Not told Family certificate not available
I enrolled as a member and paid the registration fee with CILEx themselves to have access to the Certificate in Family Law course. However, once enrolled, I was not actually able to purchase the course from CILEx Law School. The course shop did not have the course listed, even though a welcome email I was sent directed me there to purchase the course materials. I also note here that, although CILEx and CILEx Law School proport to be separate entities, this is not really the case from my experience and they very much seem integrated (in other words, you have to buy the Law School courses from the shop, which is located within the main CILEx portal).
The only learning material I had was a digital textbook from CILEx themselves; however, my understanding is that you have to be enrolled with a training centre to take the exams. You can go through and book them, but my understanding is that not being enrolled with a training centre is considered exam malpractice if CILEx find out.
This left me in limbo, as I had effectively paid out over £500 for nothing. Other training centres did not have the Family Certificate available yet either. In other words, CILEx themselves should not be offering enrolment on the certificate at the moment. The welcome email I received from CILEx themselves said that CILEx Law School was the only provider for the Family Certificate.
Upon contacting CILEx, I was informed that the Family certificate was not available until the end of January. Nowhere did it ever say this at enrolment; the implication is that you can start straight away.
I wanted to do this to dip my toes into law, but the issue is that starting the course in January would have been outside CILEx's 14 day cooling off period. Had I waited until January and then decided the course was not for me, I would not have been able to get a refund on my CILEx membership and course registration fee, even if I may have been able to get a refund from CILEx law school for the course materials.
This was a risk I was not willing to take, so unfortunately decided not to continue with the certificate. I was able to get a refund in the end.
I am writing this to warn any others who are thinking of doing the Family Practice certificate. I also believe that the Wills and Probate certificate may not be available yet at the moment, as other training centres don't seem to offer it.
This experience has unfortunately left me with a sour taste in my mouth, and I will be staying away from CILEx in the future.
20 November 2024
Unprompted review