GOC Courses: Online Courses for a GOC Concern and CPD

GOC courses are searched for by optometrists and dispensing opticians in two situations: a concern has been raised with the General Optical Council about your records, consent, honesty, a boundary with a patient or a colleague, or your clinical practice, and you need to show what you have done before the case examiners decide; or you are planning CPD for the 2025 to 2027 cycle and want material for your personal development plan and the professionalism domain. This guide sets out, from the GOC’s own pages, how a concern runs, the standards it is measured against, which course fits each concern, how the courses sit beside GOC CPD, and the price. Each course is £79 (£50 with Bulk Buy 10) for 2 CPD hours, online and self-paced, and Probity & Ethics is CPD certified by The CPD Certification Service (provider no. 13197).

How does a GOC concern run, and where does a course fit?

When the GOC receives a concern it acknowledges it and may make preliminary enquiries, which it calls triage. If it opens a formal investigation, it tells you. During the investigation it gathers evidence, such as clinical records and witness statements, and may obtain an independent expert clinical opinion. You receive all the evidence and are given the opportunity to make written representations about the concern.

The file then goes to two case examiners, one a registrant and one a lay member. They consider the investigation, the evidence, your representations and the complainant’s comments, and can:

• take no further action, with or without advice on your future practice or conduct;
• issue a warning; or
• refer the allegation to the Fitness to Practise Committee, which hears the case at a hearing held in public unless the committee decides otherwise.

If the case examiners cannot agree, or a health or performance assessment is needed, the case goes to the Investigation Committee, which has the same powers of referral. Where there may be a risk to the public or to you, the Registrar, the case examiners or the Investigation Committee can refer you to the Fitness to Practise Committee for an interim order, which either suspends your registration at once or makes it conditional on set requirements while the case continues.

At a hearing the Fitness to Practise Committee decides the facts, whether your fitness to practise is impaired and the sanction: a financial penalty of up to £50,000, conditional registration (for example, a requirement to complete set learning), suspension for up to 12 months, or erasure. Where it finds fitness to practise not impaired, it can still issue a warning about future conduct or performance. Sanctions take effect 28 days after the hearing unless an immediate order is made. Your written representations are the point at which a course matters: they show what you have learned and changed. Our guide to GOC fitness to practise sets out each step in more detail.

Which standards is a GOC concern measured against?

The GOC’s Standards of Practice for Optometrists and Dispensing Opticians, in force since 1 January 2025, set 19 standards that every registrant must meet. The conduct standards each have a course that answers them.

Which GOC course fits which concern?

Start from the concern as the GOC has described it, take the course on that subject, then add the short modules that are about the response itself.

• Records, a referral not made, or a missed finding: Professionalism in Documentation and Ensuring Clinical Competence and Patient Safety.
• Consent or an examination the patient did not understand: Privacy, Consent and Chaperone in Healthcare Practice with Ensuring Effective Communication as Healthcare Professionals.
• Honesty, fraud or money, including NHS sight test claims and CPD declarations: Probity for Healthcare Professionals and Financial Integrity for Healthcare Professionals.
• Confidentiality: Ensuring Confidentiality in Healthcare Practice.
• A boundary with a patient or a colleague, including social media: Professional Boundaries for Clinicians, Ethical Boundaries with Patients and Colleagues or Professionalism and Boundaries in Use of Social Media.
• A complaint handled badly, or a patient not told of an error: How to Deal with a Complaint or Investigation and Duty of Candour in Healthcare Practice.
• Conduct outside practice, such as a conviction or caution: Professionalism and Professional Standards for Optometrists and Opticians and Probity for Healthcare Professionals.
• The standards as a whole: Ethics and Ethical Standards for Optometrists and Opticians and Professionalism and Professional Standards for Optometrists and Opticians.
• The response itself: Module on Insight, Module on Reflection and Module on Remediation.

How do the courses fit GOC CPD?

GOC CPD is a statutory requirement with its own points scheme. In the cycle from 1 January 2025 to 31 December 2027, optometrists and dispensing opticians must obtain at least 36 CPD points, with at least one point in each of the four core domains (professionalism, communication, clinical practice, and leadership and accountability), at least 18 points through interactive CPD, at least 18 points from GOC CPD providers, and at least one peer review event. The GOC expects at least six points a year, a personal development plan in your MyCPD account at the start of the cycle, and a reflective exercise with a peer at the end. Contact lens opticians, and optometrists with an additional supply, supplementary prescribing or independent prescribing specialty, need further points in the specialty domain.

Our courses are CPD certified by The CPD Certification Service, not GOC-approved CPD, so they carry no GOC points. Where they fit: as self-directed CPD in the professionalism domain, within the share of points the GOC allows outside its approved providers; as material for your personal development plan and the reflective exercise, each course ending with a reflection on your own practice; and, in a fitness to practise case, as evidence of remediation that the case examiners and the committee read alongside your representations. Each certificate records the course title, the CPD hours and the date. Check the GOC’s own CPD pages, or your MyCPD account, for what counts towards your points.

What to do: five steps after a GOC letter

1. Get advice the same day. Contact your defence organisation, the AOP, ABDO, FODO or a solicitor before you reply to the GOC or your employer.
2. Read the concern line by line. Note which of the 19 standards each point relates to, and the date your representations are due.
3. Keep to the facts. Gather the patient records, referral letters, practice procedures, rotas and messages that relate to the concern.
4. Start remediation that matches the concern. Take the course on the subject of the concern, keep notes after each section, and add the Modules on Insight and Reflection.
5. Write a reflection that shows insight. What happened, which standard it fell short of, the effect on the patient and on trust, and what you have changed in your practice and your practice’s procedures.

Our GOC courses and the Bulk Buy offer

Every course below is online and self-paced, with immediate access and a dated certificate. They serve an optometrist or dispensing optician responding to a complaint or a GOC concern, and one planning CPD and a personal development plan.

Courses by subject

Any 3 courses for £200, 5 for £300, 10 for £500. The £49 Modules are bought on their own. Unsure where to start? Book a free call or use which course do I need.

See the courses for your profession:

• DoctorsGMC
• Nurses and midwivesNMC
• Dental teamGDC
• PharmacistsGPhC
• HCPC professionsHCPC
• Optometrists and dispensing opticiansGOC
• ChiropractorsGCC
• OsteopathsGOsC
• Social workersSocial Work England

Guides that help

This guide is part of our Professional Misconduct hub, which brings together every Probity & Ethics guide and course on the subject.

Questions and answers