Ran into something yesterday that made me pause and think.-- Got a call from a customer that lost half the electric in their house. Turned out to be a bad 200Amp Main - Unfortunately it was a Pushmatic panel. After replacing the panel we went through testing out the house- just routine to make sure everything is working ok. Discovered that several circuits in the remodeled basement all had the polarity reversed.- I brought it to the attention of the homeowner. I told her it was not right and should be addressed. She asked me if it was dangerous because it had been that way for years.- I was a little unsure what to tell her.-- Yes it could be dangerous for anyone working on the system but beyond that not sure what the danger would be.
Afterwards I thought about several other dangers- light socket shells being energized certain equipment or appliances being damaged or worse having cases energized etc.
So my question- what all dangers are inherent in a reversed polarity circuit? Should I have been more forceful in encouraging the customer to get this fixed immediately?