More PQA issues

[kr1s]

Hello all

Im retained and thinking of applying wholetime next recruitment.

Ive had a look at the dreaded PQA's and have down loaded as much info as I can. The posts on here have been a big help aswel.

Ive heard that the initial appliations which includes the pqa's are dealt with by a seperate 'company' and know of retained firemen that have applied this time round and got a thanks but no thanks letter as they didnt score well on the pqa's??

How can you be a competent, seving Ff on one contract and not be good enough for another contract. This is a big can of worms. Ive even heard of the applications being turned down and then when the brigade has been pressed the applicant has been reinstated and put forward to the interview stage.....??

Has anyone on here transferred from the RDS to wholetime recently and what was the application experience like?

Cheers

[fire999]

Hi

Dont be put of by the pqa's they are not as scary as they look, the important thing is to be yourself and draw from your own life experience.

I am retained have been trying to transfer to wholetime for 5 years, I passed the paper sift, written and physical test and pqa interview and was put on a holiding list that has now expired.

I have since applied to 2 other brigades and not got through the paper shift. I have passed my itop exam and am now acting up as cm on my retained station.

I have also just had a request to transfer to a different brigade as a wholetime ff rejected because I am retained although the day crewed station I had applied for is desperate for crew members, the letter actualy said that if I was sucessful in becoming wholetime within my own brigade, let them know and once I am competent and I can transfer. I thought that by completing my ipds pdr I was a competent ff and not a competant retained ff but hey!

What is worse is that the fbu have given me no support at  all.

[kr1s]

Thanks fire999

It just reinforces whats happening local to me, is it the brigade or the outsource people that just 'score' the applications that are making the decisions.

In my brigade there has been a big push to align retained and wholetime to the same training and records, intergrating recruits courses and multipump drills with rds and wt staff yet at recruitment its still a mountain to climb to get in.

I also wonder why the union is so quiet on the subject?