Ticking all the Boxes for Competent Persons
Steve Rae-Jones: “Not everything has to be notified to LABC.”
Back in April, we reported how Steve Rae-Jones had squared up to City & Guilds 2394 exam to bring his qualifications up to date, as a returning trade electrician. That stage marked the first of three along the way to full Competent Person certification, and Steve has now passed all the exams including City & Guilds 2395 and City & Guilds 2382 17th Edition.
“Originally, I had all the necessary qualifications about 20 years ago, but needed to pass the exams to tick all the boxes under the NAPIT scheme,” Steve explains.
“I have taken the required public liability insurance for £2 million to meet the criteria and this allowed me to join MyBuilder.com. I’ve had jobs from there, like installing extra sockets and lighting, all of which have been NAPIT certified and tested with my own equipment.”
Apart from the phase rotation function, which normally applies to three-phase electrical installations, Steve has used most of the functions of his multifunction tester including continuity, insulation resistance and loop impedance.
Filling in a Minor Works Certificate will typically involve measuring things like ring main circuits end-to-end, R1/R2, maximum Zs, polarity and RCD testing. On new circuits, testing will be required on things like external loop impedance, and for earth electrode, prospective fault current, continuity of earth conductors, continuity of circuit protection, continuity of bonding conductors.
Steve continues: “One job involved installing a new shower cable. Once I completed the job, I notified local authority building control (LABC) via NAPIT and the system automatically registers the work as involving a Special Location and the date it was notified.
“Not everything has to be notified to LABC, like adding lighting in a room such as a lounge or bedroom, which is not a Special Location. The system automatically determines if notification is needed or not.”
On receipt of the notification, NAPIT automatically updates the local authority and issues a Building Regulations Compliance Certificate to the contractor or customer. NAPIT has a Guide that is intended to provide sufficient information to allow members to carry out Building Regulations notification.
For the latest electrical test equipment, including multifunction testers from Megger, Fluke and many others, please take a look at the thousands of electrical testers available at www.tester.co.uk.
