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The Services SETA (Sector Education and Training Authority) bridges the gap between the formal education and training system and the workplace by facilitating and funding learning programmes that build skillsets required by different industries in the world of work.

With skills programmes, you can choose to learn a specified amount of work consisting of a group of unit standards, whereas with a learnership you have to complete an entire qualification. The exit points of skills programmes are generally prescribed by the needs of the learners.

You must be a South African citizen older than 18 and younger than 30 to be eligible for a learnership.

1. For each year that a learner is registered for a learnership linked to the employer’s trade, the employer claims an allowance of R30 000 for that learnership. This allowance is based on a 12 months periods, and full periods of a month, so if a learnership starts half way through the employer’s year of assessment, half of the allowance is claimed by the employer in the first year and half in the second.
2. If the learner leaves during the year, there is no recoupment. The R30 000 is merely apportioned for the part of the year, so that if the learner leaves after 4 months, the employer only claims 4/12 of the allowance, i.e. R10 000. These must be full months, so if the learner leaves after 3 and a half months, the allowance must be claimed for 3 months, i.e. 3/12 X R30 000 = R7 500.
3. Similarly, if a learnership spans 3 and half months in the first year of assessment and 8 and a half months in the second year of assessment of a single employer, the employer claims commencement allowance of R7 500 in the first year and R20 000 in the second year.
4. If the learner goes to another employer while he is still doing his learnership and the learnership is carried on, linked to that employer’s trade, the new employer claims the learnership for the rest of the year, i.e. 8/12 X R30 000 = R20 000. The new employer will also claim the full completion allowance, even if the learner was not employed by that employer in the earlier years or months of the learnership.
5. If a learner fails his or her learnership and registers for a new learnership, section 12H will not apply to the new learnership if it contains the same education and training component of the learnership that the person failed.
6. These in addition to learnership discretionary grants, is a substantial amount that is made available to subsidise the training of a learner on a learnership.

There are 2 levels:

1. R30 000 commencement and completion allowances for learnerships and apprenticeships;
2. R50 000 commencement and completion allowances for learners with disabilities.

An employer can terminate the contract of a learnership if:

• The duration specified in the learnership agreement has expired;
• The employer and learner have agreed in writing to terminate the learnership agreement, or if there is no such agreement, the SETA that registered the agreement approves the termination; or
• The learner is fairly dismissed for a reason related to the learner’s conduct or capacity as an employee.