Animal Courses Direct Reviews 

The course was easy to navigate and very flexible - I could do it at my own pace. The help and guidance provided by my tutor Karen Marsh was invaluable. My emailed questions were always answered quickly and when coursework was submitted marking was prompt and feedback was constructive.

I had a good time doing this course and my tutor Clair Cummings was a great help when needed, and responded to my email quickly. Will definatly be looking into more courses in the future.

Course was interesting and there were lots of extra learning materials. Now just waiting for my tutor to review and send me feedback!

Very good. learning something new and a lot of help when needed.

Paid for course, completed course now can't get certificate.
Waiting over a month again for an email response!
Don't pay any money to these crooks!

Without going into (a lot!!) of detail, my experience with Learn Direct has been a nightmare. I would never recommend to anyone. It took two and a half years (and over 30 emails) to receive my certificate and even then it was a duplicate as they had ''lost'' my original. Today, I have received an email from Ryan Newman with regards to my original certificate. He is the one and only competent, literate and efficient member of the entire staff I have had to deal with since February 2020. Thank you Ryan. DO NOT go with Learn Direct, they are appalling.

UPDATE....
Upon completion of course last year. I'm still waiting for my certificate over 7 months now. All I get is a sorry from them when I email.
Very poor customer support in sorting this out. Which has took it from 5 stars down to 1 star!

Level 3 canine care/behaviour
Excellent content. Definitely recommend the course. I had Karen Marsh as my tutor. Always at hand to answer questions when needed.
I'll be looking at doing my level 4 canine behaviour course soon. And I'll be definitely coming back to this company.
🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟

The advice from tutor Charlotte Jackson and advice staffs(Eloise) was replied quickly. And their responses were very detailed and helpful
The practical placement in Blackpool zoo was great and enriched more with knowledge I learned in the course.

Very informative and knowledgeable.
Can’t wait to start my course.

The support, guidance and timeframes of marking assignments and replies were always within the specified timeframes and Clair Cummings always went above her expections to offer guidance/support. I am very happy with the help and service that Clair Cummings has provided, I am very appreciative of this service. Thank you Clair.

Terrible.
Finished course theory 7 months ago, still waiting for practical placing. Moving goal posts all the time.
Do not, do not use them.

The course material was really thorough with everything you need to know about zookeeping and the placement week was an amazing experience.

Please can someone call me back for once ?? Seems I might only get a response and a conversation with someone if I post it on here .

Wouldn’t recommend this company at all!

Take your money and then don’t get anything sorted! I enrolled and then had to continuously chase them to get started as they didn’t bother to send any of my course through! I then had a change of circumstances and cancelled my course (within the 14 day cool off period) have been continuously told I will get my refund and 40 days later I still haven’t got my money back! I’ve called 5 times and emailed 4 times.

Now having to take legal action just to get my money back.

The courses are well structured, assessment critera is concise and easily understood, additional resources are provided and it's nice to see your hard work pay off as your course progresses. Ariane Holder is my Hydrotherapy assessor and she's great. She marks submitted assignments quickly between 1 - 5 working days. The feedback is always warm and concise and she's told me exactly what I need to improve on and provides plenty of praise as well. Happy with my overall experience so far.

Really enjoyed the course and learnt so much (and I thought I knew about dogs!), although it is A LOT to take in and absorb - however this means I feel well-prepared for what is coming up. Due to external events the course took me a whole year longer than I had expected and the strict marking scheme (100% correct answers are required) have played a part in that.
My tutor Karen however has been fabulous, responding promptly most of the time, she also gave me valuable feedback and advice - even when I asked her a million questions! She was also reassuring and professional. She marked my assessments on time and was always there when I needed her. Thank you Karen :)

My tutor was really helpful and the work was set out clearly. The information was easy to read and understand and the questions were challenging enough. The questions allowed you to branch out and research more which I liked.

Sigute Vitkus is a customer service agent who has gone above and beyond to assist me since I completed my course. He was very responsive and always happy to answer any questions I had. When I received my certificate with incorrect spelling, Sigute helped me every step of the way and assisted me on receiving a new one. When the person on duty for posting my new certificate was sick, Sigute went personally to post my new certificate. As someone who suffers from anxiety, Sigute made the whole experience bearable. Please recognise him for all he has done when no one else assisted.

My experience was made great by my tutor Clair Cummings, when I emailed she always responded quickly, even marking my work on a Sunday, she was helpful & instructive & friendly which helps a lot.

I recently completed the Rabbit Studies diploma. As someone with a huge interest in rabbits and over 25 years experience as a rabbit owner, I was really excited to find this course available. Generally, I was happy with the modules covered, and I learnt about the biology of rabbits, was given new ideas on ways to enrich my rabbits lives, and feel more confident in how I take care of my rabbits.

However, I feel the course was low quality for the price I paid.

In terms of the course materials, there were multiple errors in the text and sentences that didn't make sense which made it hard to read at times. There were also various external links that didn't work. Additionally, in one section there were references leading me to believe I would be writing an essay to complete the module, which I prepared for, but instead found the final assessment was a multiple choice exam.

I noticed information that is out of date with current research (e.g. a lot of mentions of mixed dry food which is not considered something that should be fed anymore, and a mention of feeding plum trees to rabbits which are now considered an unsafe wood as they contain arsenic which can be toxic.) There was also conflicting information (e.g. a recommendations of a cat ball with bell being used as an enrichment toy, then an attached PDF stating these are dangerous to rabbits).

In terms of the modules covered, I was generally happy, but I would have liked some more information on diet - I felt that this module was very focused on how their digestive system works but lacking in practical information about what to feed. There were also various sections about other animals that didn't seem relevant, plus a huge amount of information on cleaning/hazardous materials in the final module that could have been condensed.

Unlike other reviews I've noticed, there is no tutor for this course, or exams that are marked by a real person - it is all done online and the certificate is auto-generated at the end. This was not a problem for me at all, but I don't think it is very clearly mentioned at the beginning.

In conclusion, the course is on the right track, but it really needs someone to review the information, make sure it is up-to-date with current research and to proof read to fix all the errors - this would make the course higher quality and value for money.