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NVQ Level 2 Plastering
The qualification behind the Blue CSCS Skilled Worker card for plasterers, assessed on the jobs you are already on. Solid or fibrous, no college and no exam. Register any week and go at your own pace.
Why candidates choose Acadame
What makes our Level 2 NVQ Plastering different
About this qualification
The Level 2 NVQ Diploma in Plastering (Construction) is the qualification CSCS accept for the Blue Skilled Worker card, and the one most plasterers who learned on the tools hold instead of a college certificate. It is not taught. It records, against the national occupational standards, the plastering you already do: preparing backgrounds, boarding, floating and setting, skimming, rendering, or fixing and repairing fibrous work, done safely and to the specification.
It is awarded by GQA Qualifications on a solid or a fibrous pathway, each at a basic or a full level. Solid basic is for the plasterer whose work is mostly skimming over boards and backgrounds. Solid full is for float and set inside and sand and cement or proprietary render outside. Fibrous basic is for fixing and repairing cornices, roses and mouldings, and fibrous full adds making the components. The certificate carries the pathway, and the Blue card is the same whichever you take.
Assessment is a portfolio of photographs, job sheets and witness testimony from your own jobs, an observation of you plastering and a professional discussion with your assessor, most of it from your phone and by video call. There is no fixed duration: you register any week and finish as quickly as your jobs produce the evidence.
- Nothing new, if you are already plastering to a commercial standard. The qualification records what you do rather than teaching it
- How to evidence a job properly: what a photograph at each stage, a job sheet and a witness testimony from the site manager each prove
- Which pathway your week evidences, solid or fibrous, basic or full, and which options give you the most credits for the least effort
- Where the Level 3 Plastering sits, and whether the complex work you do already points at it
How completing this qualification helps you
- The Level 2 NVQ Diploma in Plastering (Construction), certificated by GQA on the solid or fibrous pathway
- Eligibility for the Blue CSCS Skilled Worker card, once you have passed the health and safety test, issued by GQA under their own CSCS card scheme
- A temporary CSCS card on registration, in case you need one while you complete
- A Level 2 that never expires, which is what main contractors ask for before they let a plasterer through the gate
Who is it for?
Plasterers who learned on the tools and hold no formal qualification, self employed plasterers who need a card for commercial sites, and anyone whose Blue card or old Industry Accreditation card has run out without a qualification behind it. If you mix, board out and help but a plasterer finishes the work, talk to us first, because you need enough of your own work to evidence.
Entry requirements. There are no formal entry requirements. What you do need is live plastering work to evidence from, because every unit is assessed on real jobs: your photographs, your job sheets, your site manager's word. Most people are assessed on their normal week. The initial assessment below confirms this before you pay anything.
Ready to find out if you qualify?
The initial assessment takes a couple of minutes and nothing is typed: you click through what you do and what you can evidence, and it tells you the pathway, the level and what to gather. Or ask MB and get an answer straight away.
Initial assessment
Check you qualify, in a couple of minutes
Nothing to type. Click through what you do, the kind of plastering you are on and what you can evidence, and it shows you the pathway that fits and the evidence your assessor will ask for. It is about what you can evidence, not a test: anything you cannot evidence yet is something we plan with you and your employer. These answers are your initial assessment, and you can email yourself a PDF of it.
The online check needs JavaScript. Without it, tell us what you do and we will run the initial assessment with you over the phone.
What you evidence
The units behind the qualification
Three units are mandatory whichever pathway you take, worth 10 credits. Solid basic adds finishing plaster and at least 11 credits of options (39 credits minimum). Solid full adds internal solid finishes and external render and at least 25 credits of options (79 credits minimum). Fibrous basic adds fixing and repairing fibrous components (37 credits, the qualification minimum). Fibrous full adds producing them (54 credits). 124 guided learning hours, 370 hours total qualification time. Nothing is taught: each unit is evidenced from your own work.
The three units everyone completes (10 credits)
- A/503/1170 Conforming to general health, safety and welfare in the workplace (2 credits)
- J/503/1169 Conforming to productive working practices in the workplace (3)
- F/503/1171 Moving, handling and storing resources in the workplace (5)
Solid plastering, basic or full
- Solid basic: A/600/7686 Applying finishing plaster to background surfaces in the workplace (18), plus at least 11 credits of options. 39 credits minimum
- Solid full: R/600/7693 Producing internal solid plastering finishes in the workplace (22) and D/600/7695 Producing external solid render finishes in the workplace (22), plus at least 25 credits of options. 79 credits minimum
- The pathway most site plasterers take. Skimming alone is basic; float and set plus external render is full
Fibrous plastering, basic or full
- Fibrous basic: K/600/7859 Positioning and securing fibrous plaster components in the workplace (13) and T/600/7864 Repairing fibrous plaster components in the workplace (14). 37 credits, no options required
- Fibrous full: the two basic units plus J/600/7867 Producing fibrous plaster components in the workplace (17). 54 credits, no options required
- For fixers and repairers of cornices, roses and mouldings on site, and for shop work where you cast the components too
Options on the solid pathways
- H/600/7696 Installing direct bond dry linings in the workplace (15)
- K/600/6565 Laying sand and cement screeds to levels and/or falls in the workplace (11)
- T/600/7699 Applying projection plaster and maintaining equipment in the workplace (16)
- Y/600/7713 Installing mechanically fixed plasterboard in the workplace (14)
- On solid basic the internal solid finishes and external render units (22 each) also count as options; on solid full the finishing plaster unit (18) does
- Anything you evidence beyond the minimum is listed on the certificate as additional credits
Method of assessment
How the Level 2 plastering NVQ on-site assessment works
Competence based, which means no exam and no written test. You build a portfolio of evidence from the jobs you are on, your assessor watches you plaster and you talk the knowledge through in a professional discussion. The online check above is your initial assessment; there is no separate skills scan.
