I did three C&G courses one after the other, 16th edition 6 weeks, PAT testing 6 weeks, installation testing 12 weeks, all night classes and all with C&G, around three hours a week.
However the installation testing was only open to electricians, and the PAT testing open to all, it was just after BS7671:2001 came out, which until the real 17th edition came out, was considered like a 17th edition.
But even the C&G course and the two exams, one for management and one for doing the testing, I realised the course only scratched the surface. It is not called PAT testing, it is called the inspection and testing of in service electrical equipment, and even portable equipment can be large, it would take 3 of us a day to inspect and test one item, very clearly portable, it still had the wagon wheels attached, it split apart to transport into 22 articulated trailers and was a batching plant making 6 cubic yards at a time, i.e. a large concrete mixer full.
OK extreme case, but it depends what the employer wants testing. The Emma Shaw case has changed things, back at turn of century it was common to get semi-skilled people to PAT test, no electrician really wanted to do the job, and we were happy to let some one else do it, some times we would do the first test, and set out how it was to be tested, but it is a boring job.
But after the court case, many firms felt there by grace of god go I, and they were more selective on who does it.
Point is even electricians can get it wrong, I have found class I being tested as class II, a mag mount base for a drill, the drill was class II but base was class I, and it did not have an earth connected. I still hate PAT testing, mainly as often not given enough time, if you take a 110 volt extension lead as an example, a yellow brick 230 volt to 110 volt transformer 3 kVA is often only fused or has an overload on the supply, so 13 amp at 230 volt = 54 amp at 55 volt, so an earth fault can and has melted insulation, this is most noted at the ends where the yellow insulation is stripped back so does not cool as well, but people have been known not to dump the whole lead, but just remake ends, so part of the inspection should be to open both plug and socket and look for damage. even a 13 amp plug may have a bit of wire shorting out fuse, or even found two neutral pins and no fuse.
Opening plugs and sockets to check fuse size takes time, I normally only PAT tested after a repair, but got sent out to do a out lying base, dropped off and picked up, so decided to do a proper job but as fast as I could, and time myself, I was there all day what ever, but finished in 6 hours, main limit was boot time of the Robin PAT tester each time moved, and the pre-set test times, but realised I was doing less than 50 in 8 hours on average. Didn't matter on that job, but I realised people were claiming to do 150 items a day, with my Robin tester that was impossible. May have been able to have done it with old one with analogue meter as no fixed time to stabilise, but the all singing dancing one I had, to do that many most would need to be class II and items brought to me, not going to items.
Look at averts they say from 60p per item, that would have been £30 a day, doing 120 a day would only pay £15 an hour with no overheads. So at that rate would need to do some where between 200 and 300 per day, at 200 per day that is 2.4 minutes each. Try opening a plug and checking fuse size and no wire trapped under it shorting fuse and reassembling it and time how long it takes.
advert 60p per unit test said:
A full PAT test includes a visual inspection of the appliance and an in-depth check using specialised PAT testing equipment. This test checks earth continuity, lead polarity, and insulation resistance of the appliance. Some appliances only require a reduced test, known as a PAT insulation test.
That is not true, it always needs a visual inspection, but testers are forced to cut corners.
My son worked for one for a short time, and the firm went through labour as a crazy rate, the inspectors were forced to cut corners, then sacked for cutting corners, so the company could always say, sorry for that, that inspector does not work for us any more, we had to let him go.
There must be some good firms, but in real terms can't really charge any less than £2 an item if giving the inspector enough time, and paying a living wage, in the main the whole thing is a pass the buck exercise.
