do City & Guilds qualifications expire?

do City & Guilds qualifications expire?

Done my course (on top of my NVQ level 3) and got Level 3 Certificate in the Requirements for Electrical Installations BS7671 2008 (2382-100).
Passed test in 2010.
Worked as maintenance electrician for 6 years until 2016.
Left the industry.
Want to come back now as contract electrician - lights and accessories upgrades.

Went on the ECS website to register.
Got message: "your knowledge of the Wiring Regulations has fallen out of date and no longer prove that you have up-to-date knowledge of the regulations"

Do I need to get the 18th edition now to be registered?

Well, I would say your qualification does not and has not expired for what it is.

However, The Wiring Regulations are regularly replaced with newer versions - latest 18th - for which you will require another qualification for any organisation which demands it.

CSCS cards or ECS cards seem to be required to work at some sites now and we were told we cannot get the ECS card unless we do the 18th, they also vIew your City +Guilds when applying, but have never queried mine, some dating back to the 80'S.
The 18th seems to be the thing there concerned with,

333rocky333 said:

CSCS cards or ECS cards seem to be required to work at some sites now and we were told we cannot get the ECS card unless we do the 18th, they also vIew your City +Guilds when applying, but have never queried mine, some dating back to the 80'S.
The 18th seems to be the thing there concerned with,

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the 18th edition test can be booked on it's own, i see. that is fine.
i wouldn't want to go through my 5 years of school again...

Yup it's only the gas guys who have to redo it every 5 years. DAMM should of been a sparky.

I was chatting to the guy doing the inspection and testing of in service electrical equipment a few days ago, he tells me some of the rules have been relaxed, but I am no longer an IET member, and I have not even bothered getting the 18th Edition book, where I work now it seems to be if it moves wave at it and smile, if fixed paint it, for what ever reason it seems rare are my skills as an electrician used.

But it is down to bits of paper, and being able to prove you should know what you are doing, even if you don't. And at 70 the government wants me to renew my driving licence and want me to confirm fit to drive, even if not required to take a test, and the 16th and 17th edition is more about being able to read than anything else, on the old 16th one of the questions in the exam was different between skilled and competent, which was "and others" which seemed such a silly question, OK now dropped and about time.

How it is considered level 3 I really don't know? Your not asked to work out what it means, it is simply what it says.

But being frank although I know rules have changed, like 70 volt to earth not 50 volt so we can have electric car charging points, I can't say with hand on heart I know about all the changes, and this is what the course and exam does, it drums into one what is now required, open contact knife switches are no longer allowed, I do some times wonder when they were outlawed, well before my time.

ericmark said:

open contact knife switches are no longer allowed, I do some times wonder when they were outlawed, well before my time.

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this made me smile. the site i was working at not long ago, 5 years back, had a stash of them. new in boxes. as i was on the way to the skip with them, was told that they are spares for the main house (listed building). didn't even came up on the periodic! no earth too

it wasn't 5 years ago I worked in a place with open knife switches for the main switch gear.
It was in a caged off area in a basement. The really strange thing was seeing the range of historic additions right up to a Schneider fused switch