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I've been working as a domestic electrician for 6+ years now alongside two NICEIC approved contractors and I hold my 1/2/3 City & Guilds NVQ, 18th edition and 2 million public liability.

I started doing the odd side jobs a while back but my work seems to have snowballed to the point where I am booking in full re-wires, extension jobs, kitchens & bathrooms, consumer units.. you name it.. So I thought maybe it time I should get registered under a competent persons scheme.

The issue is that a lot of these schemes ask for years and years of certificates, company logs, health & safety reports etc.. but if I'm a sole trader trying to grow my business I'm not going to have access to these sorts of records yet?

I have always worked to the standard that the NICEIC electricians taught me and carried out testing & inspecting, issuing EIC & Schedule of test results on all the jobs I've completed using my generic Kewtech test sheets that came with my test kit.

But it's got me thinking how am I supposed to meet the registry criteria if I'm 'legally' not supposed to be carrying out the work anyway, or is being a qualified competent person working to 18th edition and issuing all the correct paperwork to support my physical work enough?
 
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I've been working as a domestic electrician for 6+ years now alongside two NICEIC approved contractors and I hold my 1/2/3 City & Guilds NVQ & 18th edition.

I started doing the odd side jobs a while back but my work seems to have snowballed to the point where I am booking in full re-wires, extension jobs, kitchens & bathrooms, consumer units.. you name it.. So I thought maybe it time I should get registered under a competent persons scheme.

The issue is that a lot of these schemes ask for years and years of certificates, company logs, health & safety reports etc.. but if I'm a sole trader trying to grow my business I'm not going to have access to these sorts of records yet?

I have always worked to the standard that the NICEIC electricians taught me and carried out testing & inspecting, issuing EIC & Schedule of test results on all the jobs I've completed using my generic Kewtech test sheets that came with my test kit.

But it's got me thinking how am I supposed to meet the registry criteria if I'm 'legally' not supposed to be carrying out the work anyway, or is being a qualified competent person working to 18th edition and issuing all the correct paperwork to support my physical work enough?

How have you been notifying any notifiable work up until now?
 
Yes I have had my colleagues check over my work and sign it off under their scheme for now but I can't keep asking them for favours.
Had this same problem , I was bunging a mate who was NIC to notify my board changes and re-wires but he got fed up after doing this for about 2 years

So eventually I bit the bullet and joined myself , I hate paying Scam fees but it was a necessary evil when I doing quite a bit of notifiable work
 
... how am I supposed to meet the registry criteria if I'm 'legally' not supposed to be carrying out the work anyway ...
AFAIK there is nothing that a scam member can do that a non-scam member can't do "legally". Provided you are competent to do the work, then it's legal to do it - scam member or not.
What you've found is that the notification requirements for non-scam members can be quite expensive - but depending on what you do then it may or may not be a problem. The first thing to remember is that (in England) you only have to notify : work within the zones of a bathroom (and you'd be amazed how much is outside the zones if you measure); addition of a circuit; replacement of a CU.
So if the work doesn't fall into one of those three groups then you don't need to notify at all - just issue an EIC for it.

For work that does need notifying, you issue the EIC, the local building control should accept it, and they'll sign off the BC notice. The problem being that the BC fees can be quite significant - and the notice needs to be put in before work starts.

One trick is to ensure that (for example) if there's an extension being done, make sure that the electrics are included within the overall BC notice - that completely removes the need to pay a separate fee for notifying the electrics. Of course, the electrical work needed for the extension may include replacing the CU to bring it up to current standards as well as adding circuits. It does mean being involved soon enough to mention this to whoever is putting the BC notice in.
 
I've been working as a domestic electrician for 6+ years now alongside two NICEIC approved contractors and I hold my 1/2/3 City & Guilds NVQ, 18th edition and 2 million public liability.

I started doing the odd side jobs a while back but my work seems to have snowballed to the point where I am booking in full re-wires, extension jobs, kitchens & bathrooms, consumer units.. you name it.. So I thought maybe it time I should get registered under a competent persons scheme.

The issue is that a lot of these schemes ask for years and years of certificates, company logs, health & safety reports etc.. but if I'm a sole trader trying to grow my business I'm not going to have access to these sorts of records yet?

I have always worked to the standard that the NICEIC electricians taught me and carried out testing & inspecting, issuing EIC & Schedule of test results on all the jobs I've completed using my generic Kewtech test sheets that came with my test kit.

But it's got me thinking how am I supposed to meet the registry criteria if I'm 'legally' not supposed to be carrying out the work anyway, or is being a qualified competent person working to 18th edition and issuing all the correct paperwork to support my physical work enough?

Where do you need "years and years" of certs? I certainly didn't when it all came about, I presented the nic chap my two jobs for inspection and off we went.. As a longstanding scheme member of course I have to have the records but there's some degree of leniency on joining or how could anyone new actually register?

H&S policy, complaint logs and the rest of it etc etc is just all showing a "system in place" so they can tick a box, you can download generic h&S and pop your name in everywhere and so long as you have a couple of token complaint log sheets (ie date: client: complaint: action taken: resolved: ) you'll get the tick.
 
Where do you need "years and years" of certs? I certainly didn't when it all came about, I presented the nic chap my two jobs for inspection and off we went.. As a longstanding scheme member of course I have to have the records but there's some degree of leniency on joining or how could anyone new actually register?

H&S policy, complaint logs and the rest of it etc etc is just all showing a "system in place" so they can tick a box, you can download generic h&S and pop your name in everywhere and so long as you have a couple of token complaint log sheets (ie date: client: complaint: action taken: resolved: ) you'll get the tick.
I see, maybe I've got the wrong end of the stick because I seem to be getting told different things from different people.

So the NIC aren't concerned about previous jobs you've completed, just the ones your showing them for inspection?
 
I see, maybe I've got the wrong end of the stick because I seem to be getting told different things from different people.

So the NIC aren't concerned about previous jobs you've completed, just the ones your showing them for inspection?
I think the best people to speak to are the nic, as it's 15 whatever years since I joined, but I don't see how they could expect you to have a personal portfolio as a newly reg'n sparks.

The annual inspection is more focussed on that you know what you're doing.
 

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