- Nov 24, 2010
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- If you're a qualified, trainee, or retired electrician - Which country is it that your work will be / is / was aimed at?
- United Kingdom
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- Heavily Qualified Electrician / Teacher / Tutor - etc
So about two months ago now, I got a call from a customer asking if I could do a few bits, "of course" I said. She asked for a rough price to change one pendant for two and install a new socket. I said roughly £100 depending on RCD, Bonding, blah blah blah... and we arranged a date (about a week later) for me to go and price for the work. A day before I'm due to go round the customer phones to say someone has been round and quoted and she doesn't need me any more. Fair enuff.
About a month after her first call, I get another call from the same customer asking if I could pop round and give her a quote to do a few bits. Bit strange I thought but I arranged a date and this time wasn't binned off the job the day before so I got to go round and meet her this time. I arrive to find two pendants in place of one and a new socket added. She explains that the plasterer that had been round to make good the terribly shoddy work of the previous spark had refused to plaster over the gaping hole in the ceiling with only a bare connector block where the old pendant lived feeding the two new pendants. The guy hadn't even bothered to wrap it in tape! Wow I thought, hats off to the plasterer for actually knowing and refusing to go over it.
Anyway, I said for £45 I'd stick in a maintenance free JB and bob's your uncle. We arranged a suitable time for me to go back round to do it and only then did she present me with what I could only call shocking work! She showed me the extra socket run in trunking and spurred from another, only the trunking came from the existing, stopped at a cupboard and came back out the other side to the new socket. Upon looking in the cupboard, The 2.5mm cable had been stretched across it like a banjo string!! Tight as anything, unsupported and just in the middle of the cupboard!
I said to her that there was no way on earth that the guy who has done this work is a qualified electrician! To which she replied "But he showed me his qualifications?!" as she showed me two pictures that he'd emailed to her of his quals, 2382 and 2391. Upon closer inspection however it was blatantly clear that they were forged! Just scanned in certs that he'd then used MS Paint to put on his details!!! The guy also claimed he was registered with Elecsa which upon further investigation turns out he's not registered with any of the scam schemes. I said to the customer that this guy should be reported not only for fraud by misrepresentation but also for carrying out notifiable works in a kitchen and not being registered and not a cert in sight! The customer was quite happy to do this and pretty much gave me free reign to do what I liked with regards to reporting this bloke.
The next day, I'm on the phone to LABC who have passed me on to trading standards. Apparently it has to go through TS before LABC deal with it? I phone TS and they appear to be very helpful and arranging a time for an officer to meet me at the premesis to assess the work and forged documents.
So a week or so later, I'm back at the house and am met by the customer and the TS bloke who has looked at the work and the dodgy quals, taken some photos and seems very eager to catch this guy! He made it very clear though that he would only be going after him for the fraud, and not the dodgy work as that was down to LABC. I fixed the dodgy work for the £45 as agreed, and as a good will gesture sorted out the banjo string cable in the cupboard as well. It turns out that the original bloke had charged her £45 to do the original work and was there for about 5 hours!!! I did make a point of saying to the customer that when you're only prepared to pay peanuts, you'll only get monkeys, to which she agreed.
The next day I'm back on the phone to LABC, tell them what's happening and am basicly met by the reply, "Although we are responsible for enforcement where dangerous work has taken place and/or work doesn't comply with the building regs, we don't actually carry out enforcement"!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?! I asked why and they just said "Because we just don't"!?!?!?!
Anyway, to bring this story to a close, the customer had contacted the original guy for a refund and been quite rudely refused. This I then sorted out for her by contacting the scamster directly telling him exactly what's what, reg for reg, law for law, word for word. The customer told me the next day by text that she woke up to £45 on her hallway floor! Problem 1 solved! However, what really riles and frustrates me about this whole episode isn't the scamster electrician, isn't the dangerous work, nor the forged quals. The thing that really makes me proper mad is the fact that LABC were about as useful as an ashtray on a motorbike!!! No enforcement my a**!!!!
