NATS interview process
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Waiting Times
"The continuing very high levels of interest in the opportunity to train as an Air Traffic Controller mean that we have sufficient candidates to meet all our 2011 Trainee Air Traffic Control needs. We have therefore taken the decision to close our recruitment system to all new applicants from 1st April 2011.
Existing applicants are not affected by this announcement and will continue to be assessed for a Trainee role."
Existing applicants are not affected by this announcement and will continue to be assessed for a Trainee role."
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@samblundell
I don't believe there is a cure for colour blindness. I suggest you contact the CAA before progressing with your application so as not to waste your or NATS' time, details below.
Aeromedical Centre
Aviation House
Gatwick Airport South Area
Gatwick
West Sussex RH6 0YR
Telephone: 01293 573700
Medical | Safety Regulation
here is a link to the standards they require for vision
"An applicant for a European Class 3 medical certificate must have normal colour vision (normal trichromacy).
An initial applicant must make no errors when tested on the first 15 plates of the standard 24 plate Ishihara Test (a series of numbers outlined by different coloured dots, easily seen by someone with normal colour vision)."
Here is a link for an Ishihara Test
I don't believe there is a cure for colour blindness. I suggest you contact the CAA before progressing with your application so as not to waste your or NATS' time, details below.
Aeromedical Centre
Aviation House
Gatwick Airport South Area
Gatwick
West Sussex RH6 0YR
Telephone: 01293 573700
Medical | Safety Regulation
here is a link to the standards they require for vision
"An applicant for a European Class 3 medical certificate must have normal colour vision (normal trichromacy).
An initial applicant must make no errors when tested on the first 15 plates of the standard 24 plate Ishihara Test (a series of numbers outlined by different coloured dots, easily seen by someone with normal colour vision)."
Here is a link for an Ishihara Test
Join Date: Apr 2011
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Hi everyone, handy forum!
I've got my Stage 1 test at Prestwick tomorrow so I'll let you know how it goes. I'm just not looking forward to the 5 hour journey, I wish there was a more central location for these rather than West Scotland and the very South of England! Especially considering how many days of assessment there are.
I've just been going through the paper and it looks like as long as you put the time in you'll be fine. Also as has been said I imagine the maths isn't too grueling and I'm honestly finding this a refreshment against the physics revision I'm having to do of late!
I've got my Stage 1 test at Prestwick tomorrow so I'll let you know how it goes. I'm just not looking forward to the 5 hour journey, I wish there was a more central location for these rather than West Scotland and the very South of England! Especially considering how many days of assessment there are.
I've just been going through the paper and it looks like as long as you put the time in you'll be fine. Also as has been said I imagine the maths isn't too grueling and I'm honestly finding this a refreshment against the physics revision I'm having to do of late!
Join Date: Feb 2011
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"Stage 1" is near...
Hi Everybody...i've got my "Stage 1 Test" on 15th April at:
"NATS Corporate & Technical Centre,
400 Parkway,
Whiteley,
Fareham,
Hampshire,
PO15 7FL":
next week!!!...........Who is there with me in that date???
I'm looking forward to it...but i'm a bit worried as well...
does anybody know if during the calculation test (fuel/speed/distance/time/...) we can use some white paper to solve and get the result???
is there anybody that has already done the Stage 1Test in the last few months??? if yes...does he have some advice/suggestion??
or if you can report how your experience was...it would be really helpful for me....Thanks a lot in advance!!!!
"NATS Corporate & Technical Centre,
400 Parkway,
Whiteley,
Fareham,
Hampshire,
PO15 7FL":
next week!!!...........Who is there with me in that date???
I'm looking forward to it...but i'm a bit worried as well...
does anybody know if during the calculation test (fuel/speed/distance/time/...) we can use some white paper to solve and get the result???
is there anybody that has already done the Stage 1Test in the last few months??? if yes...does he have some advice/suggestion??
or if you can report how your experience was...it would be really helpful for me....Thanks a lot in advance!!!!
