First aid - how far away?

**Maza** · 02-02-2021, 02:49 PM

I'm in the process of researching a date/place for my first aid course. It runs out later this year.

When I lived in London, it was so easy and they seemed to be several local ones to choose from at any given time. Now that I'm a bit more in the sticks, it's not as easy!

I'm trying to figure out what is reasonable. How far do you travel to your first aid course?

If you don't mind me asking, how much did you pay?

Many thanks.

**Pixie dust** · 02-02-2021, 05:17 PM

I had to travel 27 miles for mine but that was in July when there weren't many courses running normally there are some a little bit closer to home. We have been lucky as our LA have been paying a contribution towards ours, we have to pay for it in full then they reimburse us part from £50 so my course was £138 but only cost me £50. I do feel we are so lucky with the support from our LA compared to a lot of areas but a lot of people moan about having to pay the £50 as it used to be fully funded.

**loocyloo** · 02-02-2021, 05:26 PM

I usually travel about 1 hr 15 mins for my course, as I really liked the chaps who ran it, and I quite like doing it with people I don't know! ( But, I'd probably have to travel 30 mins as a minimum if not an hour )

Mine was due to run out end of Jan, but my usual chaps are only doing 'whole' setting courses at the moment, so I started looking ( back in September ) for another. I ended up doing mine with tigerlily through childcare.co.uk with a discount ( pacey also give a discount ) it was 6 hrs online and then 6 hrs practical. ( very thorough, I highly recommend it) I didn't want to risk it being cancelled due to weather/covid, so I actually ended up doing it at the start of December! It was about a 90 min drive. I could have done it closer ( hours drive ) but the dates/ days didn't suit and they still hadn't released 2021 dates when I was looking! I think I paid about £85. It was a nice mix of childminders, nannies and nursery staff.

In the past I have done red cross or st John's ambulance, but I found that although they were peadiatric, they didn't really 'get childminders and kept talking about tell your manager etc!

**Mouse** · 02-02-2021, 06:22 PM

I'm very fortunate and don't normally have to travel for more than about 10 minutes as we have so many opportunities here.

There's one chap who seems to do most of the courses. He covers childminders, nurseries etc. He organises his own courses or you can get a group together and arrange one with him. The last one I did was at a childminding friend's house. There were 8 of us there. The one before I did at a local nursery. Nurseries usually get the same chap in and if they have spaces spare they offer them out to other early years workers.

I usually pay about £70.

**Maza** · 04-02-2021, 09:57 AM

Gosh Pixie you are very lucky to get help with the cost of your course!

The one I found was £108, which seems really expensive after reading your replies. Don't know whether to keep looking or to just book it to get it done.