ON: Major win for propane industry and Ontario trainers

A major win for the propane industry and for Ontario trainers: Trainers in Ontario will now no longer be required to renew their training certification through an exam every three years.

For years now, the Canadian Propane Association/Propane Training Institute had made the case that requiring long-standing, professional propane trainers to write exams for their recertification added unnecessary cost and bureaucracy. Ontario was the only province in Canada that forced trainers to take an exam for their recertification even though they were active trainers. They were required to pay to be supervised to take an exam they regularly administered to the students they trained, costing the propane industry hundreds of thousands of dollars every year.

The CPA/PTI was finally able to show Ontario’s Technical Standards and Safety Authority (TSSA) that our renewal process ensures competency amongst PTI trainers without the requirement of an additional examination for active trainers.  In fact, the TSSA’s revised model is based on the one used by the CPA/PTI in that trainers who have trained in the past 12 months are exempted from taking an exam to renew their certification.

Now the province is aligned with the rest of Canada, where trainers who have actively trained within the last year will not be required to write an exam to prove their competency.

For full details on the TSSA’s revised requirements, view Record of Training (ROT) Policies and Procedures.

The actual change to the Policy is the following:

Exemption for qualified and approved instructors:

• ROT holders identified as approved and qualified instructors for an accredited training provider are exempt from completing the recertification requirements so long as the instructor has delivered the ROT training program during the last 12-months.
• Note:
  
  • This exemption only applies to instructors who have met the instructor qualification criteria and have been approved by TSSA.
  • If an instructor has not delivered the ROT program once in the previous 12 months, that instructor no longer qualifies for the exemption, and must successfully complete the ROT training program and obtain an ROT, following the regular process as defined by the accredited training provider.