I have been really blown away by all your comments and help. Thank you. One thing that none of you commented on was the price per hour Noname charge. Are any of you charging as much as £88 + VAT? For London, what is a reasonable rate for a competent electrician.Here is the full story. I have called the company ‘Noname’ but many Londoners would be able to guess who they are. When I go to the journalists and consumer champions with this, I will be naming names. I have reported them to Trading Standards and Westminster Building Control.
....
I have recently had an experience with an electrician who was not fully qualified in the UK, and who was sent out by a maintenance firm who are NICEIC Affiliated. The work carried out did not resolve the cause of the problem and resulted in unnecessary and unprofessional results. I then needed the NICEIC to mediate.
The maintenance firm I used is Noname. They appear to rely on emergency callouts and charge £88 per hour plus VAT. In my case, they created unnecessary work and therefore additional hours for themselves.
I had the unfortunate experience of dealing with them when my tenant rang them on an emergency callout to my London flat because a circuit kept tripping and the boiler did not work.
Noname sent a charming young Australian ‘electrician’, who turned out to be unqualified in the UK. This gentleman spent some considerable time attempting to diagnose the problem and came up with a solution that not only failed to identify the cause of the problem, it then created hours of unnecessary work.
It turned out that the boiler, having been serviced only two weeks previously, had developed a loose electrical connection. This is something that a competent and qualified electrician should have been able to identify and fix in ten minutes. However, this Australian ‘electrician’ embarked on an elaborate new wiring scheme instead.
As you may know, responsible landlords (I am one, although I only rent out one property) are legally obliged to ensure our electrics are safe and up to date and now there is a requirement for an EICR, a report that checks your electrical installation to give your tenants peace of mind. So, since this ‘electrician’ was there anyway, I asked him to do an EICR, not realising that he was unqualified.
The office at Noname was friendly and helpful and took a card payment of £312 for the EICR. The Australian said he would carry out the report inspection before he did the wiring work to sort out the circuit (which seemed a bit odd to me, but he was most convincing).
I was unable to visit my property as I was abroad, but, by the end of the day, I had been charged £312 for the EICR report on my card and my tenant was asked to pay £501 on his. At the end of day two, the Australian demanded a further £698 which I refused to pay until I had seen the invoice. He signed off his own work and left my tenants without central heating and with a replacement wall socket which used to work but now didn’t.
So, almost £1200 later, not including the price of the EICR, the Australian hadn’t fixed the problem and he had created a new one.
I was already beginning to smell a rat and I started to ask questions. It turned out the Australian had some vague Australian qualifications which, despite my request, Noname did not send me. It appears that this gentleman had done a three-day City & Guilds course in the UK. He had only been in the UK since August 2020.
The Australian had messed up my electrical installation AFTER having done the EICR, so the report was never going to be worth the paper it was written on. The trunking he installed was about as incongruous as it could possibly be.
The EICR Report turned up a few days later. It was frightening how ‘potentially dangerous’ my electrical installation was. It was full of C2 codes. According to the Australian, I needed a new consumer unit. As soon as I could get to my property (the November lockdown had intervened), I had another, independent and fully qualified electrician check the report (not an NICEIC electrician). The C2 codes turned out to be unnecessary. My electrical installation was absolutely fine as I had had it upgraded a few years ago. There was nothing unsafe about it and all that was needed was for me to upgrade some bathroom lights.
However, none of this was before I had turned to the NICEIC. I had spent time filling out their complaints form. They said they would not be involved in the financial side of any dispute. They were only interested in getting the problem solved. I asked them for an independent check on my system. They replied only that I MUST have the contractor back who did the work so it could be remedied by them. Also, I MUST NOT change the work in any way. They point blank refused to mediate.
The NICEIC did, however, concede that there were ‘issues’ with the EICR Report but, again, suggested I had the contractor back to remedy them.
I could not agree to expose myself to further incompetence, dishonesty and outrageous prices. Noname had taken £501 from my former tenant and formally invoiced him for £637.20, which he of course refuses to pay and so do I. Noname is pursuing my tenant relentlessly. Fortunately for the tenant, he was on secondment in the UK and is no longer in the country. So instead, Noname are threatening me with legal action for an invoice which is not in my name. I am trying to get my money back from them for the invalid EICR and they are refusing to refund me.
It also turned out that the Australian’s elaborate wiring scheme was illegal. This was confirmed when an independent electrician, affiliated to a different professional trade association, came to look at the problem. He was astonished that the NICEIC were treating this case so lightly.
This is a sad state of affairs. We need to be confident that electricians, whether working on their own account or for general maintenance companies, are qualified and competent.
We are talking ELECTRICS here. They can be dangerous. Has Grenfell Tower taught us nothing?
My recommendation:
Think twice before using NICEIC affiliated electricians and if you do, ensure you check their qualifications thoroughly.
The NICEIC appear to be only interested in taking subscriptions. They seem to be disinterested in the quality of the workmanship of their members, nor for the safety of the general public. If my case is typical, it appears that NICEIC members may be unqualified and member companies are apparently able to send out unqualified operatives.
