Registering as a learning provider

certo lets a training provider, an academy, a bootcamp or a certification body issue its course certificates as signed records on each learner's passport. Issuing is free for you and for your learners, and there is no limit on how many certificates you send. Because there is no limit, a person at certo checks every provider before it can issue anything.

Sign up

1. Go to certo.bio/sign-up. Under Signing up for an organisation?, choose Training provider.
2. Enter your e-mail and your organisation's name, then Continue. We e-mail you a six-digit code. No password.
3. On the next step, check the organisation certo found in its company directory, pick the country and your role, and register it.

Use an address on your organisation's own domain if you can. A confirmed address on that domain makes you the organisation's owner at once. A personal address, or one on another domain, means certo checks by hand first.

If your organisation is already on certo, you ask to join it instead, and one of its owners lets you in. Until then you see nothing of it.

Waiting for certo

Right after signing up, your Issuing page reads Waiting for certo. A person at certo confirms the organisation and files its free learning-provider agreement. It usually takes a working day, and you get an e-mail either way.

While you wait:

• Your account and your organisation already exist.
• You can add your team.
• You can complete your company profile (see below).
• Nothing is issued. The button that sends a batch stays disabled until certo approves.

If certo does not approve the organisation, the e-mail gives the reason in certo's own words. Your account and your team stay. Once the problem is fixed, ask again from the Issuer agreement part of your Company profile.

The agreement

Approval files the free learning-provider agreement. It is what lets certo sign the certificates you issue. Your company profile shows it under Kept by certo, as the issuer agreement with the date it was signed.

There is no fee per certificate and no volume cap. The vetting is the control.

Before your first batch

Two more things are needed before the batch opens. Both live on Company profile, and only owners and admins can change them.

What you can issue

A learning provider issues certificates and nothing else: a course, a certification or a licence your organisation awarded to a named learner. Employment and education records are for employers and universities.

Each certificate names the learner, the address they claim it from and the certificate itself, with an optional reference, expiry date and date of birth. The next step is sending certificates to learners.