Join Date: Mar 2011
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hey,
about the Stage 1 tests. I just came from there and it wasn't bad at all. I managed to stay for the 2nd part so we'll see in a few days how it went.
About the questions, don't worry too much. It had many questions about the document but nothing difficult. Fortunately there weren't many questions about planes and that made things a bit easier. If you've read the document a few times, you should be ok.
Afterwards were the math questions, nothing that hasn't been discussed arround here, nothing very difficult but some maybe a little bit more complex about head ons, descent ratios but still manageable.
In the second part, we did diagramming and the cubes. It's pretty much what they gave us to train but more extense. The diagramming part has much more codes than those they gave us but the cubes it's about the same thing. Can't really say much as I don't yet know the results of this part. I found it easy though. It's important not to panic, the lady said no one ever made the tests completely in due time
And that's that.
Hope it helps, good luck for all*
Aha, make sure you're there 15min earlier, as security may take a little while. Seemed like NASA or smth.
about the Stage 1 tests. I just came from there and it wasn't bad at all. I managed to stay for the 2nd part so we'll see in a few days how it went.
About the questions, don't worry too much. It had many questions about the document but nothing difficult. Fortunately there weren't many questions about planes and that made things a bit easier. If you've read the document a few times, you should be ok.
Afterwards were the math questions, nothing that hasn't been discussed arround here, nothing very difficult but some maybe a little bit more complex about head ons, descent ratios but still manageable.
In the second part, we did diagramming and the cubes. It's pretty much what they gave us to train but more extense. The diagramming part has much more codes than those they gave us but the cubes it's about the same thing. Can't really say much as I don't yet know the results of this part. I found it easy though. It's important not to panic, the lady said no one ever made the tests completely in due time
And that's that.
Hope it helps, good luck for all*
Aha, make sure you're there 15min earlier, as security may take a little while. Seemed like NASA or smth.
Join Date: Apr 2011
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For my first post I should start by thanking everyone on this site who has helped me thus far by sharing their experiences and knowledge.
Another attendee of the Prestwick April 8th stage 1 here.
Congrats to everyone who made it to the end of the day and best of luck with the rest of the process.
(Except for that one person I didn't like. No luck for you
)
I personally found the Diagramming and Cube tests to be the easiest part of the day. Despite what was said at the start about nobody completing all of the questions I still managed to finish both papers without any guesses and time to spare. But, of course, I think the point of them saying that is to prevent anybody from panicing about how many they do. Getting them right is more important.
I could write some tips that help me if anyone is interested but I suspect it may be a case of 'some folk just find it easier than others'.
Since this is the first time in the course of this application that I've felt confident about how I've done it'll be even worse if I fail at this stage.
If all goes well then the next hurdle would be the online personality questionaire. In my scouring of this thread I found this statement:
I haven't found anything to corroborate this so if anyone has any info regarding this I'd love to hear it (with my personality I can use all the help I can get).
Good luck to everyone (at all stages).
Another attendee of the Prestwick April 8th stage 1 here.
Congrats to everyone who made it to the end of the day and best of luck with the rest of the process.
(Except for that one person I didn't like. No luck for you
)I personally found the Diagramming and Cube tests to be the easiest part of the day. Despite what was said at the start about nobody completing all of the questions I still managed to finish both papers without any guesses and time to spare. But, of course, I think the point of them saying that is to prevent anybody from panicing about how many they do. Getting them right is more important.
I could write some tips that help me if anyone is interested but I suspect it may be a case of 'some folk just find it easier than others'.
Since this is the first time in the course of this application that I've felt confident about how I've done it'll be even worse if I fail at this stage.
If all goes well then the next hurdle would be the online personality questionaire. In my scouring of this thread I found this statement:
If you have been asked to do a Personality questionaire, then you have made the minimum grade for the initial tests - Well Done! But beware, coz you can fail the PQ!
