Reed.co.uk and courses, too good to be true?

[75Black]

I'm currently in a bit of a situation regarding education and employment due to health but that's another story entirely. I currently work as an IT contractor, and have been looking for new opportunities in the sector as the work I do isn't what I would call real IT work. I've been sending out my CV to the usual sites, monster, reed, etc and I came across the courses section and ended up purchasing an "IT Security" package for £99, down from something like £500. It includes a number of modules including CompTIA security, CISCO, CISA, CISSP among others, I'm hoping this is something I can put to use as well as having something good on my CV and move beyond the tedious work I do now, however have I been fleeced?

[SpamDisco]

At that price i'd be surprised if it included the exams, as just the Comptia sec+ exam is £201.
http://www.comptiastore.co.uk/product-p/comptias.h...

[75Black]

While they don't provide the certification exam, they do include practice exams designed to mirror the ones that would be on the actual exam, with an average of 100 questions to prepare you for taking the certification exams. I'm hoping at the very least, the course content will teach me something new.

[rog007]

Continuing professional development is important for obvious reasons. To be most effective for you and any future employer, it has however got to have some relevance, benefit and ideally gravitas.

If your course meets at least one of those, then £99 is not too shabby an investment.

However, if your learning and CV rely too much on those short and usually unaccredited courses, that will become very obvious to a canny employer. At some point, assuming you want to be competitive in the workplace and get better at what you do, some more professional and accredited learning will be essential.

[75Black]

Some basic knowledge but not much, it is a sector I want to at some point break in to and work in so I'm hoping I can get as much out of these courses as possible.

[bigandclever]

100quid's not too much but you could've taken up the 2 day free trial with Simply Cert and evaluated it first.

[mcflurry]

On the bright side, you can also join the NUS as a student, and get discounts

https://www.nus.org.uk/en/nus-extra/discounts/