Are Electricians Being De-Valued?

[skirby]

Having worked as an electrician for over 30 years and I've seen a lot of changes since the 14th Edition of the Regs. It seems to me that electricians are no longer valued highly enough for the work they do and the training they have to undertake. Here's how I see things today...

Constant Changes

I accept that electrical safety regulations have to change to keep up with new technology and as a working electrician I need to update my knowledge. But electricians seem to be thrown an increasing amount of hoops to jump through and are expected to pay for the extra time and effort it takes, just to keep doing their job. It takes a good deal of dedication to get trained up and start out as a qualified sparks in the first place and the constant updating and re-issuing of BS7671 Wiring Regs and related courses is a serious bone of contention amongst electricians.

This would be great if we were being paid accordingly but in my experience we are just seen as another trade as far as rates of pay are concerned. Operating as a fully qualified electrician (especially running your own business) has changed from being a regular construction trade job to something far more involved but in my opinion electricians have been de-valued.

Would I recommend anyone to become an electrician today?

Yes I would. Being an electrician an interesting and challenging job and a cut above other trades as for as knowledge and responsibility is concerned (I suppose you’d call that job prestige?). By working for a company (or sub-contracting) where all the paperwork and training is organised for you it can still be a great career.

But in the present economic climate I wouldn’t recommend starting out in the domestic sector or going down the Part P route running your own small business. That’s partly what I do now. It’s interesting going through the process but a lot of effort to deal with all the paperwork, test sheets and registering jobs. On top of all that you’ve got to deal with customers, compete for work and make enough money to earn a living, which isn’t easy at the moment.

Regulation Overkill ?

As I mentioned before, in my experience most people view electricians as just another trade. I think we have respect but aren’t really appreciated for the service we provide (do I hear violins?). Very few builders, carpenters, decorators and plumbers have to update their qualifications or give any sort of certification for their work or may be held accountable the safety of end users of their installations in the same way as electricians. It’s not uncommon to come across plumbers who have de-registered for gas work and just concentrate on the plumbing. They don’t consider the cost (and aggravation) of re-training for a gas cert every few years is worth the effort. It’s also not uncommon to come across electricians who are considering leaving the trade due to over-regulation.

Over the past 20 years we’ve seen that whole industry has evolved around training, testing and regulating electricians and I guess that’s what upsets experienced sparks the most. I’m in favour of updating and improving my skills but when you’re at the recieving end of endless demands for re-training and updating your regs books you’d like to feel that you are actually adding to your value as an electrician, rather than simply keeping yourself in a job.

It seems to be a matter of- “If you want to be in the game you’ll simply have to play by the rules”. The electrical industry is a prime target for regulation overkill and maybe you need to have been around for a while to appreciate how deep it reaches.

The Future

In summary I’m saying, there should be regulation but not so much of it, it should cost us less, and we should be paid a fair wage for what we do. I guess it’s up to us to make sure we get all of these things.

Despite this, youngsters coming into the trade won’t know any different and they’ll take it all in their stride. Electricians and electrical work will always require some sort of regulation and re-training as technology evolves. That’s the nature of the electrical industry.

There will always be electricians and hopefully they will be respected for their knowledge and experience in years to come. An electrician’s life won’t be easy but I hope they will be valued enough to be paid an acceptable rate for doing a responsible and essential job.

We're all in this together. Do you feel de-valued and are you concerned about the over regulation of the electrical industry and the way it affects you as an electrician?

 

[bugsy]

Too bloody right they are,
My better half runs a cleaning company and charge £ 25.00 per hour and pat their cleaners £ 15.00

 

[Engineer54]

I don't think electricians are any more de-valued than anyone else,

And in a way things have not looked better for anybody skilled with electrics

You must be living in a different world to everyone else!!!...

 

[bugsy]

OH ****! read all the posts and now deem myself obselete.
Ithink we need to see a few people electrocuted , badly burnt , and disabled from bad installs
that might just change things

 

[Darkwood]

20 odd yrs ago i did my 4yrs at college and the pass rate wasn't very high so what you had was a country of sparkies who were highly skilled and educated, if you couldn't do maths you wouldn't survive the course, this meant we were payed a decent wage for our skills as their was a shortfall on sparkies, you could walk out of college and into a choice of jobs as you had an indepth understanding of all aspects of the electrical industry from designing full installations to installing it and an understanding of what the regs were and crucially why they were there in the first place.