Why on earth are we paying such extortionate amounts of money to these scam schemes! These so called official and government approved bodies, when LABC won't bother with enforcement when people aren't even registered as required by the building act!!!!!! I gotta hand it to Trading Standards though as he was keen as mustard to catch this bloke and has promised to update me when he does
My main point though is that I'm so livid about this whole thing. Makes me seriously, and I mean 'seriously' consider giving up paying my scam scheme coz what's the point???? Nothings gonna happen to me if I'm not registered!!! Why bother?!?!?
About a month after her first call, I get another call from the same customer asking if I could pop round and give her a quote to do a few bits. Bit strange I thought but I arranged a date and this time wasn't binned off the job the day before so I got to go round and meet her this time. I arrive to find two pendants in place of one and a new socket added. She explains that the plasterer that had been round to make good the terribly shoddy work of the previous spark had refused to plaster over the gaping hole in the ceiling with only a bare connector block where the old pendant lived feeding the two new pendants. The guy hadn't even bothered to wrap it in tape! Wow I thought, hats off to the plasterer for actually knowing and refusing to go over it.
Anyway, I said for £45 I'd stick in a maintenance free JB and bob's your uncle. We arranged a suitable time for me to go back round to do it and only then did she present me with what I could only call shocking work! She showed me the extra socket run in trunking and spurred from another, only the trunking came from the existing, stopped at a cupboard and came back out the other side to the new socket. Upon looking in the cupboard, The 2.5mm cable had been stretched across it like a banjo string!! Tight as anything, unsupported and just in the middle of the cupboard!
I said to her that there was no way on earth that the guy who has done this work is a qualified electrician! To which she replied "But he showed me his qualifications?!" as she showed me two pictures that he'd emailed to her of his quals, 2382 and 2391. Upon closer inspection however it was blatantly clear that they were forged! Just scanned in certs that he'd then used MS Paint to put on his details!!! The guy also claimed he was registered with Elecsa which upon further investigation turns out he's not registered with any of the scam schemes. I said to the customer that this guy should be reported not only for fraud by misrepresentation but also for carrying out notifiable works in a kitchen and not being registered and not a cert in sight! The customer was quite happy to do this and pretty much gave me free reign to do what I liked with regards to reporting this bloke.
The next day, I'm on the phone to LABC who have passed me on to trading standards. Apparently it has to go through TS before LABC deal with it? I phone TS and they appear to be very helpful and arranging a time for an officer to meet me at the premesis to assess the work and forged documents.
So a week or so later, I'm back at the house and am met by the customer and the TS bloke who has looked at the work and the dodgy quals, taken some photos and seems very eager to catch this guy! He made it very clear though that he would only be going after him for the fraud, and not the dodgy work as that was down to LABC. I fixed the dodgy work for the £45 as agreed, and as a good will gesture sorted out the banjo string cable in the cupboard as well. It turns out that the original bloke had charged her £45 to do the original work and was there for about 5 hours!!! I did make a point of saying to the customer that when you're only prepared to pay peanuts, you'll only get monkeys, to which she agreed.
The next day I'm back on the phone to LABC, tell them what's happening and am basicly met by the reply, "Although we are responsible for enforcement where dangerous work has taken place and/or work doesn't comply with the building regs, we don't actually carry out enforcement"!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?! I asked why and they just said "Because we just don't"!?!?!?!
Anyway, to bring this story to a close, the customer had contacted the original guy for a refund and been quite rudely refused. This I then sorted out for her by contacting the scamster directly telling him exactly what's what, reg for reg, law for law, word for word. The customer told me the next day by text that she woke up to £45 on her hallway floor! Problem 1 solved! However, what really riles and frustrates me about this whole episode isn't the scamster electrician, isn't the dangerous work, nor the forged quals. The thing that really makes me proper mad is the fact that LABC were about as useful as an ashtray on a motorbike!!! No enforcement my a**!!!!
Why on earth are we paying such extortionate amounts of money to these scam schemes! These so called official and government approved bodies, when LABC won't bother with enforcement when people aren't even registered as required by the building act!!!!!! I gotta hand it to Trading Standards though as he was keen as mustard to catch this bloke and has promised to update me when he does
My main point though is that I'm so livid about this whole thing. Makes me seriously, and I mean 'seriously' consider giving up paying my scam scheme coz what's the point???? Nothings gonna happen to me if I'm not registered!!! Why bother?!?!?
Last edited:
oliceman:
