Apprenticeships

Good for the employer…

The Fork Lift Truck Association is spearheading a National Apprenticeship Programme, to combat a serious – and growing – shortage of skilled service engineers.

In a twin track initiative, the Association is targeting young people – presenting the career as aspirational and every bit as rewarding as one in, say, the automotive industry. At the same time, the FLTA is working closely with potential employers to help them find and develop the right recruit as easily as possible.

Ideal for trainees and employers alike the scheme combines valuable work-based experience with an element of relevant, technical study.

Great for the employer, it enables a company to recruit an enthusiastic and practically minded member of staff – and benefit from an extra pair of hands – for under £10,000 in the first year. Even more important, in the longer term, the company gains a loyal and well-trained engineer. All the evidence shows home-grown recruits tend to give many more years of service than expensive, ready-trained staff recruited from another employer.

The programme is managed on the FLTA’s behalf by the City of Bristol College working in association with colleges around the UK.

How it works

Apprentices are based in the workplace, where they earn as they learn by assisting experienced engineers - supported by structured, two-week blocks of college training. As their expertise increases, trainees take on greater responsibility at work, ready for full duties by the end of the three-year course.

The College will take care of trainees’ recruitment, educational funding, assessments, learning support and pastoral care, making it straightforward even for companies with no experience of apprenticeships to find a great candidate, and offer quality training.

More information can be obtained by visiting The National Fork Lift Engineer Apprenticeship Programme website www.forktruckapprentice.org.uk.

You can download the Fork Lift Truck Engineer Apprentice Scheme brochure, a printer-friendly application form or an updated pdf with information for potential employers below or you can order free hard copies via the catalogue.

… Good for the apprentice

If you are aged 16-19, a fork lift truck apprenticeship offers an unusual and really interesting career, especially if you are “good with your hands”. You will learn many new useful skills.

As for the prospects, well you can go as far as you want. After all, wherever goods are being delivered - to factories, warehouses or docks - there’s a fork lift truck to manage the heavy lifting. Your job will be to help keep them going. Many owners of fork lift truck companies and senior managers in the industry started their careers as apprentices.

What’s the deal?

Like cars, trucks must be regularly serviced – to ensure they work correctly and safely. Unlike a car though, most fork lift servicing is done ‘on-site’, which means engineers typically spend much of their day ‘on the road’ taking their mobile workshop to the customer. No two days are the same. Once trained as a fork lift truck engineer, you will be trained in electrical and hydraulic systems, diesel, gas powered engines and much more. It’s not all ‘spanners and oily rags’ either. Like automotive engineers, fork lift specialists regularly use laptop or palmtop computers to diagnose problems or fine-tune fork lift truck performance.

The best route in is an apprenticeship – an ‘earn-while-you-learn’ scheme, lasting three years. You’ll get around £430 a month – from day one – and receive allowances for when you attend college. To be successful you’ll need to be keen and ideally have 3 GCSEs at grade ‘C’ or above. You need to be aged between 16 and 19 – but it is sometimes possible to include older students.

As an apprentice fork lift truck engineer you’ll learn valuable skills – while meeting new people at your workplace and during your college time. Chances are you’ll find an employer very close by. Currently, there are hundreds of Fork Lift Truck Association member sites throughout the UK, from small businesses to international manufacturers, where your skills will command a good salary. Aged 22 and with the apprenticeship completed, you should expect to start at around £17,000, often with attractive benefits.

Best of all, it’s a career path that offers lots of choice. You may prefer to stay on the technical side and progress to a parts or service manager. You may prefer to transfer to the sales side. If you are really ambitious, you might even set up your own business. Almost every independent fork lift dealership is owned by someone who began their working life as an apprentice engineer.

The apprenticeship programme is managed on behalf of the FLTA by the City of Bristol College. Three different locations are used for the college elements.

• Bristol - City of Bristol College                                   
• Bedworth (Nuneaton)  - North Warwickshire and Hinckley College
• Carlisle - Systems Group

To Apply:
To get the full story and for the online application form visit www.forktruckapprentice.org.uk or
email Sarah.Hoare@cityofbristol.ac.uk.

You can also download the full-colour, twelve-page pdf version of the Fork Lift Truck Engineer Apprentice Scheme brochure - or our printer-friendly pdf version of the course application form by clicking on the images below or order a free copy through the catalogue.