such a shame when people suffer at the hands of cowboys

[opm electrical]

ive just been round to my friends house to see if i could put a couple of spurs+drops for appliances in his kitchen extention because the builder had missed them on the kitchen plan so his spark hadnt put them in. fair enough i thought as i went round could just be an honest mistake. as soon as i walked in the alarm bells were ringing as they were complaing about other stuff the builder had done wrong.
took a couple of fronts off, no grommets, no brown sleeve in switch lives. none of the sockets were even the same hight, more checking, no gas bond, no water bond, its not like they hadnt been upgraded they just werent there. the extention had a 2 way sub board supplying the cooker and sockets with 25mm tails which is fine except that the cheapskate had used 4mm earth (he'd doubled it up to make 8mm, clever lad) and finally had extended the lighting cicuit from the existing house which was supplied from a rewireable board with no rcd protection, and there was no cert to go with this quality work.
it really boils my **** to think that these ***** can get away with this and give everyone like us a bad name

 

[Sparky Ninja]

I dont mean to offend anyone here, but from my personal experience it seems to me that almost every builders 'electrician' carrys out work in this way.

The amount of time I've seen a bulls up and I'm told 'the builders electrician did that' is beyond belief.

I've done work for builders before, but always as a seperate entity.

It could honestly be a guy who has decided not to update or retrain, but I've known a couple of firms where there electrician is also the chippy and the tiler..

 

[opm electrical]

thats what i mean about giving people a bad name, i do loads of work for a builder (as a separate entity, like you said) but still 'builders sparky'

 

[opm electrical]

they said the guy seemed to be dong it in his spare time but he worked for a data cabling firm

 

[Des 56]

It amazes me sometimes how many builders who do their own electrics,always seem to have an a.n. other to portion the blame,when in all probability he has performed the clown act himself

 

[opm electrical]

they were also fobbed off because they asked for a periodic on the rest of there house but were told if that happened it would affect the extention getting signed off. question is though i could do the bits he needs, upgrade earthing and bonding and fill minor works in, but without original installation cert how do they get completion

 

[Guest123]

Obtain name of said cowboy and report to LABC.

This will continue to happen unless we as the good honest hardworking sorts take a stand against the corn chewing scum.

 

[High Tower]

I'm with Lenny on this one

 

[Burnt Fingers]

When I had an extension built, I did up to 1st fix myself and because I am not qualified let a builders subcontactor do the 2nd.

I tested it before they did, and found 2 x lives bared and screwed to back box (well trapped but contacting) and a screw through a lighting cable where they had put some floor back down.

I think the eldest was about 15 and the guy that did the testing was actually a plumber.

 

[jase]

first thing to do is advise to put in bonding, you should not do any work on any install where there is no main bonding