Why do some so call sparks put the rfear of god into old people

[nickblake]

Why is it that there are so called sparks out there saying its illegal when it does not comply with the regs for example

a Recent customer had social services send a local electrical company to here house to carry out some work she was told it was illegal to have the light comming on with her fan as she has a window in her bathroom ,they also said it was illegal for her light switches to be at the hights they were , ad what do the do installed a down flow heater without an isolator and put the CDU so hiugh i couldnt reach it she is 89 with arthritis cant even switch a light switch on easily ,, just makes my blood boil

 

[oldtimer]

I totally agree but this becoming more common 3 months ago a big national company who maintain gas central heating systems (no names) are using their engineers to do the exact same ie your fuseboard is not up to standard and needs replaced if they get the sale they get 5% commission never mind whos granny it is get a sale. As fo myself I have been called in three times after the above and have stated
"You are not obliged to upgrade your fuseboard as it was installed to the correct standard at the time"
I get thanked for my honesty and I give them a quote to upgrade the board at half the price of above
Do I get the job well not those three but I do get referalls and I do sleep at night so thats ok by me

Forgot to add this is not just in the electrical field that these problems occur it is sadly indemic in our country a few examples would be car repair ( i even got caught out with that) central heating yes madam we know we have serviced it for 25 years but we do not check for sludge build up and you need a full pressure flush out at the cost of £850 bucks and if you read the small print thats not on our maintenance contract sales/commission business will always be here just look at the banks

 

[Graeme Harrold]

Honesty goes a hell of a long way if you are saving the customer a fortune. I find this all of the time when PAT testing fo companies having their IT done annually. When I show them the guidelines and highlight "up to 4 yearly", their eyes pop out on stalks...........

 

[Guest123]

a few examples would be car repair ( i even got caught out with that)

Dont even get me started on "main dealers".

 

[mayfair]

Why is it that there are so called sparks out there saying its illegal when it does not comply with the regs for example

a Recent customer had social services send a local electrical company to here house to carry out some work she was told it was illegal to have the light comming on with her fan as she has a window in her bathroom ,they also said it was illegal for her light switches to be at the hights they were , ad what do the do installed a down flow heater without an isolator and put the CDU so hiugh i couldnt reach it she is 89 with arthritis cant even switch a light switch on easily ,, just makes my blood boil

happens the world over ...as long as you can sleep at night

 

[oldtimer]

Dont even get me started on "main dealers".

Well lets just say they have the same name as a building society

 

[nickblake]

Lenny you mean £69.00 per hour ford .. £95.00 per hour Volvo , took my van into fords for a new key cost me £120 quids ,then the indicators didnt work they'd only disconeected them why ill never know

 

[DurhamSparky]

Well lets just say they have the same name as a building society

could that be the one that is "Nation" wide across the UK

 

[Guest123]

This does go on, no doubt about it. I do think that along with the unscrupulous swines that quite happily go around robbing old ladies there are also those who genuinely dont know any better through poor training or bad misinterpretation of the regs.

 

[DurhamSparky]

come across few of them..!! like oh "that other spark could have went to jail if i never told you" to the customer, ...!! "over a Hidden Earth Rod" (see another thread)

 

[Deleted member 9648]

I'll second all of the above.....but I honestly believe that a few of these chancers really think what they are describing as illegal...IS illegal !!....they are simply thick rather than dishonest...that doesnt excuse the stress and uneccessary cost they inflict on vunerable people though.

 

[Burnt Fingers]

Honesty goes a hell of a long way if you are saving the customer a fortune. I find this all of the time when PAT testing fo companies having their IT done annually. When I show them the guidelines and highlight "up to 4 yearly", their eyes pop out on stalks...........

All too common Graeme. Sadly I have a lot of hospitality customers so its stupidly frequent until some data gets built up but honesty is truly the best policy. especially when you hate appliance testing as much as I do!

 

[philip962]

My sister in law called me today and said her shower was not working told her give me 3 hours and will have a look typical woman could not wait se calls me about and hour later saying she had a guy out to fix it he looked at the shower and the board said the shower was deadly and about to blow up and with that locked of the supply to the shower said that's £50.00 and if you want it fixed call me
so I go round there with bolt cutters and take his lock off and have a look at shower find that it needs a new pull chord and needs rcd protection so installed a rcbo called the other guy back playing the part of husband and asked him want was up he then told me I need a new board witch would be £500.00 and a possible Rewire I am now intregued so get him round asked what he was going to do he said give me 2 hours and your new board will be in
then his face droped when I asked whohe was registered with a bit of err and he said nic so asked him for reg number won't give me it I said fine asked him about water and gas bonding he said you don't need it on your system with that I chucked him his lock off kit from the board and told him to get out He then wanted another £50.00 call out and said he won't leave untill he gets it's you should of seen him run when I got the phone out andstarted to dial 999
I hate these peoplei know work is a bit slow but that's no reason for going for rogue trader tatics is it

 

[wattsup]

I recently installed a single socket for a 92 year old lady, in a kitchen (she called it a new fangled gas cooker....that needed electric ignition) old wylex rewireable fuses. No probs I said, £35.00. She said bloody ell, thats good are you really an electrician? My daughter says get a real electrician to do it, she got one to quote £350 because I needed new electric....I knew what she meant...
Anyhow I told her it was basically illegal to do what I was going to do, she was not stupid had all her facilties, when I explained how the system worked, she said...do the illegal stuff, would you like a cup of tea...and whisky in it.

It took me 15 mins to do the job, she said here's £40...err nope just give me 35....she insisted, Oh ok thank you
I can sleep ok

 

[Johno]

Wattsup, though I agree with your point (knowing that all you are adding is a 0.001A suplly to an ignition) I personally am scared to do ANYTHING that doesn't comply these days, after hearing horror storys of sparks getting fined thousands for doing a quick job, and that IF there was a fault to occur (that was existing wiring), and insurance company or police or fire or whoever asked "have you had any electric work done" than your name would come up.