Hi Chris
No disrespect to you personally but 'registered gas engineers' have threatened my & my families' life on 3 separate occassions & lied on one other over the last 30 years so you'll understand that I reluctant to take ANY professional on trust! - especially when my life is at stake!!
1. British Gas poorly soldered a 22mm gas pipe fitting causing raw gas leak under floorboards which I discovered by accident when insulating under the floor & rectified
2. A gas flue problem was caused deliberately during house construction (no doubt because of flue spillage into living area) but breaking out the integral gas flue built into the wall to allow gas flue products to discharge into the wall cavity. The resultant gas flue spillage depended on the direction of air flow under the suspended wooden ground floor & thence into the cavity.
I discovered this when cutting a hole in the cavity wall to accept a 'balance flue' design gas boiler.
Previous occupants had complained of drowsiness on Winter's evenings (when gas boiler was no doubt lit).
3. Corgi gas engineers failed to spot cause of the above open gas flue spillage (back draft) into living room at a property we were renting to students. These same engineers couldn't understand (their own words) why a carbon monoxide gas detector failed to detect the spilling gas flue gases (carbon dioxide from a blue gas flame, carbon monoxide from a yellow flame - incomplete combustion)
4. Tenants of ours called in British Gas because of the smell of gas. British gas promptly condemmed the boiler, stating that the main gas valve (Honeywell permanent pilot light type) was leaking & that the boiler needed replacing! On checking this myself, I found that the pilot light gas tube to pilot jet compression securing nut was loose & allowing a small amount of gas to leak. Tightening the nut solved the problem
I understand that there is a 'Corgi' engineer currently residing at Her Majesty's Pleasure for causing the death of a young woman by poor working practice.
Just because a professional knows how they should behave doesn't mean they will behave in accordance with the rules & regulations of their profession.
When it comes to risking my life, ONLY I will make that decision, not some beauracrat in Whitehall who wouldn't know a spanner from a mop!
In the 'old days' a person had to be 'competent' ie they had to fully understand the importance of doing the job correctly but nowadays it seems that a 'certificate' is the prime requirement & an 'uncertified' person is breaking the law.
I'd rather break the law than cause a death.
Sorry for the rant but HSE has become paranoid about safety. You can't legislate good working practice (common sense) only punish bad practice.
"Hello Chris",
Sorry that I have not replied sooner I have been away from Home for a few Days.
I am sorry to read about the very dangerous defects on your Gas appliances that have either been caused by or `missed` by Registered Gas Engineers / Installers.
Unfortunately you seem to have had `Incompetent` Gas Installers working on / inspecting the appliances in every case - I am not at all surprised that You would have become suspect of the entire `Registered Gas Engineer / Installer` system and perhaps all who are Registered in it.
In any Trade / Profession there are the people who don`t carry out their work to the best standards - BUT in the cases that You wrote about DEADLY circumstances had been created ! - the people concerned should have been prosecuted - although I know that is easier said than done.
However I must comment on your comments here:
QUOTE:
In the 'old days' a person had to be 'competent' ie they had to fully understand the importance of doing the job correctly but nowadays it seems that a 'certificate' is the prime requirement & an 'uncertified' person is breaking the law.
I'd rather break the law than cause a death.
Sorry for the rant but HSE has become paranoid about safety.
END QUOTE
In the `old days` - pre 1994 - ANYONE could have been carrying out Gas Works - working on Gas Appliances - whether they had any Gas Qualifications or not - including people who did not even know of the existence of a Manometer / Water Gauge for testing `Gas Tightness` - let alone any of the Regulations / British Standards for Gas works and the individual types of Gas Appliances / Flues & Ventilation etc.
An Unqualified person would only have been prosecuted IF a situation happened where either Death - Serious Injury or Property Damage occurred - NOT where these dangerous circumstances were found before any of the above happened.
For Domestic and Industrial / Commercial Gas works the ONLY people with Gas Qualifications were British Gas Engineers / Fitters and Plumbers who had Gas Utilisation as a part of their Plumbing City & Guilds [plus HVAC Engineers ?].
