Becoming an Electrician in the UK

[vards01]

Becoming a domestic Electrician in the UK

I am potentially thinking of a career change, currently I am a design engineer in the mechanical / electrical field, degree qualified, unfortunately work in this sector is drying up salaries are low and is mainly office / desk based……fine if you like that kind of thing, but I've just had enough of it and all the office politics. I am toying with the idea of starting afresh; and being self employed, I enjoy practical work and am interested in seeing whether this is a viable venture…. I’m mid 30’s….

I have done some basic googling and see a whole multitude of ‘required’ qualifications for fast track colleges and all seemed a little disjointed to what actually qualifications you would need to go out alone, I am aware that really you need to work alongside a time served electrician for a while to gain experience ……but was more interested in what actual qualifications are required to carry out domestic installations.

Thanks in advance…..

 

[charliegolf]

Hi, I'm no expert, but searching 'becoming an electrician' here in DIYNOT will give you loads of gen from the people you're asking. CG

 

[ericmark]

The requirements are what the scheme operator ask for, they are not all the same, and since you already have some qualifications you would need to ask, although you can do non notifiable work without being a scheme member it's all too easy to find you need to do something which requires notifying, maybe when you start the job you don't see the need but then you find there is some bit you hadn't foreseen that needs a compliance certificate.

The LABC charges do vary, you could ask what they are in your area, but likely only way to ensure you don't spend over the top getting completion certificates is to become a scheme member.

I did look at going down the sole trader route myself, and was surprised to find how much it would cost to satisfy the scheme providers, that is when I have been an electrician for some 35 years, so that is first port of call.

If some one like Corgi will allow you to self signify with what you already have then great, you don't need any qualification to be an electrician, they may be desirable but you don't need them. All you need to know is how to do the job in a safe manor. Normally you will also need insurance, my son found insurance was not that expensive, neither did they ask for too many bits of paper to show you know what you are doing.

However it takes time to get established, for first couple of years making money is hard, companies pay, but the house holder always wants it on the cheap, you will find those who want a good job, but they will not deal with people who have just started, and the number of you fitted a new socket now my lights don't work, and all that's wrong is the bulb has blown, and you have travelled 20 miles to replace that bulb.

The other is dam I have run out of ceiling roses or any other small part, and you have to again travel to get one. Because your new and have not got a van crammed to ceiling with bits and bobs, a small job can cost you in time petrol and materials more than you can charge for the job.

My son did reverse, he was a sole trader, now he works cards in as electrical engineer in a glass factory, no way would he ever go back to house bashing.

 

[vards01]

I wouldn't really want to start without being able to certificate my works.......so was ideally looking to see what the most efficient way of achieving this was. So you suggest possibly maybe worth a call to NIC or NAPIT and have a discussion with them to see what weight my degree would carry and what I would need from there to achieve my goal of being a domestic installer and certifying my own works?

 

[EFLImpudence]

There is confusion with the term 'certifying' your work.

What the schemes call 'self-certifying' should be called 'self-notifying' - this refers to the few LABC notifiable works left in England:
New circuits, Replacing consumer units and Additions and alterations in special locations (within the zones of bathrooms and the like).

Electrical certificates which should be issued for all work, anyone can complete.

 

[vards01]

So a major works certificate, you would need to part of a governing body but anyone could offer a minor works certificate and self certify?

 

[endecotp]

I am potentially thinking of a career change, currently I am a design engineer in the mechanical / electrical field, degree qualified

A friend of mine with an engineering degree decided that he didn't want to work in an office any more and decided to become an electrician.

He said the course was mostly full of lads just out of school who treated it like an extension of school. He (generously!) helped them with the maths that they seemed to have entirely forgotten in the six months since they managed to pass their school exams. I think he realised that he should probably be working NOT on bog-standard domestic electrics (crawling around under floors is easier when you're 17) but rather on something more technically challenging e.g. commercial / industrial / trams / solar farms.

Then he gave it all up and joined a startup company making some mechanical gadget. And he split up from his girlfriend. It all looked like a bit of a mid-life crisis to me.

Does that look like your situation?

 

[EFLImpudence]

So a major works certificate, you would need to part of a governing body but anyone could offer a minor works certificate and self certify?

No, anyone may issue an electrical certificate - Minor Electrical Installation Works Certificate or Electrical Installation Certificate.

The type of certificate has nothing to do with whether the work is notifiable or not - and vice versa.

All you need a self-certifying (i.e. self-notifying) scheme (they are not governing bodies) for is to avoid paying the LABC fee and have them inspect your work on notifiable jobs.

 

[charliegolf]

All you need a self-certifying (i.e. self-notifying) scheme (they are not governing bodies) for is to avoid paying the LABC fee and have them inspect your work on notifiable jobs.

And out of interest, what hoops have to be jumped through to achieve this?

 

[EFLImpudence]

You have to give them money every year - about the same as two LABC fees (although they vary hugely)

Seriously though, you have to have lots of paperwork, insurance, necessary equipment, the latest wiring regulations with qualification and have some work and knowledge minimally inspected and tested annually.
Also, for some reason I haven't fathomed, a copy of the On-Site Guide - a publication for those who cannot think.

 

[charliegolf]

Cheers for that...

 

[vards01]

A friend of mine with an engineering degree decided that he didn't want to work in an office any more and decided to become an electrician.

He said the course was mostly full of lads just out of school who treated it like an extension of school. He (generously!) helped them with the maths that they seemed to have entirely forgotten in the six months since they managed to pass their school exams. I think he realised that he should probably be working NOT on bog-standard domestic electrics (crawling around under floors is easier when you're 17) but rather on something more technically challenging e.g. commercial / industrial / trams / solar farms.

Then he gave it all up and joined a startup company making some mechanical gadget. And he split up from his girlfriend. It all looked like a bit of a mid-life crisis to me.

Does that look like your situation?

Believe it or not I am actually getting knee problems sitting at a desk all day staring at a screen doing CAD models........so maybe I need to do some crawling around to get active!

My main issue with the design engineering arena is the salary just keeps going down / availability of jobs........whether these are going overseas who knows....just manufacturing in general is in decline in the UK.

But my idea is to work relatively local in the domestic field.........hopefully not a midlife crisis

 

[vards01]

You have to give them money every year - about the same as two LABC fees (although they vary hugely)

Seriously though, you have to have lots of paperwork, insurance, necessary equipment, the latest wiring regulations with qualification and have some work and knowledge minimally inspected and tested annually.
Also, for some reason I haven't fathomed, a copy of the On-Site Guide - a publication for those who cannot think.

This makes me wonder whether an Electrician I had do some work a few years ago was just buying the bits of paper from somewhere and filling them out.......the work he left behind was shocking and had to get someone else in to sort it out........and ironically I phoned NIC and they didn't really give a monkeys.......just told me how to complain to this guy.....

 

[ban-all-sheds]

This makes me wonder whether an Electrician I had do some work a few years ago was just buying the bits of paper from somewhere and filling them out

He might not even have bought them. I don't know if you still can, but there was a time when anyone could download NICEIC branded blank certificates from their website - they put them up as samples so that customers know what they should look like. And they cleverly overprinted them so that they couldn't be used in anger:

Well, not unless you first spent a couple of minutes editing the PDF file:

 

[John D v2.0]

You can get the blank ones with no registration number field on free download, exactly the same other then that and with all the correct spaces to fill in your test results etc. Only the one that you have to be registered is restricted.