A four-week EIAT study plan

Four weeks of regular practice is enough for most people. The plan below assumes a few hours a week rather than full days, and it is built around one principle: practise the way you will sit the test — on paper, timed, without a calculator.

Apprentice Tests is an independent practice resource. We are not affiliated with, endorsed by, or connected to NEIEP, the IUEC, any local union or any elevator company. Recruitment rules and test formats are set by NEIEP and the locals, and they change — always follow the guidance issued with your own recruitment.

Before you start: get the kit right

Pencil, eraser, scrap paper, a clock. No phone calculator within reach. If you practise with a calculator you are training a skill the test does not measure.

Week 1 — find out where you stand

Take one timed section from each of the three areas plus the tools section. Do not revise first. The point is a baseline, not a good score.

Write down your percentage for each. One will be clearly worse than the others. That section gets the largest share of your time for the next fortnight.

Also use this week to learn the two format quirks that catch people out: the reading section is a cloze passage, and maths questions have a fifth "No answer" option that is sometimes correct.

Week 2 — rebuild the arithmetic

For most adults this is the week that matters. Work through, by hand:

• Long division with decimals, until moving the decimal point is automatic.
• Converting mixed numbers to improper fractions, then multiplying and dividing them.
• Order of operations on nested expressions, writing each step down rather than holding it in your head.
• Percentages built from ten per cent rather than multiplied out.

Little and often beats one long session. Twenty minutes a day will move this faster than three hours on a Sunday.

Week 3 — mechanical and tools

The mechanical section rests on a short list of ideas: gears alternate direction, smaller gears turn faster, turning effect is weight times distance, count the rope sections supporting a load, force follows piston area, wide and low is hard to tip. Learn those six and most questions answer themselves.

Spend an evening on the tape measure until reading to a sixteenth is instant. It is the highest return per minute of anything in this plan, because the tool assessment feeds your interview score.

Week 4 — full runs and the interview

Sit complete timed sections back to back, on paper, in one go. You are training stamina and pacing now, not learning content. Note where you slowed down.

Then stop working on the test and start on the interview, which is what actually ranks you. Have an answer ready for why this trade, what you know about the work, and a time you handled something difficult.

The day before

Do not cram. Re-read your notes on the two format quirks, check what you need to bring, and sleep. Hand arithmetic gets worse when you are tired, and this is a test where tired costs marks.

Every section has a free sample on our EIAT practice page.