I Need Work Electricians form abroad seeking advice

[Patrik]

Hello everyone,

I am a 26 year old "recently" (about a year ago) moved to London from Italy and I would need any piece of advice that anyone could give me.

I translated all my qualifications via Uk Naric, I passed the health&safety exam, passed the 17th edition exam, and got my ECS cards (white card - electrical labourer ).

Here is where my problems start. I don't have that much of experience when it comes to commercial/industrial work since I worked (that little that I have) in a shipyard in Italy, and I am "mostly" qualified in the network field (CAT5/CAT6/), telephones and some simple lighting and sockets.

All the jobs I tried to apply for are self employed, not having experience I am a bit afraid to go self employed. I don't mind starting from scratch as an electrician mate, develop and learn something new and then maybe one day go self employed.

I have a few questions that I would like you guys to help me with.

How does self employment work here? Because where I come from, self employment means you are basically on your own, your tools, your working our, your own boss, your own company. Seeing all of this job opportunities around on sites, it seems to me that I am missing something here.

Does anybody know any sites or any agencies that I can visit/contact to help me get what I need? Basically I need someone to employ me, train me and let me continue my electrical adventure with them.

Any qualification that might be worth getting?

I hope someone can give me some good advice, any kind of help would be greatly appreciated, and thank you all for reading this.

Patrik

 

[The Ghost]

Morris Services - Getting Started - http://www.morrisservices.co.uk/gettingstarted.asp
Hi Patrik and welcome. Please read the above it will put you in the picture on how to become an electrician in Britain. Advertise in local electrical wholesalers for electricians mate job. Try for agency work and work toward a qualification in the meanwhile. If you take a course make sure it gives you the qualifications for the routes above for whatever route you choose to take. Do not waste your money on anything less as many people offering training will lie to you to get your money and you won't be any nearer to being an electrician just poorer and crying at your loss of money.
The true core courses for electrician are the 2365 City and Guilds level 2 and 3 (C&G). After attaining those core skills/exams you can add 2394/95 C&G or 2391 as an alternative just coming out now. That is testing and inspection. If you go onto a job site for electricians you will see again and again what qualifications they want for the job and it is very much like the above. Things like the 2382-15 are for electricians who have the core training, by itself it will not get you work as an electrician. Hope that is of some assistance. You might consider applying for the trainee section on this forum as well.

 

[Squid]

Self employed means you are either working on your own or "employed" by a company as a self employed contractor, it means they don't have to worry about NI, TAX, Holiday and Sickness pay.

If you have experience in data cabling then try to get some work in data cabling especially in the City and the Wharf as you work to becoming an electrician, it'll be better then working in Starbucks.

A friend of mine is a sparks and was Cisco qualified but now does network cabling with some sparking for a company based in the City as self employed.