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Is this the end of 6 week wonders? New Domestic Gold Card Apprenticeship announced

Discuss Is this the end of 6 week wonders? New Domestic Gold Card Apprenticeship announced in the UK Electrical Forum area at ElectriciansForums.net

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New Domestic Apprenticeship announced leading to Domestic Gold Card


Interesting.

Still as clear as mud how this will work but this is probably the thing we've all been waiting for.

Hopefully it will clear the waters and stop DIY Dave having a go - making a Gold Card the standard should make domestic electrics like Gas Safe where people will start to recognise that only those who hold a qualification should be touching them. The beauty of industrial/commercial work is it's extremely hard to get work in those sectors if you're not absolutely 'qualified' with a Gold Card. Some blokes even struggle when they have the qualifications but haven't served their time.

This change in the domestic sector will in turn drive up prices and help real electricians who charge real prices secure the work instead of someone quoting pittance to do a bodge.

What say you, board?
 
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I really don't get how nobody seems to realise this thread is about those doing short courses and not 'dave down the pub'. It's even in the thread title. ?
Your opening post talks about DIY work, and making domestic electrical work exclusive to those who are qualified (which it currently isn't, and the introduction of this qualification alone isn't going to change that). No mention of short courses until later on.
 
I really don't get how nobody seems to realise this thread is about those doing short courses and not 'dave down the pub'. It's even in the thread title. ?
You said it was to stop people undertaking electrical work in homes which is what the 6 week courses were trying to do

All you are doing is making the 6 week course a 6 month course or whatever
 
You said it was to stop people undertaking electrical work in homes which is what the 6 week courses were trying to do

All you are doing is making the 6 week course a 6 month course or whatever
3 year apprenticeship. Did you watch the video?

My point is that honest decent people aren't going to undertake work that they're not legally allowed to do, knowing full well they're not legally allowed to do it. Which is most people.

They will also not pay for courses that don't give them their desired result.

This will 100% result in less competition in the domestic sector if done properly. How many people wanting to change career will do so if they know they have to essentially find an apprenticeship or get taken on as a mate for 5 years to become a 'experienced worker'? Not many i'd wager.
 
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So in a nut shell the course providers are changing from 6 weeks to 36 months...

Marvelous , it won't make a jot of difference in the short term

DIY Dave and Kevin the Kitchen Fitter will carry on regardless and will do safe in the knowledge that they won't ever be pulled up for doing so

At 43 I certainly won't be retraining or doing another apprecticeship , not a chance

I will carry on regardless, doing what I have been doing for the past 25 years
 
6 week courses shouldn't enable someone to carry out electrical work but I bet a lot of people doing the 6 week courses are decent and honest people who have been sold a load of crap but actually believe that it's worth something and at least they've went out of their way to try and gain knowledge... fair play to them!

The dodgy builder who comes to site and manages to convince the customer that they're capable of doing building, electrical and plumbing works and then goes ahead and attempts it all themselves without subbying the work out.... these are the people that need dealt with!
 
What SHOULD be happening is that LABC were funded and trained appropriately to monitor work in their area, and dish out enforcement notices to require crappy work to be corrected. Instead, building inspectors are generally being privatised, overworked, and as often as not barely visit a site any more in my experience, let alone monitor whether electrical work has been done properly. (Some areas are better than others)
Personally... I don't want my council tax to go up any higher ! So I'd like to see the trade bodies actually do something for the extortionate annual fee... Let's legally enforce them to actually be responsible for the standard of their members ??
 
So in a nut shell the course providers are changing from 6 weeks to 36 months...

Marvelous , it won't make a jot of difference in the short term

DIY Dave and Kevin the Kitchen Fitter will carry on regardless and will do safe in the knowledge that they won't ever be pulled up for doing so

At 43 I certainly won't be retraining or doing another apprecticeship , not a chance

I will carry on regardless, doing what I have been doing for the past 25 years
Nope, none of this was said anywhere. I don't think you watched or understood the video.

They are bringing in a domestic apprenticeship which results in a Gold Card to prove you've done said apprenticeship. For those that haven't you will have to prove competency through an 'experienced worker' route. It's likely competent persons schemes will require these to join in future.

