Slightly hypothetical question regarding qualifications

Also Johno, to protect yourself from future problems, ALWAYS get written confirmation that can be produced in the future of any instructions, requests or directions that you may receive from your company (such as H&S Dept. or managers) so that if in the future some back stabbing basket has it in for you, you can produce evidence for your defence. Get memos or email confirmations every time. Do NOT ever rely upon verbal instructions. People may leave the company and not be there to defend you in the future if problems arise. Get everything in writing and store that material safely at home. You need to act like a Civil Servant.

 

Z.

Thanks for the info, this is pretty much what we do already, and you are right about the backstabbing etc.


It's better to ask for something from a knowledgable position than to ask for it blindly - that's my thinking re the qualifications for myself.

EEbee unless they have changed it seems that many with "approved contractor" stickers are actually domestic installers, and there are many sharks out there with labels and nothing else. The 18th edition exam is completely useless as a sign of competency, except as an ability to find things in the book. How many of the less competent even have a copy, many having only an old edition "On site Guide". How many use it as bed time reading? Now there is a good idea, ask when they last consulted the BYB, in my case yesterday and probably every day for years back. The same with some of the others here, we use our reference documents and the standards to ensure our work is up to scratch.

In Northern Ireland electrical installation work in large parts of the public sector must be procured through a licence to practice scheme. This monitors the individual competence of the contractors workforce and is on top of the requirement for the contractor to be NICEIC or similar. It gives added assurance that those on site are competent or are adequately supervised.

i would agree with Davezawadi that the 2391 would be a good start. We run the course one day per week over six consecutive weeks with set home study in between. This gives time for candidates to assimilate the information rather than have it dumped on them over five consecutive days as would be the norm it seems. Quite often participants will be in similar roles to you, factory engineers, estate services managers etc, who just want a handle on what is required to be done. We relish having such people on the course because it brings a different perspective. Your local college might have a 2391 evening course that is run over a period of 16 weeks. 

By the way, I was late to the party myself. I started when I was 25. I soon came to realise that even if I had two lifetimes to devote to it, I still wouldn’t know all I wanted to know about electrical installation work. That’s the joy! Good luck!

Qualifications are only one method of checking on competency and integrity in whatever field. A company per se, is responsible for ensuring amongst other criteria, that employees with relevant qualifications are used for the work in hand, and that outdated qualifications and technical abilities are being monitored. (At a higher level and having been employed in many large engineering project companies, both in the UK and overseas; older titled engineers who have been appointed as directors and such like in the administrative field, will eventually lose their ability to function at the coal face in their chosen field), 

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Another factor that I disapprove of is the annual assessment of companies, by assessing one individual only (or more for large companies), and the submission of selected jobs by the contractor .


Jaymack

Dave Z,   

my answer to you was a bit tongue in cheek so to speak.

Although to the best of my knowledge (rightly or wrongly) NIC had/have Approved Contractors or Domestic Installer but the ACs could request (and often receive) DI status as well. I`m not aware of any DIs being allowed to call themselves ACs. I could be wrong though

?

I thought so Ebee! You will see the threads on EICRs for rented properties. There is an underlying problem which various are trying to sort out, that "anyone" can produce an EICR for a rented property which is of any quality from great to fraudulent to get work. This is completely unfair on everyone. Somehow a little leveling up is required, so that the safety is sufficient but the cowboys are excluded. One of the first steps has to be suitable levels of competence of all electricians, and that varies enormously between persons. Unfortunately the present systems where exams are dumbed down because too few pass is hopeless but rife throughout the education system. Take 2391, the last 2 changes have taken a 3 hour written exam with full essays for some questions, calculations etc. to a multiple choice thing where much less knowledge is needed (so I am told). When I took mine only 3 out of 16 passed, and in my view the teacher was pretty good. Many of the rest could not even understand Earthing systems, that TT, TN-S, TNC-S as being fundamentally different or describe them at all. That is totally useless, and several of them failed the practical section as well, despite being supposed electricians.

Yes Dave, when I did the 2391 there were some failures. We had excellent tutors on both 2380 & 2391, a few years ago I needed to retake the 238X (2382 I think it was then) and was appaulled at the standard taught was purely an exam passing course .

The vast majority of periodics/EICRs I`ve seen make me shudder, my labrador dog could do a better job of it!