Who's legally responsible when the building burns down, or someone gets killed because of faulty wiring?

Texas Ranger mentioned that in his area the contractor is responsible for inspecting his/her own work. I'm not clear about the legal ramifications of that set-up. My thoughts are that it doesn't matter much whether a code of regulations is used, or a set of standards is used, so long as the contractor knows what needs to be done for safe practice (and I address this issue in my previous thread).
Without someone else looking over the work, and verifying that it is safe, then when the building burns down or someone gets killed, how is anyone to know who did the work? ..or know whom to blame? Anyone can come in after the contractor leaves, and modify or extend on the original wiring. Without some outside inspection process, how can anyone come back to the original contractor and take him/her to court over falulty wiring?

Seems to be that for the last 30 years in the US, it's a Sue Everyone that may even be Remotely Connected mentality.

It does raise some interesting questions. As I think you may have all gathered by now there are no official inspections in England. Some contractors will leave a sticker with their details on the main distribution panel if they've done a big rewire, but chances are you won't find it otherwise.

So many of our stock of homes have wiring which has been extended and modified so much over the years that in many cases it would be almost impossible to say who did what. If it's recent work, then the owner may well remember who is responsible, but you can almost guarantee when a house is sold that the new owner will have no idea who installed any of the wiring.

I'm no lawyer, but as I understand English law, somebody can be taken to court if it can be shown that his negligence resulted in a fire or electrocution. I know of at least one case a few years ago in which an "electrician" did some work in a kitchen, was called back twice when the owner reported that people were getting shocked on the stainless steel sink, and reported that there was nothing wrong. He ended up being charged with manslaughter when somebody was killed a short time later.

But such cases are the exception rather than the rule -- The guy had just been working there and checks afterward revealed that he had made a major error (he'd actually bonded the sink to a 240V hot conductor instead of ground -- How the h*** he managed that is anybody's guess.)

I think in most instances it just goes down as "electrical fault," and as nobody has any idea who installed the wiring nothing else can be done.

Paul,
Is there any chance, that that last story you mentioned, could have been caused by the mains being transposed at the meters or the switchboard?.

Possible if it were a PME (MEN) installation, but I'm afraid I don't have the details. I read the story severqal years ago, and I just remember the conclusion being that the sink had been bonded to phase somehow.

Sweden is like Austria and the UK: The electrican is his own inspector. There was a recent case where an electrican confused phase and neutral/earth which meant that the sockets of the affected house were on 400V. His companion tested the connection and approved it... Luckily, nobody was hurt but there was extensive equipment damage. The interesting part is that it was the master electrican who was fined, not the electricians who had carried out the work.

(The electrician didn't know the old colour code with red earth and green phase and assumed them to be the other way round. Had he been reading ECN, he would have known )

(Edited to add the following: Here is an article about the incident, in Swedish)

[This message has been edited by C-H (edited 03-04-2003).]

Paul,
I think I recall the incident you are referring to. It happened around 1990/1 in SE England, the home owner's grandson was electrocuted as a result of the electrician's negligence. Electrician was jailed for manslaughter.

If my memory of the account given in the trade press is correct, the scenario was this:
Electrician wired central heating boiler & controls using 3 core flexes instead of 4 or 5 core flex. He used a green/yellow core as a switched phase (against regs.) at one end and connected the other end to the earth terminal of a piece equipment.
Electrician was called out (at least twice) to investigate people getting shocks from the sink, and failed to identify the fault, perhaps because it was only energized when the programmer was in "heating on" mode.
A failure of 2 safety devices, a faulty MCB in the consumer unit & lack of adequate earth bonding to water pipes, resulted in the sink becoming live at 240V.
I don't recall any mention of reverse polarity at the meter or mains board.

It was a clear case of incompetence & bad workmanship by the "electrician" and the jury recognised this.

Like a lot of places, now, NZ, requires it's Electrical Workers (Electrician's, Line Mechanics, Electrical Service Technicians and
Electrical Inspectors), to sign thier lives away, by asking them to certify thier own work.
The crunch really only comes, if you do a really dodgy job, and the house burns down or if someone gets electrocuted, because of your work.
Just means, that you have to be really sure of your working practices.
If you do no wrong, you have nothing to fear!.
I do know that a few people over here, went to buy a lot of Test Equipment, when Self-Certification came in, people that had been in the Trade, longer than what I have been alive.

David,
Thanks for your recollection of the full story. I didn't remember anything about beyond what I posted above.

I've seen similar situations, where somebody has just used a couple of lengths of standard 3-core flex instead of going out and buying 5-core or whatever is needed. I remember the house at Bacton from last summer had a horrendous mess of wiring for the central heating controls when I arrived.

Why do these timers always seem to be wired so poorly? Are 90% of them done by plumbers?

C-H,
I've always maintained that education on electrical systems should include information not just on the way things are/should be done now, but also on the way things were done in the past.



[This message has been edited by pauluk (edited 03-05-2003).]

Here we have an independant inspection body which inspect every major work before that you can get a connection from the PoCo. In doing that, it protects the main responsibility from the electrician.