Jump forward to modern times; due to goverment intervention in the 90's their was a push to get more kids off the street and into jobs and one way to achieve this was to strip down the courses make the final exams easier and let the companies worry about teaching the apprentices about the industry the backlash of this was a flooding of the industry of ill prepared 'qualified' electricians and due to this market saturation it had a knock-on effect of diluting the earnings.

In comparison you now have newly qualified electricians who can locate the Reg's they want to find but dont really know why its there, can wire a house but haven't been trained how to design and install a complex commercial or industrial wiring system and believe it or not have poor maths, english and customer relation skills. I stress its exceptionally rare now i see a young sparky that i consider would have the intellect to pass the course we did all those yrs ago..... this is what happens when the schools dumb down exams and colleges dumb down course which effects all industries just watch the news about firms refusing to recognise grade A etc cos they are dished out like confetti.

All that aside and yes maybe im a little bitter about it but its the way it is now and this recession has had an unexpected effect of filtering out the lesser knowledged sparkie as companies need to reign in and review the employees who are worth their salt, il justify this with many examples if needed but the best one that comes to mind is an apprentice i had who was asked the question what is 3 x 8 (for working out a load) and he said 18 ... looking at my shocked face he quickly changed it to 21; i rest my case if you can pass all his college courses and become an electrician as he had and not even know his 3 times table im afraid to say the modern courses are a joke hence 3week, 5week, 8week wonder courses can exist. Its diluted the skill of the industry and thus the wages, we used to get payed top wack in the building trade and now we are on a par with brickies, plasterers and joiners.

It may be hard to face up if it applies to yourself when reading this but if you've qualified over the last decade you really have had an easy ride through college although im not having a personel pop at your skills and abilities here its just a comparison to the good old days

 

[imago]

If I'm honest, perhaps a little too honest, all this wailing and gnashing of teeth gets on my wick. There is no point moaning on a forum about how hard life is, how poorly of this trade (or that trade) is.

Anyone who is dissatisfied with their lot in life can either do something about it, or suck it up and accept it. What can be done about it? Improve your business, do something different or do the same thing differently. I will stick my neck out and say that good electricians are amongst (if not the) brightest of tradespeople. So use that to your advantage and start making some changes. It could be retraining in one of the 'golden' trades everyone keeps mentioning. Alternatively you can make your current trade more attractive by offering something different.

As an example, the lad who works for me isn't an electrician, he's a qualified plasterer. Due to him being young enough and keen enough I'm putting him through college again doing a general building skills NVQ. So when someone is talking about redoing a room, or they aren't happy about damage caused chasing in a new circuit 'we' can offer an additional service and plaster the room or the wall. If they are doing a kitchen I have a tiler who I sub the work out to etc

Why should you as an intelligent tradesperson play tail-end-Charlie to a builder? Pricing an extension is a lot easier than working out a rewire for the first time, only the materials are different.

My point is, it doesn't have to be doom and gloom, but you do have to adapt and change with what the market wants. The majority of people want to buy all their groceries in one shop. How many butchers, bakers and green grocers went out of business wailing an moaning but doing nothing about it? How many who wanted to stay in business changed their approach? It's easy to spot the ones who did the latter, they're still trading.

Seriously, have a think about what people want, or what they need, or what you'd like to do, then change accordingly. You will allways be a qualified electrician, you don't have to remain a poorly paid one.

 

[Darkwood]

Good point Imago BTW i wasn't moaning cos im on poor mans wages i run my own business and im booked up solid into the new year so possible like yourself ive took the initiative and found my cliche in the market.... but 20yrs head start on the younger crowd goes a long way

 

[imago]

I'm not pointing at anyone for moaning, we all like a good moan It's just when a lot of people get together and do it they start to convince each other that there's no way out.

 

[vaughant]

