Your answers Gentlemen, please. This is indicating a serious problem in the Industry. Trust is now zero. I am disgusted with the behavior of these alleged "inspectors" who are dim, dumb, deaf and blind, and cannot read the BBB. It is not good enough is it?
Been very informative reading the posts on this and I totally agree the EICR especially those carried out for Landlords leave a lot to be desired. I have posted on other threads about the whole "Competancy" situation today with regards electricians, electrically skilled, inspectors etc.
A young electrician having just completed his apprenticeship/NVQ Level 3 and their AM2 according to the awarding bodies and scheme providers those persons should be able to complete satisfactory a EICR! But what experience do they have, how would that person thats only been exposed over their short career and educated to the current regs and standards correctly inspect an installation whose core installation is 20yrs old and had a number of additions and alterations?
I remember attending and passing my 2391 back in 1998 and it was a tough but fair assessment and I actually learnt valuable detail on that course, we all know it had a high failure rate and it was laterly weakened down, to get a better pass rate and thats where it all started again it was heavily biased to domestic electricians who it was said didnt need the same level of technical ability after all its only a house!. I have never understood that, electricity in the wrong hands or in the wrong/poor installation still kills the same as in a high tech industry with its said far higher qualifed technicians.
I absolutely hate those scheme operators that produce site guides, codebreaker lists etc, they actually cause the issues because people like a definitive list, so if its on the list then no thinking or assessing the particular item or installation they are looking at. They are happy to stand behind that publication and say thats what the book says.
The situation is only going to get worse, of course in the domestic and rental, landlord sector its stack them high sell them cheap always has been and I never see it changing.
Assessments need to be fair and reasonable and I agree on simulated inspection boards/installations, if there are "X" faults then candidates should find them all and certainly critical faults that would be C1's. Having say 30 faults and candidates need to find say 66% of them to me isnt correct, also somebody mentioned for every comment that isnt actually a defect but perhaps bad workmanship should loose a mark! Im involved in inspection assessments on a slightly diffrent area of work and the candidates according to the scheme operator must never be told how many faults are actually on the assessment board, much to their disgust! but thats a reality of life when one goes to carry out an inspection the client doesnt inform you that the install has "x" faults! reality is there could be none if correctly designed, installed and maintained by competent people, there could be 1 fault or 1001 faults, but issuing a report to say satisfactory or unsatisfactory without applying your electrical knowledge, experience and competance on that age and type of installation is a big issue that I fear will never be resolved and only get worse.
Some things in life are a challenge and difficult and not everyone will succeed, the answer is certainly not make the assessments easier or provide a checklist of "Faults". What about the fatal flaw that will easily provide a fatal shock, but its not listed in these checklist books? does that mean it isnt a fault according to the inexperienced and incompetant inspector? or the competent person with a great working knowledge of the system they are inspecting and knowledge of all the appropriate standards and regs easily picks up on that fault with no checklist book other than the form fields on the reports and their understanding of what they mean.
Been very informative reading the posts on this and I totally agree the EICR especially those carried out for Landlords leave a lot to be desired. I have posted on other threads about the whole "Competancy" situation today with regards electricians, electrically skilled, inspectors etc.
A young electrician having just completed his apprenticeship/NVQ Level 3 and their AM2 according to the awarding bodies and scheme providers those persons should be able to complete satisfactory a EICR! But what experience do they have, how would that person thats only been exposed over their short career and educated to the current regs and standards correctly inspect an installation whose core installation is 20yrs old and had a number of additions and alterations?
I remember attending and passing my 2391 back in 1998 and it was a tough but fair assessment and I actually learnt valuable detail on that course, we all know it had a high failure rate and it was laterly weakened down, to get a better pass rate and thats where it all started again it was heavily biased to domestic electricians who it was said didnt need the same level of technical ability after all its only a house!. I have never understood that, electricity in the wrong hands or in the wrong/poor installation still kills the same as in a high tech industry with its said far higher qualifed technicians.
I absolutely hate those scheme operators that produce site guides, codebreaker lists etc, they actually cause the issues because people like a definitive list, so if its on the list then no thinking or assessing the particular item or installation they are looking at. They are happy to stand behind that publication and say thats what the book says.
The situation is only going to get worse, of course in the domestic and rental, landlord sector its stack them high sell them cheap always has been and I never see it changing.
Assessments need to be fair and reasonable and I agree on simulated inspection boards/installations, if there are "X" faults then candidates should find them all and certainly critical faults that would be C1's. Having say 30 faults and candidates need to find say 66% of them to me isnt correct, also somebody mentioned for every comment that isnt actually a defect but perhaps bad workmanship should loose a mark! Im involved in inspection assessments on a slightly diffrent area of work and the candidates according to the scheme operator must never be told how many faults are actually on the assessment board, much to their disgust! but thats a reality of life when one goes to carry out an inspection the client doesnt inform you that the install has "x" faults! reality is there could be none if correctly designed, installed and maintained by competent people, there could be 1 fault or 1001 faults, but issuing a report to say satisfactory or unsatisfactory without applying your electrical knowledge, experience and competance on that age and type of installation is a big issue that I fear will never be resolved and only get worse.
Some things in life are a challenge and difficult and not everyone will succeed, the answer is certainly not make the assessments easier or provide a checklist of "Faults". What about the fatal flaw that will easily provide a fatal shock, but its not listed in these checklist books? does that mean it isnt a fault according to the inexperienced and incompetant inspector? or the competent person with a great working knowledge of the system they are inspecting and knowledge of all the appropriate standards and regs easily picks up on that fault with no checklist book other than the form fields on the reports and their understanding of what they mean.