I had my stage 3 last week and we took the opportunity to ask HR about it. It seems to be that if you pass the initial tests by a wide margin, then its pretty much impossible to fail the PQ. However, if you only just make the grade, then it is quite easy to fail the PQ. As at this stage you don't know how you did, then you can't know how easy it is to fail on an individual level. Savvy?
I had my stage 3 last week and we took the opportunity to ask HR about it. It seems to be that if you pass the initial tests by a wide margin, then its pretty much impossible to fail the PQ. However, if you only just make the grade, then it is quite easy to fail the PQ. As at this stage you don't know how you did, then you can't know how easy it is to fail on an individual level. Savvy?
Good luck to everyone (at all stages).
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Hi Everyone,
my 1 stage test is near...on 15th April: next week!!!
oes anybody know if during the calculation test we are allowed to use some paper to write down the calculations and getting the result???
Thanks in advance...
my 1 stage test is near...on 15th April: next week!!!
oes anybody know if during the calculation test we are allowed to use some paper to write down the calculations and getting the result???
Thanks in advance...
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I'm currently at the college at Hurn and if you aren't already aware, NATS is moving the college from Bournemouth Airport to the Corporate and Technical Centre (CTC) in Whiteley as of August 2011. They have stopped trainee intake until after this data because the courses wouldn't have time to finish before the move. We are the last course that's going to graduate from Hurn assuming we all pass. They have also been doing a hell of a lot of work modifying course to keep them in line with the SESAR (Single European Sky) initiative from Eurocontrol and to satisfy EU law. Our aerodrome course is the 1st of the new format as well, subsequent courses will get the same as us providing it gets CAA certification, so that's just a couple of reasons intake has been suspended. Anyone joining after August be assured, the new college at CTC is absolutely state of the art. NATS has spent about £3m on the new sims there. We're getting to test them out next month 
Thanks very much for this news. I, for one, was not aware of this and I'm sure I would've remained ignorant had you not mentioned it.
I can't find any official announcements but it does explain why they stopped taking applications this year.
If your class was the last intake (January) and there isn't another until August then it's fair to assume that the next intake or two will be very popular.
If you, or anyone else, (an HR rep maybe) can provide any further details now or in the future then please do. I'm sure I'm not the only one who finds this relevent to their interests.
Thanks again. Have fun with the sims and good luck with the rest of your course.
@ Giuseppe G.
We were given scrap paper before our arithmetic test, however, you'll be at Fareham while I was at Prestwick so it may be different.
Not to worry though. For both the Motivational test and arithmetic the answer sheet is blank on the reverse side. Flip the page, instant scrap paper.
This was handy because they didn't hand out the scrap paper until after the Motivational and there were a couple quick math questions slotted in there.
Good luck.
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I sat the online test 5-6 weeks ago and still haven't had a response.
I'm sure I read somewhere that NATS get back with a yay or nay within around 3 weeks.
Should I call them?
I'm sure I read somewhere that NATS get back with a yay or nay within around 3 weeks.
Should I call them?
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thanks for that update
Topman ,thanks alot for let us know that. hun so how about your experience during your selection test? I have done alot partice on the stages and I have been reading many techinical ,motivationl books and journals on it both on Nats and ATC service .I am stil concern that if have tailor myself to fit in for NATS. I will like to know what things that make stand out different from others which make you get the offer. I really want to become an ATCO pls need advise on all aspect the selection test.
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Hi.
Is anyone sitting their stage 2 exams in Fareham on the 3rd of May ? I'm flying down on the 2nd from Scotland and staying in the Premier Inn on Southampton road in Fareham.
Let me know if you are
Is anyone sitting their stage 2 exams in Fareham on the 3rd of May ? I'm flying down on the 2nd from Scotland and staying in the Premier Inn on Southampton road in Fareham.
Let me know if you are