Qualifications for Electrician?

Hi All,

What Qualifications needed for fitting other peoples domestic electrics in UK?

Thanks

Reply to
Jimbo
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None. (At least until next year).

Christian.

Reply to
Christian McArdle

At present, zero.

From April 2004 most electrical work will require certification by a qualified tradesman.

Andrew

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Reply to
Andrew McKay

I though that from April 2004 most electrical work will require certification from a tradesman belong to specified organisation(s) - which is not necessarily the same as a qualified tradesman.

James

Reply to
James

What do you mean by 'most'? I advertise myself as a handyman and do a lot of minor electrical work, i.e. swap light fittings, replace socket outlets, garage lighting and sockets etc. etc. Will this affect my 'ability' to do such work? Can you point me in the direction of something I can read up on it?

TIA

John

Reply to
John

It sounds like you and I perform much the same service for our clients in terms of electrical jobs. So my pessimistic interpretation does have its roots.

I refer to the forthcoming regulations which will be imposed from April 2004 by our ever-helpful Labour government. In fact more specifically, by the office of the Deputy Prime Minister, John Prescott. You need to read the documents on the following web site in order to get the full SP:

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regulations are not entirely dissimilar to the intentions of the corgi scheme involving gas fitting - except that with corgi they refer to "competent persons". With the new electrical regulations they have tightened the noose so that you have to belong to a recognised trade body who will underwrite the certificates which you issue.

The proposals do not include some minor works where no new circuits are implemented EXCEPT if in bathroom or kitchen, in which case work must be certificated.

I wrote to my MP about this legislation about a month ago, and received a response back from Keith Hill MP, who is the minister with responsibility for the new regulations. Summing up his words:

1) I don't need to worry about minor works which are excluded from the regulations (yes folks, I am still able to change a fuse in a 13A plug). 2) I can do the work, then request the local authority to carry out certification checks (Dear Householder, I am sorry that I am not qualified to do this work, if you would just let me have a cheque to cover the cost of a separate inspection.....). 3) Get registered.

I am currently looking at the latter option. It involves going to college to get C&G2391. Then buying about £800 worth of 16th edition test equipment. Add to that a yearly calibration cost. Then I've got to join NICEIC or another recognised industry body, who will do a random inspection of my work and check various other factors about my business before declaring that I can issue self-certifications.

I summed up the costs for this, which I recently exposed on this forum. It came to about £2000 just to get into the scheme, then maybe £1000 a year after that.

You can get more information about NICEIC from the following web site, with costs and how to apply:

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Labour have invented a new quango which they have forced people to join. I presume that Labour are getting some sort of backhander from this arrangement, like they do from the unions. My grips about this new arrangement is that at least in union membership you can request that your party donation is given to a charity instead. Not so with NICEIC, it'll cost several hundred bucks a year, and quite frankly do nothing to improve safety.

Still, one positive consequence of this is that by forcing my company to spend its money there will be less to hand over to Gordon in taxes at year end.

Andrew

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Reply to
Andrew McKay

I am an NICEIC contractor only a small one man band. the whole thing is a stitch up. the intention of this goverment is i'm sure to eventually have us all working for one big plc so that it is easier to get their hands on our money. the paperwork involved with doing the simplest job now takes a couple of hours. this year despite not having to have a written health and safety policy cause i dont employ more than 5 its now in the rules of the niceic along with a proper written risk assessment for every job making me think is it worth the bother.

by the way your comments about giving to charity you'll be glad to know you still will as the niceic is a charity.

Reply to
LOZ34

I'm sure that that's part of the game and have strong suspicions that plumbing will be next. Self certification is the big hobbyhorse and like a lot of the garbage emanating from the ODPM looks convincing at first sight. It is the bogus supporting justification to support a policy that is not the wish of the man in the street that is the problem.

The next step would make the trade associations companies limited by guarantee, like Notwork Rail, and by a simple matter of stealth into pubic ownership.

For now......

.andy

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Reply to
Andy Hall

Andy not only is it a charity but its also a company limited by guarantee

Reply to
LOZ34

Well there's (not) a surprise......

.andy

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Reply to
Andy Hall

The primary qualification is the ability to suck your teeth and say "Cor- not seen one like them since the fire in Acton". The ability to say " yer need a new disti unit and it'll cost yer GBP900" qualifies you for intermediate grades. Further lessons can be obtained from any passing plumber but the Infernal Mental Midget lessons are available here for free.

Reply to
Peter Parry

No, like Network Rail, that new model of efficiency busily soaking up our taxes....

Steve

Reply to
Steve

We just had an NICEIC firm in to PAT test, amongst other things, some ~200 computers. They did this one evening after everyone had gone home, and sure enough, they all have stickers on them the next day to say they were tested. This was a truely remarkable accomplishment, because not one of them was rebooted during the process -- most had uptimes of many weeks, since we last had a power cut, and none had been rebooted in the last 24 hours.

