I am in the middle of 3 counties that all do the referee booking differently. One county, which I will want to ref the matches in, puts the refereeing available courses online straight away months in advance, and they are booked until April. However, with the other county FAs, you have to fill a form in of intent and then get notified of upcoming ones. I was wondering if you would be able to do the course in an alternate county then you ref in
Does it matter which county FA you do the ref course with?
- Thread starter Elijahtens10s
- Start date
Typically you are required to register with the county that your postcode falls under. That doesn't necessarily mean you can't do the course with one of the others, and you could register with the other two as affiliate members, but your parent county FA will usually need to be the one that your home address is in.
Gabriel
Well-Known Member
May I ask where you are? It does depend on the county by also, that is a very similar situation to the one I am in. I referee with Birmingham County FA, but I live in South Staffordshire but also want to referee in Shropshire, which is a stones throw away. I am also only an hour from several other counties due to being so central. Which is why midlands refs are used in basically all the leagues at NLS Step 4 and above I guess.
Bear in mind, in addition to what everyone has said here, you are able to transfer counties after qualified.
I would advise going with your postcode one but if there are no courses you could qualify elsewhere and switch across. Many people do it for uni, relocation etc
I am in the midlands as well, in the east. My postcode is county 1 (I trust you but still to make sure I'm calling them county 1 2 and 3), but my house is technically in county 2 and I play football in county 2, and I do other sports as well with a club in county 3 so I could do it with all 3. However, I would prefer to be down as notts as my bros are in a notts league. County 1 are booked out until April, which is why I asked.
ChasObserverRefDeveloper
Regular Contributor
Football does not use current county boundaries, its county boundaries are from some long time ago. You can referee in any county once qualified.
Gabriel
Well-Known Member
Think you gave county 1 away anyway at the end. I would change that if you are that bothered.
I live in Wiltshire (just) but ref most games in Hampshire and the training venue was much closer too. Gave up trying to get on a course in Hampshire and did it with Wiltshire. On completion and after five games, they registered my with Hamts FA but I'm now also registered (or listed, not quite sure how it works) with Wilts, who are different class when it comes to comms/CPD etc.
It is called dual affiliation. Hants are your parent CFA and Wilts your affiliate, you can register with any number of affiliate CFAs. That's very common in the London area, within a maximum of 10 miles from me there are teams that are London, Middlesex, Hertfordshire, Essex, and AFA parented.
Thanks Rusty.
