Dear all

I am currently in a dilemma as to whether or not to join the CIPD student account. Basically i had signed up for the CIPD course via the organisation dpg, where i instantly have the access to the cipd community, until later i realise that i have to pay both joining fee and student account fee(£132) to upgrade from the guest account which i currently have, so i called dpg and they said they had paid for my registration fee(which  i thought it would be the same as the joining fee) but it turns out not to be. 

At the moment my whole purpose of joining the dpg was to obtain my level 5 qualification, and it may seem that it can not be achieved if i do not join student account(where you would have a proper membership number). So my question is, is it worth to join as a student account  and did anyone else was with dpg course then pay more for student account just for the sake of obtaining the actual certificate? obviously i wish to step my feet in HR for a long run, so this small amount of investment is just a drop in an ocean, however, i do not wish to invest unnecessary money into this if there are just some materials and resources available where i can obtain free elsewhere. I also spoke to the staff from cipd and they said that having an cipd membership would be more recognisable for any future career prospective, does anyone finds this true?

Can someone please share your views/experiences. 

Thanks in advance and i appreciate your support :) 

Paula