If they made this a legal requirement you would do it, wouldn't you? You certainly wouldn't just carry on as is since you seemingly made a huge fuss recently about those not signing up to a scheme being 'cowboys' and leaving all the 'decent, honest' electricians to compete with the prices of those who don't have joining fees..

Nothing about course providers changing to 36 months, nothing about you needing to 'do another apprenticeship' ?
 
I've a feeling, with all the new house building 'planned' by the government that we're going to need a hell of a lot of newly qualified 'trades people' in the next few years. With brexit we're not going to be importing any ...so where are they going to come from?
Are these 'private teaching firms' offering qualification courses going to get their houses in order?
.....or are we going to re build and open all the technical colleges that used to be, to provide proper apprenticeships?...Some chance!
More means for money making for the scammers and friends, I'll wager.
 
This will be my last post on this topic as most people all ready know my views on scams

But good luck with the 3 year competent person scams and I am sure you will get some poor saps to part with their hard earned money

But nothing will change and nothing will stop me finding botched installations every week that was supposedly fitted by an 'electrician'
 
This will be my last post on this topic as most people all ready know my views on scams

But good luck with the 3 year competent person scams and I am sure you will get some poor saps to part with their hard earned money

But nothing will change and nothing will stop me finding botched installations every week that was supposedly fitted by an 'electrician'
So if they say you can't join a competent person's scheme without a gold card you're going to give up work? Did you do the same when the schemes themselves came out?
 
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From my experience, everyone carrying out electrical work who shouldn't be hasn't even been on one of these 6 week courses you're talking about. They're just handymen who think they can do it but they couldn't be more wrong
This.

Those that take the time and commitment to change career, spend thousands and gain the required* qualifications are rarely the ones to worry about.

They are no more or less likely to turn cowboy as those that went the full college, apprenticeship, NVQ and AM2 route.

Some control is undoubtedly needed but you have to ask how THIS and previous attempts are going to deliver this.

The vast majority of those offering unqualified and uncertified electrical services will continue to do so as THERE IS NO WAY OF KNOWING that the work has been done.

People don't care in that any new circuit to the garage, garden room, loft conversion, hot tub will often never come to light. The only real mechanism is on the sale of a house and even then chances are it will not be picked up.

The parallels with gas are a bit of a false comparison as, one, the opportunities for gas work are usually no more than 2-3 per property and, two, even with gas anyone can go into screwfix and buy a cooker hose. Do you really think there is no illegal gas work going on?

All this is is a rebranding of the present state of affairs, more schemes, more certificates, more paper course,more hurdles to jump, more expense to those that do the job properly....

....and most importantly more expense to the customer who is even more likely to get dodgy Dave in to fit that new light.


(*required, not necessarily desirable or the experience that is essential)
 
So basically, anyone can do electrical work and we just need to hope that those doing it know what they're doing and that's the best we can hope for?
Exactly.

The only thing stopping anyone doing any domestic work they want is that some of it should be notified to building control and often the customer will expect the electrician to do it via certifying the installation after the work is complete.

If you do electrical work without doing this the homeowner has to do it.

Currently, there's nothing to stop anybody from doing any domestic electrical work.
 
Except ethics.....but that thought went down the pan for many, ages back.
I would guess people who feel confident and competent to do the work wouldn't have a problem with ethics since they probably don't think they're doing anything wrong.

That said i find people to be much more ---- online about all the stuff we talk about on here compared with real life where most people really don't care.
 
I would guess people who feel confident and competent to do the work wouldn't have a problem with ethics since they probably don't think they're doing anything wrong.

That said i find people to be much more ---- online about all the stuff we talk about on here compared with real life where most people really don't care.
A better way of putting it,
If they get what they pay for, OK....if they don't, they've no idea anyway, so who gives a t0$$.

Some of us are still ethical, by the way.
Plenty, in a position to be, ARE NOT.
 
A better way of putting it,
If they get what they pay for, OK....if they don't, they've no idea anyway, so who gives a t0$$.

Some of us are still ethical, by the way.
Plenty in a position to be ARE NOT.
Depends how you define ethical though.

I wouldn't say carrying out a CU change for example with zero qualifications is 'unethical' if you know you can do the job safely. Some would.
 

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