Approval for administering SELT services, which is used for UK visa and immigration purposes, was awarded to Pearson in December 2019.

“It is heartening to see that people plan to travel abroad to live, work or study”

It currently has two forms – the PTE Academic (UKVI), which tests speaking, listening, ready and writing for work and study visas, and the PTE Home for family, settlement, citizenship applications as well as sportsperson and representative of an overseas business applications, which tests speaking and listening.

IELTs, Trinity College London and PeopleCert also all have commercial agreements to offer SELT.

The new Pearson locations include Stockholm, Geneva, Algiers and Bethlehem.

Pearson said that the testing will be delivered through its Pearson VUE test centre network, which has implemented proactive health and safety measures such as readily available hand sanitiser, increased sanitisation in high touch areas, and the regular disinfection of testing workstations. Face masks will be required in the centres.

“As we near the end of what has been a year like no other, it is heartening to see that people plan to travel abroad to live, work or study and that many of them are heading to the UK,” said Freya Thomas Monk, senior vice president of English assessment at Pearson.

“Test takers are now able to choose from over 170 locations worldwide to sit their UKVI test, with more PTE centres set to open in the coming months.”

New locations:

• Africa: Dakar, Senegal; Kampala, Uganda; Lusaka, Zambia; Yaounde, Cameroon
• Asia: Bandar Seri Begawan, Brunei; Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan; Guangzhou and Nada, Hainan, China; Kabul, Afghanistan; Yerevan, Armenia
• Europe: Brussels, Belgium; Channel Islands; Copenhagen, Denmark; Geneva, Switzerland; Nicosia North, Cyprus; Stockholm, Sweden; Vienna, Austria
• Caribbean: Champs Fleurs, Trinidad and Tobago; Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic
• Latin America: Bogota, Colombia; Panama; Santiago, Chile
• MENA: Algiers, Algeria; Bethlehem, Israel; Salmiya, Kuwait; Tunis, Tunisia