So... If there's a serious accident in Belgium after the wiring has been inspected, who gets sued? The electrician, the inspector, or both?

The only problem with any inspection like this is that somebody can still come along afterward and tear into the wiring, leaving it in a dangerous state.

Here in Oregon(U.S.), there is electrical safety law that states that if there is previously installed wiring that isn't "up to code" and wasn't up to the code that was current when it was originally installed, then you can't add on to that circuit. So, when a portion of a circuit is extended by someone who doesn't do it right, and a contractor comes along later and extends it even more, then he is taking on responsibility for the reliability and safety of the previously installed work. So, he has to take time to check out the condition of the previous work, if he wants to stay out of trouble. This is a beginning step towards requiring electricians to responsibly inspect electrical installations, and not rely exclusively on the local inspectors, since a lot of work is performed by people who don't take out permits, and don't get inspections.
I worked on a job where the splices in every switch box and receptacle outlet box that I checked out were not crimped down properly -- the connections were all loose. I told the customer that there was a need for checking out all the splices in the house, and I got chewed out later by my boss for creating the impression that the house was unsafe, and that my comments put the electrical contractor I was working for in a difficult position.
It appears that the laws are trending towards increasing the responsibility of the installing electrician, and yet the real world conditions make it impossible for the electricians to protect themselves. I get the feeling that we all are assuming risks that we don't even know we are assuming.
As Bjarney mentioned, everyone and anyone who is involved in wiring a structure is likely to be sued...especially if they have 'deep pockets'. As Trumpy mentioned, there are contractors signing their lives away, not only in NZ, but also here in some of the States, via self inspections. To "do no wrong" is to have nothing to fear, but only if you have the money and time to press your case in court. No matter how innocent you might be, you still have to protect yourself and avoid dodgy installations like the plague! I guess it all comes down to making sure you have lots of documentation that precisely describes what portion of the wiring you are involved in altering, and a clear listing of materials used as well, signed by the customer. I don't think this will keep me out of court, but I hope it will make my defense strong enough so that I won't get dragged down by lengthy court proceedings.
For those who are not in the US, is there a requirement for upgrading (up to code, or in compliance with standards) any portions of the wiring which relate to what you might be called upon to work on?

Now I would need the input from Kent on the real world, but I know that the code requires anyone working on an installation to take into account the affect on the existing wiring. (This e.g. means that the effect of adding more load to a circuit with only short-circuit protection must be checked)

There is also the general principle of "existing installation" which means that you don't have to upgrade existing wiring that is to old codes, (what you'd call "grandfathered" in the US).

Documentation is conveniently "lost"...

[This message has been edited by C-H (edited 03-10-2003).]

"So... If there's a serious accident in Belgium after the wiring has been inspected, who gets sued? The electrician, the inspector, or both? "

The inspector, since the electrician would be covered by the inspection. That's the idea of the inspection. Let me add that the inspection is made by a independant body.

"The only problem with any inspection like this is that somebody can still come along afterward and tear into the wiring, leaving it in a dangerous state."

Then that person would be responsible. That's exactly why that when we have a inspection we need to make a complete plan of the installation. That plan is printed in 3 examples. 1 for the electrician , 1 for the owner, and 1 for the inspection body. All 3 are stamped by the inspector.

Whoa, the only thing that strict here are the construction regs.! All building plans from I don't know when are filed at the Construction police department. We went there and had no problems getting the original plans for our 1913 house (except for having to pay $11 and very expensive copies).
Not even gas lines are checked that much here. A plumber has to install them, when the rough-in is completed he calls the gas company for a first inspection, then you can plaster the holes in the walls. This inspection includes a thorough visual inspection of all pipework and a soundness test (done with quite a weird instrument which looks like a large freestanding bycicle pump with a clear vertical plastic pipe. The pipe is filled with water to nearly overflowing and twice the usual pressure is pumped into the pipework. If the water level drops over five minutes the lines aren't tight) When everything is finished, appliances are connected the gas co. guys come and hook up the meter. About half a year later the final visual inspection comes. This guy check's for example whether you have the required vent cutouts in the bathroom door if a boiler is installed in there (quite a sad feeling to cut holes into old panel doors).
However, there are no plans of the pipework, only a list of which appliances are connected to the supply. Whenever any pipework is added or altered rough-in and final inspection have to be done again.
Plus you have to have a chimney soundness certificate signed by your chimney sweep prior to installing any gas appliances (direct vent into the room or venting to the outside air is prohibited, ALL gas appliances have to be connected to a chimney, not like in Belgium or France where direct-vent 5l boilers are still used, or like the UK where venting through outside walls seems to be quite common)
Sorry for the halfways off-topic post.

Belgian, how long has it been the responsibility of the inspectors to assume the risk for someone else's work?
Do inspectors get paid well in Belgium for such risk taking? Do they have to take personal responsibility? I get the impression that they are independent contractors of some sort...just doing inspections. They must have to inspect and document everything thoroughly!