1. Initial assessment, online
The questions you click through above are your initial assessment. They tell us whether your work is solid or fibrous, basic or full, whether you have enough live work to evidence it, and whether the complex work you do already points at the Level 3 instead.
2. Register with GQA
We register you with GQA under qualification number 600/6511/4 on your pathway. That registration can also release a temporary CSCS card in case you need one, once we have your HS&E test result report, a passport style photograph and the right postal address.
3. Evidence from your own jobs
Photographs of the work at each stage, from the bare background to the finished wall, job sheets and day sheets, the drawings and specifications you worked to, delivery notes, witness testimony from the site manager, the RAMS and toolbox talks you signed, the CoSHH sheets for your materials. Your assessor tells you exactly what each unit needs.
4. Workplace observation
Your assessor comes to the job and watches you plaster: setting up, applying, ruling off, trowelling up and cleaning down, and records what they see against the standard.
5. Professional discussion
A recorded conversation about why you work the way you do. It covers the knowledge a photograph cannot show: why that plaster on that background, suction control, drying times, what you do when the specification will not work.
6. Certificate, then the card
Internal quality assurance, then GQA issue the certificate. Pass the CITB Operatives test, or GQA's own health and safety test, and we apply to GQA for your Blue Skilled Worker card.
After the qualification
Getting the Blue card, not just the certificate
The qualification is only half of it. The Blue Skilled Worker card needs the Level 2 qualification and a pass in a health and safety test taken within the last two years, either the CITB Health, Safety and Environment test for Operatives or GQA's own test. Not the Specialist test, and not the Managers and Professionals test. We book the right one for you. GQA issue their own CSCS cards, so the certificate and the card both come from GQA, and the card carries the CSCS logo and is read on site like any other.
You do not have to wait for any of that to be on site. GQA issue a temporary CSCS card as soon as we register you, in case you need one while you complete, and post it to you direct. We pick up the cost. You give us your HS&E test result report, a passport style photograph and the exact postal address, because GQA send it once and we will not pay for it twice if the address is wrong. It is not a free Blue card: that follows the certificate.
- CITB Health, Safety and Environment test at Operatives level, or GQA's own test, booked with us
- Blue Skilled Worker card application, which we make to GQA for you, valid five years
- Temporary card on registration, in case you need one, posted by GQA
- The Level 3 Plastering next, if the complex work is already yours
Level 2 NVQ Plastering FAQs
No. There is no classroom and no exam. Everything is assessed on the plastering you already do, through photographs and documents from your own jobs, an observation of you working and a professional discussion with your assessor.
As long as you take. There is no fixed duration, no cohort and no term dates: you register any week and the qualification is led by you. Most plasterers finish inside a few months alongside the job, and someone with a phone full of photographs from recent jobs can be quicker.
The Blue Skilled Worker card, valid five years. You need the Level 2 certificate plus a pass in the CITB Health, Safety and Environment test for Operatives, or GQA's own health and safety test, within the last two years, then the card application, which we make to GQA for you. The Level 3 gets the Gold Skilled Worker card.
Yes, in case you need one. GQA issue a temporary card as soon as we register you and post it to you direct, at our cost. We need your HS&E test result report, a passport style photograph and the exact address to send it to. It is not a free Blue card: the Blue card follows the certificate.
The one your jobs already evidence. If most of your week is skimming over boards and backgrounds, that is solid basic. If you float and set inside and render outside, that is solid full. If you fix and repair cornices, roses and mouldings, that is fibrous basic, and if you cast the components as well it is fibrous full. The Blue card is the same whichever you take, and the initial assessment on this page works it out from what you click.
Photographs of each job at stages, from the bare background to the finished surface, job sheets or day sheets, the drawings and specifications you worked to, delivery notes for boards and plaster, witness testimony from the site manager, the RAMS and toolbox talk records you signed, and the CoSHH sheets for your materials. Your assessor maps each one to a unit and tells you what is missing.
You carry on from the next job. Evidence can come from more than one job and your assessor plans the units around what your next job will produce. Anything you cannot evidence yet is something we plan with you and your employer, and the initial assessment shows it before you pay.
Yes. Employers can be invoiced and can put several plasterers through as one booking. A CITB grant may be available to CITB registered employers, and we check what applies before you commit. Self employed plasterers pay direct, with interest free instalments if you want them.
£850 + VAT. That is the whole qualification: registration with the awarding body, your assessor, the visits, the portfolio and the certificate. There is no separate exam fee and no course fee on top, because there is no course to attend. The CSCS card is applied for separately and CSCS charge their own fee for it.
Yes, and for a plasterer who has been on the tools for years and never had the paperwork that is the normal route. There is no set length. You are assessed on the work you are already doing, so the pace is set by how quickly the evidence comes together rather than by a timetable. People who already have photographs, job records and a supervisor who will sign a witness statement often finish inside a few weeks. Nobody is held back waiting for a term to start.
Your assessor comes to you, on your own jobs, in your own working week. They watch you work, take photographs, ask you why you did it that way, and record it against the units. Between visits you upload evidence and your assessor tells you what is still missing. There is no college, no classroom and no written exam.
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Putting several people through?
One assessor and one invoice for the whole team
Group registrations are common on frameworks and large sites. We assess on site so nobody leaves the project, and we handle the awarding body, the certificates and the cards in one place.