Reply to
Andrew Gabriel

are generally otherwise unemployable other than in administrative positions and that can't actually do it so they can sit on their arses and tell someone else how to do it .. rake in the money and take away profits ... a government taking more money from skills and putting it in to administrations and turning us in to a country of administration with a zero skill base ... pretty soon we will have all these people qualified to administrate .. with no skills left to administrate. ... an Anti-Skill Labour government ... where's the irony in that?

Reply to
Simon

Clearly part of the NICEIC course is to join Harry Potter at college for a year!

Reply to
Simon

I've always been amused to see that the stickers to say equipment had been PAT tested are often attached to the removable mains leads.

It was about 5 years ago now, but I cannot recall seeing the stickers on the PCs themselves.

Nuts.

cheers

Richard

-- Richard Sampson

email me at richard at olifant d-ot co do-t uk

Reply to
RichardS

I think you've made Mr Prescott's point for him. Could a skilled amateur have done this?

What testing should be done apart from earth pin of plug to metal of case? Without knowing exactly what's involved the idea of pushing HV test voltages around electronics sounds a bit worrying

Reply to
Tony Bryer

Didn't anybody tell you about the micro-UPS that Sparc chips have on board - right on the die?. Only runs under Linux, though :-)

.andy

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Reply to
Andy Hall

Our removable mains leads actually have separate stickers to indicate that they don't need testing but that they have been "Formally Visually Inspected".

Reply to
usenet

In my previous two jobs, I had some involvement in the electrical work. For PAT testing, we insisted the contractors turned up with their own C&G certificates on the first day, and we couldn't find any NICEIC companies who had qualified PAT testers. We used independant qualified electricians in the end who did have the qualification. In one case, we had to get the company rule changed which had required use of NICEIC contractors - it was changed to require use of _qualified_ contractors, which in practice ruled out the NICEIC companies we had been using as they seemed unable to supply any qualified staff to do work.

The first thing is a check on the equipment being suitable for the use it is put to. For example, you would fail a PAT test on a hot air paint stripper with nothing wrong with it if it was being used as a hair drier. (This is why you must inspect appliances where they are being used, and not have them brought to some central test location where such misuse would not be aparent.)

Next is a formal visual inspection. Check the plug, lead, casing, etc for signs of damage, and also check the socket outlet for signs of overheating (might show up there rather than on the plug). Check plug fuse rating and that fuse is marked with appropriate BS and in the case of BS1362, it must also be marked ASTA approved (diamond symbol). For a rewirable plug, remove the top and check connections and cord grip. If the appliance is being checked prior to being sold, the plug must have sleeved pins. In any case, the plug must have a broadened base to discourage fingers being wrapped round underneath it during withdrawal (this change came in the

1950's -- would need to be a very old plug to fail that).

Check the appliance conforms to IP2X (no finger can reach any live parts). A common failure here are old bar heaters where the grill has too wide spacing. The silica glass tube of a radiant element counts as a live part for this check. Lampholders are excluded from IP2X test.

Note the general condition of the appliance, how quickly it is wearing out, and if it will thus merit more frequent inspections than it would otherwise get. This implies some record keeping. You might fail an appliance because it is of inappropriate quality, e.g. a domestic kettle might not be up to continuous use in an office, or would only be so with very high frequency of PAT inspection/testing.

You have now done the most important part of the test -- the formal visual inspection. This is the part which picks up some 95% of test failures. This is the part which is skipped by people who don't know how to do a PAT test. The only tool required was a screwdriver. You do not go any further with the testing if there are any failures here -- indeed it is dangerous to do so.

The next stage is to actually use an appliance tester. How you test the equipment depends on lots of things relating to the type of equipment and how it is earthed. In some cases, no testing is possible. For Class I (earthed metal case) appliances, one of the tests does involve checking the earth continuity, but the method varies depending how much current your tester can provide to do this. You don't use HV test voltages around electronics unless the appliance claims to conform to EN 60950 or BS 7002, in which case it has been designed to withstand the 500VDC test. Instead, you do an earth leakage test. Again, you should keep records to check for deterioration, and spot that more frequent testing may be required. In the case of a rapid deterioration, even though still within spec, this could be the cause for a test failure pending discovery of the cause. Likewise, records could show over time that you don't need to test so often.

Finally, it's a good idea to do a functional check, because otherwise you will get laughed at for passing an electric drill which simply doesn't turn, although it may not necessarily be unsafe.

BTW -- this is from memory, and I haven't done it for some time, so I may have missed some parts out.

Reply to
Andrew Gabriel

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