More than ever, a good knowledge of English is needed to succeed in international business and commerce. If you can show you have relevant language skills, you’ll have a great advantage in the jobs market and more choice if you want to work or study abroad.
The Business English Certificates (BEC) are for individuals who want to have a business-related English language qualification.
BEC Preliminary is a pre-intermediate-level exam aligned with Level B1 of the Council of Europe’s Common European Framework. It corresponds to the Cambridge level of PET.
If your English language ability is sufficient for most simple communications, such as shopping, you may consider progressing towards BEC. You should have an understanding of, or interest in, the world of work, business and commerce.
BEC Preliminary has three papers:
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Reading and Writing (90 minutes)
This paper has seven tasks including multiple choice, matching, form filling and other. In the writing part, the candidate is supposed to produce a piece of company and business communication. |
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Listening (40 minutes)
In the Listening component there are four tasks of the following types: multiple choice, gap-filling and form-filling based on the text that can be a dialogue, phone conversation or discussion. |
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Speaking (12 minutes)
The candidates are tested in pair and during the test each candidate responds to questions, gives a ‘mini-presentation’ lasting approximately one minute, takes part in a collaborative task with the other candidate and takes part in a discussion with the other candidate. |
The minimum successful performance which a candidate typically requires in order to pass the exam corresponds to about 70% of the total marks.
There are no pass/fail marks for individual papers, so you do not need to reach a particular level in any component in order to achieve a pass in the examination. There are two pass grades — Pass with Merit and Pass.
Once awarded, Cambridge ESOL BEC certificates are valid for life.
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