Thread: Firearm licencing

Originally Posted by CovertHunter

I applied for a first time License December 2020, Will be a 9 month wait by the time I do the course in September 21.

What was interesting is I emailed the FAO a couple weeks ago about the wait time, I then received a confirmation letter the next day that was dated a couple months back.. wtf

Also is anyone able to tell me if the "practical training" after the test is a 1 on 1 or a group activity? cheers

Bad news for you but it's probably going to be much longer than a 9 month wait, after the test you still have to wait until the AO gets in touch for the safe inspection and interview. In my case that was 4 months after I did the test. Then you'll have to wait after that for them to tell you the outcome. And then you'll have to wait more to get the actual licence card in the mail.

The test itself is harder that I expected, they get everyone to sit it right at the beginning and you can only get 2 questions out of 30 wrong, except for the first 7 or 8 questions where you can't get any wrong. If you fail this test you'll be able to resit it with the alternate version at the end of the course. If you fail this then that's it. Don't underestimate the test, just under half the group I was with failed both attempts (although the instructor did say this was the most he had ever seen fail, maybe the group I was in was particularly bad). If I hadn't studied the whole arms code and relied on the online modules I would have failed it.

The practical training is probably the easiest part of the day. They split everyone into groups of 4 - 5 and you take turns practicing moving bolt action and semi auto (deactivated) .22s through the various states (load, action, instant, unload) and saying what state the firearm is in out loud. The course I did had no functioning pump actions but I believe they use these as well. The instructor walks around observing and if you visibly have no idea, are pointing firearms in an unsafe direction, or generally not inspiring confidence he may make notes and notify the police of his thoughts. How I found this out was that one lady in the group I was with was terrifyingly incompetent to the point that most people noticed and / or remarked on it. I asked the instructor after the course what happens in these cases as she technically did pass the theory test.