My further recommendation is not to trust Noname’good reviews on Trustpilot. On examination, the positive ones seem to have been written by the same person.
I have been really blown away by all your comments and help. Thank you. One thing that none of you commented on was the price per hour Noname charge. Are any of you charging as much as £88 + VAT? For London, what is a reasonable rate for a competent electrician.
I'm not London based anymore... so I don't charge anywhere near that. The pricing model for London will generally be "whatever we can get away with". What makes it an expensive place to operate in is the parking cost (both per minute + penalties) and the travel time. £88+vat does not seem particularly 'outrageous' to me... just 'extortionate'.
It would be interesting to see how some of these "media consumer champions" (Watchdog, Rip of Britain, Which ) would handle and respond to your experience when they always peddle and promote the use an NICEIC electricians as some sort of reassurance
The fact that competent doesn't necessarily mean skilled is where all these schemes fall short,
The schemes and primarily the NICEIC rely on the media promoting the myth that they are the guardians of finding a qualified electrician to carry out work to a high standard, when the reality is totally different
The whole industry has radically changed in the last 15 years people believe a regs exam and a 2391 ticket is all they need to hit the road and do EICR's and it's all backed up by these so called competent persons schemes as we plummet to the bottom
IMO the reason the NICEIC resist complaints is it upsets their ISO 9000 quality assurance and puts a black mark in their records as in most of the QA systems there should be no complaints
Since 2005 the industry seems to have spawned a lot of parasitic baggage that seems to run the show without any regulation and no one to answer to.
I was recently looking into the competent person scheme regulation and there doesn't seem to be any formal procedure for raising a complaint about a CPS provider with the government dept concerned or the people they appointed to oversee and approve the CP schemes
This is where a lot of ISO accredited companies fall down, they believe complaints will leave a black mark against them.
Having met several auditors and been involved in the process it's how you act on your complaints, not that you receive any.
ISO is about process, I would actually be more suspicious of companies with no complaints as either they are really good and don't make mistakes or actually cover them up...
ISO 9000 / BS5750 led a lot of companies up the garden path to some utopia that has never existed, quality assurance was totally the wrong name for it and some of those that went through the mill to gain recognition thought they were turning out a quality product when all it was about was turning out a product within the parameters laid down in their manual
I thought that any competent person can carry out an eicr and dose not have to be a qualified electrician.
L
loz2754
Technically true, but it depends on who is ordering the EICR. Letting agents, for example, will likely only choose someone who is on a list such as the NICEIC list.
And as has been mentioned, a much higher level of competency is demanded when carrying out an EICR. Knowing how to install to the regulations is one thing - being able to use all of one's senses, skills and experience to inspect and test an installation which may have undergone many changes (good and horribly bad) over several years, is quite another.
You're not based in London are you? Which electrician did you use in the end? And how did you find him? I could do with a fair electrician to fit a rcbo consumer unit and bring my flat to an eicr pass. I ve been variously quoted £750 inc and £650ex vat including an eicr test. The quotes were based on prior vis inspections. Are these prices unreasonable. They seem quite expensive to me.
For London, and what’s been said before, that’s not bad. A portion of that quote will be materials, so at the aforementioned £88 per hour, he’s maybe falling short on the number of hours he’s going to take.
Well i stand informed :-/, thankyou.
There are 2 different electricians, both of which are experienced and i feel, competent, although one speaks in technical gobbledegook and " doesn't have time to educate me".
I'm trying negotiate with the 2nd buts hes avoiding me. I guess he reckons time will pressure me into accepting his orig quote.
I estimate materials metal cons unit ~£50, rcbo and fuses £5x10 (seen online). Call it £150inc vat + getting it The rest is labour. So that works out at £66/ circuit to unscrew a cable from one unit and screw into another, test their and say 12 sockets continuity, mark up a form, email it to me.
The problem.with the fellow's quote is what i want it a clear EICR form in my hand, that is one done with necessary corrections. We both expect any extra work if any to be minor, but you never know. His quote is to fit the consumer unit and do the test. That is if he id any additional problems on the form it goes and an estate agent will want it corrected and restested, according circulating rumours.
As hes not communicating now, i'm left in a difficult. Accept and leave myself open to ransom. Refuse and potentially go through similar with another electrician.
Its seems theres no standard of practice. Thats not to say either of electricians who've quoted are dodgy. But i the punter am having to go through a system of what ought to fundamentals in supply if a service, but are turning into sticking points. Perhaps there should be a common standard of customer service, overseen by BEIS or the Dept for Energy. That is:
prices quoted should include to completion of work incl fixes for id'd and additional small newly id'd problems.
Work should be conducted so that a premis/ property is left in an condition another competent electrician would find no faults.
In the event any fault is identified in a persons work or paperwork, he will fix it with 2 weeks of being notified, unless dangerous in which case within 1 day.
