Skills for Work: Customer Service
Customer service is a 20 hour Skills for Work unit, from Entry 1 to Level 2, about what good and excellent customer service looks like, why it matters to a business, how to communicate with customers, including handling complaints at Level 2, and how teamwork supports good service. It is one unit that learners combine with other 10 or 20 hour units into a Skills for Work, or Skills for Life and Work, Award, Certificate or Diploma. Digital demand is low. No assessment criterion asks for digital work; digital skills appear only where learners research a real workplace and discuss online reviews.
- Awarding body
- WJEC
- Level
- Entry Level 1 to Level 2
- Guided learning hours
- 20
- First taught
- September 2027
- Amount of digital work
- Low
How this unit is assessed
- Entry Level (Entry 1, Entry 2, Entry 3): Three learning outcomes (know what good customer service is, communicate with customers, work as part of a team to provide customer service), with separate assessment criteria at Entry 1, Entry 2 and Entry 3. Evidence goes in a portfolio, internally assessed by the centre and externally quality assured by WJEC. 20 guided learning hours.
- Level 1 and Level 2: Three learning outcomes (understand how to deliver excellent customer service, communicate effectively with customers in various scenarios including complaints, understand the importance of teamwork), with separate assessment criteria at Level 1 and Level 2. Evidence goes in a portfolio, internally assessed by the centre and externally quality assured by WJEC. 20 guided learning hours.
Skills that use Identity, image and reputation
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Understanding online reviews and a business's public image
At Level 1 learners explain two key benefits to a business of excellent customer service, and the amplification lists positive reviews and recommendations and the public image of the business among the examples. The criterion is assessed, but reviews are only one example of a benefit, so looking at online reviews is taught, not assessed.
DCF: Identity, image and reputation, Health and well-being
Getting pupils ready
- Year 7
- Pupils read three printed online reviews of a local cafe and sort them into good service and poor service, underlining the words that show it.
- Year 8
- Pupils compare the star ratings and written reviews for two takeaway shops on a review site and discuss which one they would choose and why.
- Year 9
- Pupils look at how a business replies to good and bad online reviews and explain how each reply could help or harm the business's public image.
Show the specification wording and the DCF statements
Where it is in the specification: Level 1 and Level 2, learning outcome 1, assessment criteria L1 1.2 and L2 1.2, page 7; Amplification of LO1, page 10
“positive reviews and recommendations”
Progression step 3
I can think critically about information shared online, e.g. the impact of sharing images and videos, metadata of images and videos.
I can identify marketing elements designed to draw my attention.
Progression step 4
I can discuss the benefits and risks of presenting myself in different ways online.
I can identify stereotypes and their impact in a range of media.
Good to know
- The unit codes are S655E1, S655E2, S655E3, S655L1 and S655L2, and the unit is 20 guided learning hours in the Skills for Work suite (Unit overview, page 3).
- No special equipment is needed: "Assessment of this unit should not require any specific resources." (Resources required for assessment, page 14), and delivery uses standard classrooms and "commonly available resources" (page 14).
- Evidence does not have to be written or digital. Sources include teacher observation of role play, annotated case studies and "recording of practical demonstrations of evidence, such as role plays or discussions" (Sources of evidence, page 13), and the specification says a portfolio "is not limited to paper-based materials" (section 4.1, page 18).
- Suggested assessment tasks are optional: "These tasks are not mandatory." (Skills for Life and Work specification, section 4.1, page 18).
- AI use must be acknowledged. Properly referenced AI use "can be acceptable", but "Failing to acknowledge use of AI tools when they have been used as a source of information" is malpractice (Skills for Life and Work specification, section 4.6, page 21).
- Appendix A of the specification maps this unit only to Literacy among the integral skills, not to Digital Competence or Numeracy (page 29).
Links with other qualifications
Customer service sits closest to VCSE Retail and Customer Service and Foundation Retail and Customer Service, which cover the same ideas of customer needs, communication and complaints in more depth, and to VCSE Hospitality and Catering, VCSE Travel and Tourism and VCSE Sport and Leisure, where serving customers is part of the work. GCSE Business covers why customer service and reputation matter to a business. The pack names Fairness and inclusion in the workplace, Rights and responsibilities in the workplace, Understanding the changing labour market, Working in Wales and Wellbeing and work as closely related Skills Suite units, and Enterprise venture and Teamwork also link through serving customers and working in a team.
Source: WJEC Customer service unit delivery and assessment pack, read with the WJEC Entry 1 to Level 2 Skills for Life and Skills for Work specification, approved by Qualifications Wales, teaching from September 2027 (© WJEC CBAC Ltd 2026).