BLS and BRIQ: study for DB-U registration at your own pace

Builders Licence Success (BLS) has teamed up with BRIQ, our sister study app for Victorian builders, so you can study for DB-U registration on your phone, at your own pace, instead of building your week around a classroom. If you want more help, BLS also offers one-on-one training with experienced industry trainers.

Here’s what that means if you’re working towards Domestic Builder (Unlimited) registration with the Building and Plumbing Commission (BPC).

Why skip the classroom course?

Short courses squeeze the study into a block. They still run on the course’s timetable: set days or nights, a set room or a set video call, and a pace that suits the room rather than you. For a working builder, that usually means time off the tools, or hours in a chair after a full day on site.

Then there are the intensives: a few long days back to back, with the whole lot crammed in. By day four, most of us can’t remember what we had for brekkie, let alone a clause from day one.

They aren’t cheap either. One well-known Victorian course provider lists its training and application package at $7,495 including GST. Quotes passed on to us put its hard-copy reference book pack at around $2,350 to $2,750 on top of that.

Here’s the catch: BPC doesn’t allow printed or saved PDF copies in its online assessment. You open the permitted references on screen, and any Australian Standards you need come through your own online access, bought from Standards Australia or one of its authorised distributors and paid for by you (BPC permitted reference materials). BPC is only letting people with hard copies sit in person for a transition period, and says that option will end. Australian Standards are yours to buy, so there’s no reason to pay a mark-up on them through a course. Buy only what your class needs, in a form you can use on the day.

That’s a lot to spend before BPC has even looked at your file. If it’s more than you want to spend, Check your next step and talk to us about your options.

And the course itself isn’t what gets you registered. BPC reviews your qualifications and experience for the class you apply for, and checks that you’re a fit and proper person (BPC registration requirements). It also says it may disregard experience gained as part of a training course.

What a classroom can’t change is how you’ll be assessed. BPC’s new single assessment, starting with DB-U, replaces both the old face-to-face interview and the plan-based test. It’s done on a screen, with question types like multiple choice, drag and drop, reorder, true or false and image select, and you use the permitted reference materials online, inside the assessment (BPC building assessments). BPC tells you if you need to sit it. For now, it’s running them in person at its Head Office on a BPC laptop, but it’s still on a screen.

So it makes sense to study the way you’ll be assessed: on a screen, a bit at a time, wherever you are.

What does BRIQ give you?

BRIQ was started by Melbourne tradies who’d been stuck with the classroom route themselves. It runs on iPhone and in a web browser, and your progress follows you between the two. You get:

• Short lessons and practice questions on the NCC, Victorian building law and Australian Standards.
• Timed practice, so you get used to working against the clock.
• More of what you get wrong. BRIQ keeps bringing back the topics you’re weakest on.

Use it on site at smoko, in the ute, or on the couch, whenever you’ve got a spare few minutes. BRIQ’s own guide on how to study for BPC’s on-screen assessment goes deeper on the format.

BRIQ is study and practice. It isn’t a qualification, and it doesn’t replace the qualification or experience your class needs.

How do you get BRIQ through BLS?

If BLS supports your Victorian DB-U application and training, your package comes with 12 months of BRIQ access. BLS sets it up and emails you the details, so you can start studying while we work through your application with you.

You can also use BRIQ on its own, alongside any course you’re already doing.

What if you want one-on-one help?

Some topics don’t click from a screen. Maybe it’s reading a set of plans, finding your way around the NCC under time pressure, or a part of building law you keep getting wrong.

BLS also works with experienced industry trainers to offer one-on-one training. You bring the part you’re stuck on and work through it with a trainer. It sits alongside BRIQ: the app keeps your study ticking over, and the sessions go where you need them most.

BPC still runs the assessment and makes the decision on your application.

Is self-paced study right for you?

It suits you if:

• you’re working full weeks and can’t give up site days for a course;
• you’re a long way from a classroom, or your hours change week to week;
• BPC has asked you to sit its assessment and you want regular practice on a screen.

If you learn best in a room with other people, a classroom course may still suit you, and BRIQ works alongside one too. Either way, one-on-one training is there for the parts that need a person.

Which Victorian builder class should I study for?

Studying hard for the wrong class wastes your time. Before you start:

1. Match the work you want to quote to a class. Compare DB-U and DB-L, or read the three categories of builders in Victoria.
2. Check your experience against BPC’s current requirements. See what your Victorian registration experience needs to show.
3. Read up on how BPC’s new assessment replaced the interview.

Get it sorted before you lodge

BLS walks you through your Victorian DB-U application: your class, your evidence and your referees, so it’s sorted before you lodge. With BRIQ for study and one-on-one training when you want it, you’re not left working it out alone. See domestic builder registration application support. BPC assesses every application and makes the decision.

Rather talk it through? Call us on 0468 008 598.

Sources

Checked 10 November 2026:

• BPC, Builder registration requirements and eligibility: qualifications and experience, fit and proper person, training-course experience.
• BPC, assessments for builder registration: the single assessment replacing the interview and plan-based test, question types, online permitted references, in-person sittings at Head Office.
• BPC, permitted assessment reference materials: no printed or PDF copies in online assessments; Australian Standards via your own online access, paid by you; the in-person transition option for hard copies, which will end.
• BRIQ, home page and About page: what the app covers and who built it.
• A Victorian course provider’s public package price page: the $7,495 including GST training and application package (provider not named).

For the wider application, check Victorian builder registration requirements before choosing a class or paying a fee.