In theory these Tradesmen were `legally`able to work on almost ANY form of Gas Works and Gas Appliance - as they were `Qualified for Gas Works` and there was no Legal `seperation` of Domestic and Non Domestic Gas Works at that time.
Although I would have expected British Gas did allocate its Engineers / Fitters to specific areas of Gas Works to suit their Training and experience and I would have hoped that Plumbers stayed in the Domestic Gas area of Gas Works.
I would have hoped that Industrial / Commercial Gas Works / Appliances would have been VERY closely supervised / monitored with respect to the persons working on it being both Qualified and experienced in Industrial / Commercial Gas works and Appliances.
`Nowadays` it is recognised that because of the VAST amount of KNOWLEDGE that is required to be able to Pass the ACS Assessments to work on ALL categories of Commercial and Industrial Gas works / Appliances there is a completely separate `entity` of Gas ACS / Registration categories for Registered Gas Engineers - `Non Domestic` - there are quite a few categories within that definition of Gas Works.
It is VERY unusual that a Gas Engineer has all of the Domestic and Non Domestic categories - this is because they would not want to be Trained and Assessed for categories that they did not work much in and because unless one is very experienced in Non Domestic Gas works and Appliances AND keeps up to date with the Regulations / Maunfacturers Instructions etc. it would take a LOT of `research` to get to a standard of knowledge to be able to Pass Assessment on those categories.
It is also quite `Expensive` to obtain Certification on all of the available Gas Work Categories - unless a Company is paying for the operative to go through the Training and Assessment or just Assessment / Re-Assessments.
Even the Domestic Gas categories of ACS Assessments require either a LOT of knowledge and experience or a lot of `Open Book` reference - even very experienced Gas Engineers still refer to the Gas Utilisation reference books during Assessments as the questions can be very technical or require referring to a Chart etc.
In the `old days` I would have guesstimated that about 50% of all Domestic Gas work / work on Gas Appliances was done by people who had NO Qualifications of any kind regarding Gas and I have personally had to `condemn` countless Gas `systems` and Appliances and have had to notify the Gas Company Emergency Service to come and cap off many Gas Supplies at the Meter because the situation in the property was `Immediately Dangerous`.
When I started working in peoples Homes installing Central Heating - in the 1970`s - I very rarely found that the Gas System / Appliances had NO `Defects`!
This situation did NOT get much better until a few YEARS after CORGI registration for Gas Engineers / Installers was made mandatory - probably as late as about 2000 [Year] - that alone would indicate to Me that mandatory registration for Working on Gas is VAST Improvement on NO Legislation of the Gas Industry.
Regarding Your comment about people simply having to be `competent` to work on Gas - `fully understand the importance of doing the job correctly` - since the mandatory registration of Gas Engineers / Installers it has been deemed that PROVING `Competence` should be by Passing Assessments - `Gas ACS` - that is the ONLY `Legally Recognised` method - irrespective of the Qualifications that are held by the Person.
That has to be done every 5 Years - either Re-Assessments for existing categories that are held or Training and Assessment for `New` categories.
This is not directed at You Chris - although it might apply to You [?]:
People who THINK that they `know about Gas` and might feel that they are `Competent` to work on Gas / Gas Appliances would be SHOWN to `NOT be Competent` in MINUTES by a few Technical / Safety questions from a Gas Engineer.
Just as people who THINK that they `know about Electrics` would be shown to NOT be `Competent` in Electrical knowledge / Works by a few Technical / Safety questions from a Electrician / Electrical Engineer.
In the event of a Dangerous situation occurring on a Gas Installation / Appliance where a prosecution followed - take that into a Court situation and it would be evident in MINUTES of questioning from an `Expert Witness` Gas Engineer / Gas Safe Inspector that the person should NOT be working with Gas / a Gas Appliance - prosecution proven !
Just imagine the scenario where the Non Qualified / Non Registered person carried out some Gas Work / work on a Gas Appliance and that resulted in a DEATH / Serious Injury or the Destruction of the Home / Properties adjacent !
So Chris - I take it that You will NOT be following My `Advice` in the first message - due to your complete mistrust of `Registered Gas Engineers`.
Regards,
Chris - Registered Gas Engineer - Heating Engineer - Heating, Plumbing & Gas Contractor.