and creditors; creating sales credit notes, processing purchase credit notes, adjusting stock records, plus checking and reconciling the VAT return, producing profit & loss and balance sheet for management accounts, checking budget figures versus actuals, carrying out the year end procedure.

The course lasts approximately 30 hours, and you work at your own pace, with support from one of our friendly Course Advisors when you need it.

Microsoft Excel*

Microsoft Excel is the world’s most popular spreadsheet program; learning how to use the software with Pitman Training shows that you’ve taken one of the best Excel courses available.

You don’t need any prior experience of Excel but you will need to be familiar with the Windows environment and have some basic keyboard experience.

Our Microsoft Excel course is very flexible – as is the case with all our courses, you will have the freedom to take the Excel lessons at your own pace, based at one of our handy town or city centre locations, with support on hand should you need it.

This Excel course comprises several lessons, which provide a detailed but manageable study programme, so you can be confident about your new skills in the workplace. Just some of the areas covered include creating worksheets, formatting text, simple and complex formulas; handling rows and columns, autocomplete, using styles, headers and footers, average, max and min functions and using charts.

*Depending on skill level it may be possible to study the Expert course as an alternative core course.