Becoming a domestic installer

[Taylortwocities]

Or you could find an electrician who is prepared for you to do some of the work under his/her guidance. He/she could then do the tricky bits including design, test certification and notification. you would also learn a lot that you could use in the future.

 

[ericmark]

I was lucky, when I moved there was no Part P. However I never intended the move, it was a gradual sidewards step, started as an apprentice motor vehicle and bridge builder engineering apprenticeship for the local council, found I did well at auto electrics and specialised in auto electrics, and this resulted in my repairing portable traffic lights, SLD pumps wanted some one to repair their traffic lights and were willing to train me in pump repair, I went to work in Algeria as an auto electrician but found myself doing any electrical work, so by 1980 I was doing more work on 220/380 volt than 12/24 volt. Having worked on heavy plant batching plants etc, I found my skills were in demand, by 2000 I decided I needed the paper qualifications and did a 6,12,6 week set of night classes to get 16th edition, inspection and testing and PAT testing. But to be frank my skills at PLC programming resulted in little problem finding work, I did do the odd house bashing but the Part P law stopped that, looked at getting the qualifications for domestic work, but took a degree in electrical and electronic engineering instead. Working in Hong Kong and Falklands I had always been considered as the engineer, but sorry to say my maths was not good enough, imaginary numbers were OK, but calculus I found a problem, and realised I was not going to go over level 5 without a lot more maths, then the funding changed so education stopped.

It does I know seem daft to need to learn imaginary numbers and calculus, as a domestic electrician is unlikely to need them, but the exams for domestic and industrial are the same, so boolean logic may not be used with domestic but you still need it to pass exams, so my son also became an electrical engineer, but he had studied maths in Uni before he started as an electrician, and as an auto electrician I had also been taught maths.

Through my education I have started early enough to be shown how to use steam tables, in the early 70's tried for a HNC but girls got in the way, but at Uni be it motor vehicle, avionic, sound, or electronic engineering we were taught the same maths, so swapping from one engineering trade to another you already know the maths, so a side move is not that hard, but if the job you had before did not involve maths then going to be rather hard.

As to collage courses I was invited to join one to see if I thought it would help, I could not believe the level of education of school levers, where they questioned if mercury, silver, steel, and gold were conductors. So your taught as if a 12 year old, so 10 hours in collage and taught 3 hours worth of real knowledge.

Not the kids fault, I wanted 'A' level maths, so one course was £100+ and three courses were £10 so did three, so did digital photography and physics as easy options, the wiring digram given in the book for physics for a fluorescent lamp completely missed out the ballast. So they are taught wrong in school and collage to start with, and often harder to unlearn incorrect things than if never taught, find this with electricians doing 17th edition when rules change, today 18th edition.

The problem is you need to learn to be an electrician, not simply a domestic electrician, even if you never work on a three phase supply, you still need to know about how it works to pass exams, and I got it wrong a few times, asked can you work with logs I said yes, I had used log tables since being 12 years old, but that was not what was meant by working with logs.

 

[EFLImpudence]

I was lucky, when I moved there was no Part P.
...
I did do the odd house bashing but the Part P law stopped that,

Part P has nothing to do with what you are talking about.

Once again:

That's it; there is no more.


I am assuming you did not, before 2005, design and install electrical installations in order to endanger persons...

 

[ericmark]

OK in theory one can use the LABC route to register work which I have done, but the minimum charge is £100 plus vat, so unless part of a bigger job, or for the disabled, then the charges are too high, the special locations being kitchen, garden, and bathroom, and the problem I found was jobs escalated, you went to do a job not needed to be registered, but some thing happened to change that.

The problem is to be worth being a scheme member the work has to be at least 50% domestic needed registering. It was not worth becoming a scheme member for the odd domestic job I would do. Do remember here in Wales still on the original Part P law.

So yes the Part P law in real terms stopped me doing the odd domestic job, in theory it is down to the home owner to inform the LABC and to pay fees, so if the electrician does not claim to be a scheme member and he issues minor works or installation certificates then he could claim he thought the home owner had informed the LABC.

One would have expected a permit to work system, where the LABC gives the home owner a permit which he in turn gives to the electrician to say he can proceed, but this does not happen, it is word of mouth, so if the home owner says this electrical work is part of the larger planning permission work and the LABC will issue the completion certificate you as the electrician have no way to know if this is true or false. Clearly you know the LABC will need the certificate from you, so unless you issue an installation certificate it is clear you did not think the work was legal, but I have seen where only after all the work was done, lucky not me, did the electrician find out the owner had not ticked the right box and wanted a compliance certificate.

The electrician saying sorry you told me you had registered the work LABC does not help getting the money for work from the client, he (the owner) may have made the error not ticking the right box, but that does not help.

I think the whole idea that the owner has to register the work or apply for planning permission is flawed, one expects the builder or electrician to do that, but as my parents found out, if the builder does not apply for permission it is the owner who is responsible not the builder. My parents did not even realise permission was required to turn a loo and pantry into a wet room. New about Part P bit, but not the need to say what room in the house is used as a bathroom.

One would expect the LABC inspector to deal direct with the electrician, but no he had to tell my dad you can go ahead and dad tell me, at least officially. All a tax anyway as no one inspected when completed it was simply a completion certificate through the post, but fact remains jumping through the Part P hoops is not easy if not a scheme member, so except for my parents, and only than as forced, when Part P came out I gave up doing domestic.

 

[RB2020]

Search here: https://search.napit.org.uk/
They are the only scheme which has third party certifiers, the Stroma scheme is part of NAPIT now.
NICEIC / ELECSA do not operate a TPS scheme and never have.


It's either pay building control, or pay a third party certifier. The end result is the same.

Just to update this, managed to make contact with original electrician and he’s happy to inspect and sign off my work.

I’ve outlined my circuit designs, so how I’m going to split the circuits, what sized cables allowing for voltage drop and installation methods, what sized rcbos, earth rod on outside sheds with non exported earth etc.

And they are happy that I know sufficiently what I’m doing to make a start and have told me to crack on, leave wall chases exposed and then they will inspect and test it once done.

im not an electrician, far from it, don’t claim to be or even have the entire knowledge of an electrician.

I’m glad that the electrician made contact, he’s happy that I sufficiently know what I need to to make a reasonable job of it in a supervised manner.

I can also use it for my portfolio later on I assume? As it’s all been signed off and contains lots of different electrical works.

So will return back to my long term plan of doing the full qualifications because as mentioned I want to get into renewables.

thanks all for the advice