Sentinel e-learning wins HandV News award

E-learning pack from Sentinel, the UK's leading chemical water treatment provider for domestic heating systems, awarded Training Initiative of the Year in the HandV News Awards.

The judges commented that the Sentinel e-learning package was "well presented, well designed and perfectly packaged".

They were impressed with what they considered to be a thorough, well-researched, informative e-learning safety package which would quickly bring users up to speed with Part L requirements.

Interactive and intuitive, the judges felt that users would quickly come to grips with all the issues surrounding chemical water treatments.

Presented by hilariously irreverent comedian Patrick Kielty, the award, sponsored by Vaillant, is a huge vote of confidence in not just the actual e-learning programme itself, but the thinking behind it, which was the result of significant research undertaken by Sentinel before the decision was taken to axe its training programmes around the country and replace it with a universally accessible alternative that installers and specifiers said they would prefer.

The programme is downloadable from the company's web site, making it accessible to everyone in the industry in the UK.

It has already begun to make a huge impact with installers.

But rewardingly, also on a wider front, with boiler manufacturers and industry bodies seeing it as a valuable addition to their current training activities.

A number of manufacturers in the domestic heating sector are currently evaluating the programme, looking at using modules from it in their own training courses and the IDHEE has endorsed the programme and will include it in the courses they run for installers.

Bill Bucknell from the IDHEE has developed a twenty question exam for the organisation's web site, based around the content of the pack, successful completion of which will provide points towards membership of the IDHEE and its 'Points to Professionalism' programme.

Sentinel launched its new e-learning training package for installers to help them save time, reduce call backs to jobs and to help them offer the most energy efficient solutions possible to their customers domestic heating and hot water requirements.

Sentinel decided that the best way to provide the highly flexible training that installers felt they needed was to go down the e-learning route - to provide the training course for all installers who wanted it - but in a way that allowed them to undertake that training in their own homes at a time that suited them.

The vast majority of installers have their own PCs or laptops and providing an interactive training programme on a CD would allow installers to get all the information they needed in a very user friendly package.

The new e-learning pack provides installers with a basic understanding of corrosion, scaling and fouling in a typical central heating system and the actions that should be taken to address and cure these problems.

The training is divided into easy to use modules designed to help installers to provide the best possible solutions to all central heating requirements.

Topics on the CD include a closer look at the Benchmark scheme and its requirements, central heating system design issues, causes of corrosion and related problems, in addition to water analysis and the benefits of power flushing.

The CD comes as part of an easy to use pack that also includes Sentinel Product Information and a handy user manual guide, the DWTA Code of Practise, Sentinel technical information sheets, energy efficiency information and a promotional voucher that entitles recipients to complimentary Sentinel X100 and X400 concentrates.

The programme includes question and answer areas so you can check if you have really picked up all the information you need from the sections you have covered.

Sentinel's Mark Walker commented : "As a company we fully support training in the industry to raise standards across the sector, but we have to respect the feedback we've had that after all the Building Regulations Part L changes, there is a great deal of training on offer in the marketplace at a time when installers feel they cannot afford to attend every course they feel is of value to them".

"We want to support the demand for knowledge but in the most easily accessible way we can and we believe that this new e-learning programme will help installers to get the training and knowledge base they want, in the way they want it".

The Sentinel e-learning pack is available at GBP34-95 - it can be ordered and paid for on the Sentinel website.

For more information and further details of the new e-learning training programme visit the Sentinel website.

Back to top