I wired the entire house myself and got an electrician to say he had done it.
He had a bit of a whine about where I had tidily wired inside a 100x100mm RHS column which has 8 light switches let into it, I twisted the invidual wires that belonged together because I took the TPS shieth off the cables because there wasnt enough room to get them thru the massive great 150x100x10mm RHS beam across the top.
He only whined about it because no electrician would have done it like that even tho it was perfectly legal to do it like that.
If I cant do it myself, I would have the phone number on the laptop for someone who could.
Contracted out to cheapest bidder, seems to be a two person team, one drives the van, the other throws the book at front doors ;)
What, with a sign, "free, take one"? I think a lot of people wouldn't bother, unless they still do the old book muncher recycle points, as well?
How about an order form in next phone book --> then at least those who don't want one don't get one? But I sometimes refer to the paper book in the Internet not turning up some local whatsit I expected, that's more the yellow pages, which can be better for country town.
But I've yet to receive a free catalogue from Jaycar's order form in current one, just their junk mail. Though some years the shop will give me one, if I been buying a fair bit around that time of year.
If they charges for it, few would bother, but then the cost would likely skyrocket too, if the numbers (volume) go down.
that the Yellow Pages on-line is utterly
How country? I'm in Bendigo, which is larger than average, but only couple hours from Melbourne. I use yellow pages a few times a year.
Viop is worth it? I'm not so happy with the voice quality, a friend had voip. His used to fall over lots too, so it would often just ring out. No message option?
And, what of all those on mobiles these days? People with landlines supposed to be a minority these days?
I suppose he'll strike some balance between overuse and under use by charging?
I met someone who'll ring an odd number (from phone bill in shared house) to ask who they are, in order to work out who should pay for the calls.
Dunno how much they charge, but it's legal. The electrician takes on the workmanship 'guarantee' and puts his stamp on the meter (at least that's how it was a while ago) as signoff.
I've done 200A industrial wiring that just needed to be looked at and signed off by the sparky. Good systems in place on industrial sites, nice big padlocks holding the power switch off.
Lotsa people do their own house wiring and only get caught out after the place burns down and it gets looked at -- oops no insurance cover...
unless the sparky is on site and available for consultation while the work is being done. It appears that a householder could do some of the work while the electrician he is employing does another part, but it would not be lawful to do the work first, and then get the electrician to look at it later.
From a safety perspective, and as long as the electrician really does look at the relevant parts of the work, I can't see what difference it makes, but that's how I read the law.
Heavens! In my early days I could never afford an electrician and their lazy apprentices. I soon learned the basic tricks:
1/ When buying electrical switches, relays etc always pump the man behind the counter for all the info you need. Ask for the regulations book on cable sizes and installations.
2/ Go to auctions to buy cabling; it's 1/10th the price. Remember if the cable is too small it can be doubled up inside a conduit. Similarly it can be lengthened if too short, though this is best done with solder. A good trick with cabling of the old yellow colour (verboten) is to hide it inside conduit.
3/ Lose your fear of switchboards and substations. A connection between the neutral (black coloured) and any line will give 240V, but if you connect to two lines you get
415V! Brilliant!
4/ Study the layout of the old decrepit premises to see if there are unused water, compressed-air and steam lines. These may be stuffed with cables the inspector will not see. (Earth 'em though.). Any boy starting out can to well to peppercorn-rent a dump and gradually do it up. If the girlfriend demurres - dump her!
5/ Again, auctions will have all sorts of goodies, such as old motors (seem to last forever), fuse boxes and fuses, relays, contactors. Remember that components can be too small, but rarely are they too big. Old aluminium power cables are available and can be useful because they're light.
Just for good measure, and in the same vein, it appears from this definition
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and the associated sections of the act, that on a proper construction, one cannot even change/clean the dust filter in one's airconditiong system, but must call in a tech to do it.
Now, anywhere but Australia, one would question whether that was really the intent, but these days, Australians seem to be prohibited from doing pretty much anything they're not expressly permitted to do, so a prohibition against doing something to the dust filter seems entirely plausible. Unlicensed breathing is still legal, for the time being.
Also note the uncertainty regarding whether a typical split system is in a building.
Well I'm 'Mexican' and my info is decades old, I have done the industrial bit, thought I'd be supervising the sparky at the time, but he was twice my age, thus called the shots -- besides, he held the key to the OFF switch padlock :) Yes sir, no sir...
Employees don't give "directions" to employers. Employers do give directions to employees, but that is not the factual context. I don't see how subsection 14(2) can apply in this factual situation, and I imagine that a court would be very reluctant to give section 14 a broader construction contrary to what the legislation is about.
The electrician and the person would not be in an employer/employee relationship in the normal sense, such that the employer can give directions to the employee. The relationship in question would be that of an person contracting to perform a particular service for another. If the nature of that service includes performing the function of a supervisor for the purposes of the act, then I can't see any difficulty with that.
The legislation is generally about ensuring that work is competently done, mainly in the interests of safety, and it seeks to achieve that goal by requiring that persons qualified to perform the work are involved in it. Yet section 14 clearly envisages that some of the work will be performed by persons who are not qualified to do it completely on their own. Further, that section envisages two levels of supervision, depending on whether the person doing the work has a trade certificate or not. The greatest level of supervision is required when the person doing the work is essentially a layman, but even there it does not, in my view, require that the supervisor be close enough to the work to watch while each and every element is performed. Indeed, such a requirement would make a nonsense of the sentence in brackets in 14(4)(a).
Subsection 14(2) is not about that provision of services relationship. It is about a relationship where the supervisor can and does give directions. A sparky does not give directions to the person on whose site the sparky is working, and a construction that pretends that it does run counter to your own views about this the controlling nature of this legislation.
That is simply not true regarding subserction 14(2).
Not a layman, but an apprentice.
Oh, yes it, does - see paragraph 14(4)(c).
It's not a layman, but someone like an apprentice, being contemplated by the provision. That is, someone who can be given directions, and where the relationship between the supervisor and the person doing the work is such that the work is controlled appropriately by the supervisor.
It distorts section 14 for the quite different relationships contemplated to be recognised. That might be regarded as unfortunate, but the remedy is to change the law. I doubt if the law would be changed to recognise that case.
Crazy -- and there's no guarantee the tech will do a proper job either.
We still allowed to run a vacuum cleaner?
You remind me of another silly new law, that I'm no longer allowed to make my own ethernet cables? Or something? Since deciding that I had to buy the tool to reterminate faulty storebought cable, I'm certainly not going to buy cables that are worse quality than ones I can do myself. Though my localnet's been shrinking down from eight to five machines, lots of spare cable running around. But then, I'm renting, so none of it is permanent wiring.
I know I can do what I like this side of the power plug, too. Or did that change?
Exactly the same words are used in 14(3)(b) in relation to a person who holds a trade certificate, but 14(3)(b) notably excludes the requirement that the supervisor be present. It makes no sense to give the words in
14(3)(b) and 14(4)(c) the construction you propose.
I don't see how you can assert that a particular relationship is contemplated where that relationship is not inherently necessary. Nor that a court would construe the subsection so narrowly, and thus criminalise conduct that is on its face authorised by the words of the subsection.
If the intent were to restrict the section to the situation where the individual is an apprentice, it would say so. It just says "individual" (defined in the Interpretation Act to mean a natural person). I see no problem with the supervisor giving directions to the person he's contracted to provide a service to. Doctors do it all the time.
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