Additional there shd be a guidance chart automatically updated to average unit cost / materials across a number of common suppliers( computers can do this these days)
And by constituency:
Average length of job
Average labour rate
Average call out charge
These figures wouldn't regulate down the prices, but by visibility would allow customers to know when they're being scr'd or when they're simply facing the going rate, no matter uncomfortable it is ;-)
Last edited:
Materials costs depend on manufacturer, and I can assure you they are not all equal, some cheap brands really are also nasty and take longer to install.
There is also a bit more to it than unscrewing a cable from one unit and into another. I for one would be somewhat unhappy if that is how you put it to me, I wouldn't be "negotiating" as you mentioned, but walking away and letting you find someone cheap enough.
cheapest rcd split board, possibly proteus from CEF. They have pre populated boards, but maybe not with an SPD.
might have to swap out certain sizes of breaker. £100 ish for materials.
Rcbo board, as above... £30+ per breaker, never mind the empty board.
electricians like to fit what they choose. That way we know we can give a warranty safe knowing the materials won’t be at fault.
fitting customer supplied stuff can get complicated when it goes wrong.
Buying cheap tat, esp from eBay, you could get a fake device that doesn’t work as it should.
I’m in a relatively cheap part of the country, and I would struggle to change a board for under £500, on the strength of a visual inspection.
working with electricity is as safety critical as working with gas or the brakes on your car, and you wouldn’t think twice about paying for those..... or would you?
might have to swap out certain sizes of breaker. £100 ish for materials.
Rcbo board, as above... £30+ per breaker, never mind the empty board.
electricians like to fit what they choose. That way we know we can give a warranty safe knowing the materials won’t be at fault.
fitting customer supplied stuff can get complicated when it goes wrong.
Buying cheap tat, esp from eBay, you could get a fake device that doesn’t work as it should.
I’m in a relatively cheap part of the country, and I would struggle to change a board for under £500, on the strength of a visual inspection.
working with electricity is as safety critical as working with gas or the brakes on your car, and you wouldn’t think twice about paying for those..... or would you?
I don't know what your line of work is and whether you have customers that forensically analyse what they think they should pay for the products and / or services you supply but with that in mind I would suggest you put yourself in the position of the electrician(s) who have quoted you for the work and then read what you have posted then decide how you would react then you may understand what the problem is, personally I would probably just walk away and not communicate with you
To the OP, I think what you need is a "JCT Small Works Contract" that would give you overall control of contractor and would give the contractor the benefit of payment for additional works found during the fit out, perhaps both of you would be satisfied, personally I would walk away.
I’ve been an electrician for over 30 years and these condition reports are a steep learning curve and I would say I’m still not there 100%.but I tend to pick up the same problems.over 50 to 70% a new fuseboard is needed because everything has to be protected by an red.also las to be metal.the bathroom light has to be ip rated most times it’s not.the fan if it’s in zone 2 has to be extra low voltage.gas and water bonded. Continuity of ring main these ar Ed main problems anyway.you could be looking at 700 for this and at the moment it isn’t out the ordinary.people might disagree
I admit myself I’m not 100% there but I’m nearly there.just by a visual check I can tell the land lord the direction he will be going in.another one is smoke detectors linkedthey are £40 each so it soon builds up
Everything has to be rcd protected; No.
Fan in zone 2 has to be SELV; No.
Non-linked smoke detectors; Not a concern for an EICR.
Fan in zone 2 has to be SELV; No.
Non-linked smoke detectors; Not a concern for an EICR.
Dartlec
Arms
Actually, 240V fans are fine even in zone 1, if they are the relevant IP rating (can't remember off the top of my head - 67?)- though 12V ones are sometimes a better idea.
The bathroom light one is perhaps the most common picked up for sure, because seemingly every new build in the 80s and 90s around here just put a pendant in - though even then outside of zones (including above 2.25m which most ceilings are), then there are no specific IP requirements.
Though some things depend on whether you have a NAPIT EICR or not, of course.....
I know it’s not relevant to this particular situation, but in Scotland, smoke detectors do need to be linked... in every home, not just rented.
yes, but not in the remit of an EICR, unless they are installed with non-compliant wiring.
Afraid they are in Scotland. The short form tenancy agreement and/or Housing Act asks us to comment on the fire detection when undertaking an EICR. I appreciate you would not know that being in England. BS7671 also reference BS5839 within the fundamental principles - 110.1 so, personally I'd comment on fire detection.
i would also comment on itbut there is no mention of fire detection on any of the BS7671 EICR forms.
L
loz2754
I agree. In view of the importance of having adequate working smoke alarms, I always add a comment (with no code), if there are no smoke alarms, or if there's a problem with the smoke alarms. It's just something I do. Because I'm that kinda guy.
OFFICIAL SPONSORS
These Official Forum Sponsors May Provide Discounts to Regular Forum Members - If you would like to sponsor us then CLICK HERE and post a thread with who you are, and we'll send you some stats etc
Advert
Thread Information
- Prefix
- N/A
- Replies
- 70
Advert
Advert
TrueNAS JBOD Storage Server
-
-
-
Understanding TrueNAS JBOD Servers: A Comprehensive Guide- Started by Dan
- Replies: 8