CBA to read all the replies but here`s my take on it all (not that anyone cares!!!).
After 5 weeks you are not an electrician, you can wire up a few sockets and lights, you are a glorified labourer and it will take you many years to get to even a basic house basher level.
If you think I`m out of order your deluded. That`s not to say you won`t make a good living out of it and provide for your family, but please don`t embarrass yourself and try and discuss real electricity with people like myself, I`ll see through you in 5 seconds.
Domestic sparks/ house basher types?
Hmm, I think you lads ruined it for yourselves by jumping on the building boom bandwagon back 6-7 years ago buying L200`s with "Joe Bloggs property maintenance" down the side charging over the odds to do simple work that anyone could do and also ignoring smaller jobs to constantly look for the big payday, no sympathy from me, I`ve seen a few of these in industry where I am now and not one so far has cut it for me, yes they make things look pretty but anyone can do that given enough time, set them a real fault finding task and the phone usually rings soon after crying for help.
Industrial sector?
Some good talent out there but grass root training is again the problem, lack of ability to do the basics i.e read diagrams,understand voltage concepts,resistances etc, methodical searches and so on. Huge investment required by training providers who have actually worked in this industry and understand what will be required.
High voltage?
law unto themselves but deserve every penny they get, scary ---- that!!!
Are we underpaid?
Depends, my hourly rate is pants but I made £43000 last year despite having 10 days off a month every month and 2 weeks in the summer in what is the worst payer in the area, although thats not hard considering I`m in Aberdeen where tech wages are off the scale compared to the rest of the country. I think £40K plus is a good wage myself so I cant say were underpaid, I think for what I do its about right but bear in mind someone pulling cables, changing lights and resetting breakers on 8-4 shift gets around £30K its maybe not that brilliant, although it`s put me in good stead for the offshore job I`ve got an interview for on Tuesday.
I think the issue is that a few years back people thought,fuelled by Blair`s cheap money to borrow and ever increasing house prices, that the artificially high economy was never going to end and ended up living way beyond their means and like Issac Newton proved, what goes up must come down and right now boy are we on a downward slope.
We stand today in an economy where people are choosing between eating and putting petrol in their car, whether they all eat or just their kids, whether it`s worth going to a job that costs you to get there what you earn, where any slight financial issue can take a year to recover from, where "I`ll get a job stacking shelves in TESCO" is no longer a joke option, it`s one where graduates are competing with you for, where a TV ad telling you that being a KFC chef is akin to cooking in a Michelin starred restaurant, these were jobs for losers years ago yet now a deputy manager in Lidl earns £23000 and the store manager gets £32000, yet a maintenance spark is asked to be a fitter,operator,supervisor,and perhaps sweep the place with a broom up his bum for £24000 a year.
Therefore electrical work is pretty far down the list of peoples priorities. An old consumer unit that needs changing soon? Wait til it breaks. Need some outside lights fitted? I`ll do them myself, "but thats illegal, you need a certificate", well, thats a risk I`ll take.
My guess is its the same in all trades right now, i`d certainly agree that we should be on more than a painter decorator but when the industry dictates a wage then thats life, your still working for it and theres 1000`s of others to take your place tommorow at the drop of a hat so either look to do something else or lump it.
I chose to further my career and invested in it via courses,training and knowledge and I`m hoping to soon see the fruits of my labour but its come at a price of leaving my family for 18 months, living 600 miles away in the back of a Transit Van in Scotland for 4 months and paying two lots of bills.
We must first value ourselves before we look to what others value us as,otherwise we really will be fighting a losing battle.

 

[shagbite]

i hope you succeed in that interview, vaughant. let us know, won't you? i'm thinking of canada myself - i fancy the northern territories where it's nice and parky!

 

[vaughant]

i hope you succeed in that interview, vaughant. let us know, won't you? i'm thinking of canada myself - i fancy the northern territories where it's nice and parky!

Cheers man, I hope so too.
Looked into Canada myself a few years back but it didn`t really work out for a number of reasons but they are pretty desperate for sparks from my background, if you do a bit of hunting you`ll find the job is "on the list" which means provided you meet some other criteria you get in.
Dependent upon age you may get sponsored by a particular community within a state who sort EVERYTHING out for you as regards working there, there maybe commitments to that particular area as part of your sponsorship agreement but its a very good way to get out there.
Don`t believe the hype that its way cheaper than the UK,in the real world theres not a great deal in it, although I`d say after a few years you`d have a few more ££££ in your pocket.
Oil sands is where the money is, some good rotations out there as well.

 

[shagbite]

Cheers man, I hope so too.
Looked into Canada myself a few years back but it didn`t really work out for a number of reasons but they are pretty desperate for sparks from my background, if you do a bit of hunting you`ll find the job is "on the list" which means provided you meet some other criteria you get in.
Dependent upon age you may get sponsored by a particular community within a state who sort EVERYTHING out for you as regards working there, there maybe commitments to that particular area as part of your sponsorship agreement but its a very good way to get out there.
Don`t believe the hype that its way cheaper than the UK,in the real world theres not a great deal in it, although I`d say after a few years you`d have a few more ££££ in your pocket.
Oil sands is where the money is, some good rotations out there as well.

thanks for the info'. i'm 40 now, so i'm probably pushing the limits of what's desirable for sponsorship. i'm still going to look into it though.