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PAT Testing

Former Community Member
Former Community Member
Booked on a pat testing course next week and trying to find some revision material online but having no joy.


Its a one day course so I can’t imagine having much on the day.


does anyone have anything they can pass over or send me to?


Clint


  • 0
    Here's some notes I knocked up a few years ago. Electrical theory hasn't changed but the etiquette and some regulations have been updated.

    No exam Papers i'm afraid, although they are all on line now.

    http://www.leghrichardson.co.uk/electricalpresentations/PAT%20Course%201.pdf


    Legh
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    I don't know if this will help at all. I hope it does.

    http://www.hse.gov.uk/electricity/faq-portable-appliance-testing.htm


    Z.


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    PAT testing is a bit misleading actually. As evidenced by the current vs 4 code of practice, it's now called in service inspection and testing, which recognises that more than just portable appliances now need testing / inspecting, such as various fixed appliances also.


    That said, however, you may find that the course is tailored for anyone, ordinary people and electricians alike,  so will cover training for just portable appliances, without covering fixed appliances which will require safe isolation procedure to be undertaken, which ordinary people won't do, so they'll only be able to test plug in appliances; which means you could only be doing part of the testing job on a site.


    So, given who the course is probably aimed at in terms of skill level, you won't cover electrical principals in much detail, it'll be fairly low level stuff - formal visual inspection, and plug it in to test and let the tester do it's thing and read off the results. In short, swot up if you want but don't vex yourself as they'll keep it simple.


    F
  • Former Community Member
    0 Former Community Member
    Thanks for the replies.


    Think my biggest concern is the multiple choice exam. I don’t know what to expect and how in-depth this will go, as my knowledge isn’t the greatest I would like to try prepare.
  • 0
    You'll do fine Clint,

                                   those running the course will want you to pass, it reflects well on them. They will help you all they can I am sure. Anyway the multichoice exam gives you a 25 per cent chance of guessing right even with your eyes closed.? Or better if two or more supplied answers are completely obviously wrong. The course will hopefully prepare you for the exam. Good luck and don't worry too much.
  • Former Community Member
    0 Former Community Member

    Farmboy:

    PAT testing is a bit misleading actually. As evidenced by the current vs 4 code of practice, it's now called in service inspection and testing, which recognises that more than just portable appliances now need testing / inspecting, such as various fixed appliances also.


    That said, however, you may find that the course is tailored for anyone, ordinary people and electricians alike,  so will cover training for just portable appliances, without covering fixed appliances which will require safe isolation procedure to be undertaken, which ordinary people won't do, so they'll only be able to test plug in appliances; which means you could only be doing part of the testing job on a site.

     




    Now this is very interesting - always thought PAT was very inconsistent with mostly visual inspections carried out by a 'competent' person... Considering the IET CoP for  in-service inspection and testing of electrical equipment was updated in 2012 (4th Ed) I haven't heard anyone else mention iSiT (what I am going to call it from now on!) - I guess that this is because in reality, the competences required are higher, and therefore going to take more time and cost more? 

    In my opinion, to do PAT / iSiT properly, every site would need a complete risk assessment for every type of item / general location / use, and in a school there are hundreds, if not thousands of electrical items... The HSE though, through its own case study seems to think it should be made easier...:

    http://www.hse.gov.uk/electricity/faq-portable-appliance-testing.htm 

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    Who is actually going to bother risk assessing each individual item of equipment?  The risk assessment will probably take longer than the test.  In reality, whatever type of equipment it is, the test is going to be to carry out a quick visual inspection.  Then plug the equipment into the tester, press a button, and wait for the tester to spit out a "pass" label.


    It may not even be worth devising a separate test interval for different types of equipment.  It's easier to designate a day, then do a sweep of the entire office, PAT testing every bit of electrical equipment you see.

  • 0
    Easier still to decide not to do it at all if the history shows that it is largely nugatory, as it seems the HSE themselves have, quoting their own website.

    In 2011, the HSE reviewed its approach to portable appliance maintenance in its own offices. Thinking about the type of equipment in use, and how it was used, the HSE looked back at the results from its annual testing of portable appliances across its estate over the last five years. Using the results of the previous tests, the HSE decided that further portable appliance tests are not needed within the foreseeable future or at all for certain types of portable equipment. Also, they decided to continue to monitor any faults reported as a result of user checks and visual inspections and review its maintenance system if evidence suggests that it needs revising. Electrical equipment will continue to be maintained by a series of user checks and visual inspections by staff that have had some training.




    I suspect that in the intervening 8 years of this fascinating experiment, nothing bad enough has happened to require them to change back to doing formal annual inspections, as that notice has been on their website for a while.


    I presume the folk selling PAT courses don't often refer to the HSE as an example of good practice however ..

     


  • 0
    How was the course Clint?


    Sadly many ordering the work treat PAT as a tick box exercise with no regard to safety of employees or property. I recently made a client aware that the well known contractor they are now using for testing should be questioned. One "technician" tested over 800 items in two days in a building with difficult access whilst many of the items should not have even passed the visual inspection yet have the magic green label. Staff also report that no items of equipment were powered down or tested, just labelled. Client not interested! they have a pass certificate. 

  • 0
    First of all great respect to those contributors naming it "PAT" rather than PAT testing. It ranks with PIN number and TUC congress as one of irkes.

    Yes, as stated, there seems to be an ethos of tests and tickets on an annual basis with the goal of getting a PASS and no thought to the actual safety aspects behind the idea. Due thought, due diligence, visual inspection then proper testing with a resonable frequency and the training of users to view and report any perceived problems at time of use or sighting.

    But instead of this ideal world we live in the real world so it becomes a mostly useless paper excerise. Nice one H & S

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