Part P Self certifications Scheme degregulation theme

[sparkticus]

Hello fellow sparks, I'm registered with the NICEIC approved contractor/domestic installer. Had a survey through this week which was asking my views about the part P scheme. It appears that that general mass of the population think part P is overkill/not working/waste of money/disadvantage to the likes of me who have to cover the costs of yearly subscriptions/assessment days etc/should be deregulated. I had been aware of the issues but receiving the survey has made me consider whether or not I should stick with the domestic installer scheme. I am due to renew the domestic installer registration in June and seriously questioning if I should do so. About 40% of my work is domestic so going back to the LABC scheme is not something I relish (waiting for LABC to inspect installation, waiting for customer final payment etc) Though I am the first to admit that part P is far from perfect.

Anyone in the same boat/same concerns?

cheers,

 

[riveralt]

I'm not with NICEIC but completed a similar survey this week. I have to ask why would you need to have domestic installer status if you are already an approved contractor? Surely approved contractor status covers work done in the domestic scenarios?

 

[sparkticus]

Well technically the work done by a domestic installer is a sub-set of an approved contractor assuming the approved contractor includes domestic work within the spectrum of work submitted for yearly assessment.

My son and I run a small sole trader business and he takes care of domestic while I take care of everything else. He (my son) is the registered QS for the domestic installer scheme. This means that we can show the approved contractor logo and the domestic installer logo which I think has been instrumental in getting us domestic work. I must admit that I have only just realised that I can notify part P work via the BRCS site with my approved contractor login so that probably solves that problem - no idea why I did not think of that until now!!

So if we drop the domestic installer scheme then he will no longer be able to sign off part P work but I will. Not a direction I wanted to go in but it's a thought! We also will not be able to use the domestic installer logo which appears to be meaningful to the public in terms of getting domestic work at least from our experience. But we would save a few hundred pounds/year not paying for the DI scheme.

How likely is it that the part P thing will be de-regulated? Does anyone have a feeling for that?

 

[ebee]

There are mumblings to the contrary.
Qualifications needed for new QSs are being upgraded.

I suspect that if Part P were better policed thereby creating more of a "level playing field" then there would be less objectors.

 

[sparkticus]

ebee, regarding domestic installer I could not agree more with raising the entry level for the QSs.

There also appears to be confusion regarding "full scope" VS "defined scope"

My son has two level 3 C&Gs, Btec in electrical engineering and 7 years experience but you can get in with a level 2 VRQ (plus the DI assessment) which is probably not enough if you don't have a significant background in electrical installation. Having said that I recently worked with such a person who I have to say did a good job and knew not only the regs well but understood electrical science well. This was a person who changed jobs from being an accountant to an electrician but had always wanted to be an electrician, had the aptitude for it and read about the theory for many years.

Interesting that the survey mentioned deregulation on one hand but improved compliance on the other. I wonder how that works?

 

[comms]

The domestic electrical trade needs to be policed far harder & the 5WW courses need to be shutdown.

Part P needs to be advertised to the public far better by the scheme operators on behalf of their customers (that’s us people), NICEIC employing the likes of the home design expert, what’s that all about I've not seen a single advert with her promoting part P, her tv show is about internal design from what I've seen. Fine that she bigs up part P in the connections mag & on the niceic web site..but that is targeting the wrong audience, after all we already know about it as we are paying the yearly fee to implement it & pay for the cack advertising.
Advertising part P at the home/building expos is a start but surely that’s a limited audience & an audience that will be either in the trade or diy’ing anyway.
The little title banners on the TV page of the sun advertising part P by the NICEIC a few months ago.........wasted advertising to small nothing to explain what it was about & held no relation to the TV page anyway.

The ESC did little pamphlets on part P (latest ones free for us to use & distribute) a good idea but why have them in the wholesalers waiting for us to pick up & distribute, again wrong target audience, get the pamphlets put in every carrier bag at every diy shed & super market and news papers.

This might upset some diy’ers, but the sheds need to be clamped down on with regards to what electrical materials they sell or at the very least they need to be made to promote part P & the need to notify work.

Assessments: I have no problem with being assessed but it is becoming more difficult to get domestic customers to be in for the assessment day visits, this year I will be going to one of the addresses visited last year.
Not something easily solvable I know.

As for part P getting binned, will never happen to many are I suspect making big bucks on the back of it.... they must be I pay £400ish a year multiply that by XXX registered sparks around the country?.

And when I do receive my questionaire from NICEY I shall be stating much the same

Rant over......

 

[bernardgreen]

As for part P getting binned, will never happen to many are I suspect making big bucks on the back of it.... they must be I pay £400ish a year multiply that by XXX registered sparks around the country?..

This "making big bucks on the back of it" is what is wrong with the way Part P of the Building Regulations has been implimented compared to the way all the other Parts of the Building Regualtions are implimented.

It did seem that the electrical industry set the way it would be implimented and maybe I am cynical but it does seem to have been done in way that generates income for the "schemes".

A roof conversion with the inherent dangers of collapsing floors and roofs can be carried out by builders who are not registered with any scheme or trade organisation. They will submit plans, drawings and calculation and then are trusted to work to those plans. Most do but a few do not. Building inspectors cannot inspect every site and trust that non electrical work will be done as per the approved drawings.

So why does that not apply to electrical work ?

Is it because the "schemes" saw a way to make money by getting the building control regulations written in such a way that only by using one of their members could a house owner get electrical work done ?

And while I regret being able to say it it is true that any builder can self certify that his bodged and dangerous loft conversion "complies" to the drawing and no one is the wiser until the thing collapses and maybe kills people below.

There is no safeguard that prevents a bodger from self certifying his or her own bodged work.

Is there any really effective safeguard that a "registered" electrician will never take a short cut in work he or she then self certifies as being compliant ?

 

[holmslaw]

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