ECN Forum Forums General Topics of the Trade General Discussion Area Rant inside

This may have been covered before but I am so sick of these "handyman" outfits doing electrical work. They do not have an electrical license so I am going to report the next time I find out about it to the inspectors office. Mainly for the safety of the home owner. The have no idea about the nor care.

I think we worry a lot about the DIY and handyman types when we should first weed out the incompentants with a licence in their pockets.

I used to feel strongly about this issue but I don't anymore. "Hackymen" will always exist, but it's the homeowners who are to blame for hiring them without checking their credentials, or lack thereof.

I think Sberry makes a great point. Let's remove the log from our own eye before pointing out the speck in someone elses eye. Licensed hacks are a much greater threat to the trade than any handyman, IMO.

Peter

I've seen electricians make mistakes, but I'd bet most of the "disasters waiting to happen" in the Photos Section are from handymen/weekend warriors. You know what I mean...the missing covers, flying splices, overfusing, etc.

Dave

Sometimes the hack and handymen are my best salesmen!

This is because I get called after the customer has already tried cutting every corner. He has, by than, paid several times for the job- which still doesn't do what was desired.
I come in, usually have little trouble running down the problem, often have the parts on the truck- and when I leave, everything works!

Sometimes the customer watches, and is impressed by my 'rolling workshop' of a truck, and my trade-specific tools. Soemtimes I am able to explain just why this particular situation was beyond the abilities of the other guys- training, education, and experience, you know!

I leave behind a customer who is awed- and who has learned the foolishness of taking short-cuts. From then on, he calls a pre, and I have a good customer.

I think that we should import all of our strawberries from countries where the farmers concentrate more on agriculture and leave electrical work to the incompetent electricians. There are many Doctors that did not graduate in the top ten percent of their class ( about 90% of them ) but I would trust the guy a the very bottom of the class to do an operation before I gave the butcher a call.

Quote "I think we worry a lot about the DIY and handyman types when we should first weed out the incompentants with a licence in their pockets."

You are a new member around here, I would recommend you don't start bashing people on here, especially other electricians.

Number 1, I didnt bash anyone and number 2 is there some kind of senority here? I see a lot of crummy work, from handyman types as well as trade guys, at least the handy types have an excuse, they dont know any better. I certainly agree there are people who shouldnt be doing the work they do, there is a guy in my area that I still can spot his work, never understood short circuit interuption, cut the ground wire off in every cable. It would have certainly been prudent to educate him on it. Its something I try to make clear when I get asked about wiring projects from friends.

[This message has been edited by sberry27 (edited 08-14-2005).]

[This message has been edited by sberry27 (edited 08-14-2005).]

I think renosteinke makes a valid point here, he uses this to gain customers, good move.

Renosteinke does not make valid point because that is not how it works. In most cases the handyman or hack does get the lights on or the machine running or whatever. The customer usually does not even know how many dangerous code violations there are until later. Flying splices, buried boxes, oversized breakers and fuses, cable laying on ceiling grid,boxes uncovered, live conductors in crawl spaces, the list can go on forever of items that can be wrong and dangerous with the building or equipment still showng no symptoms. I was at a job not long ago where the ground system had been disconnected ( 6 years since the hacks were there ). It was caught on an inspection ( home inspector that caught many faults). I had to explain to the owner that the last remodeling job had been done under the table as I could tell from the obvious violations ( no GFCI protection in kitchen an electrical inspector would have caught that one easy ). Handymen are not good for the trade because in many cases home and business owners are not knowledgeable enough to know the difference between a job that is to code and safe and a job that seems to work. There are licensed hacks in every trade but I don't think you can start to get rid of them without some sort of trade regulation ( license requirements). Michigan requires 12,000 hrs. experience and testing. How much experience does our strawberry farmer have to be giving advice to friends on wiring projects. If Mr. sberry27 is a retired master electrician I will apologize, if not he should stop giving advice because he is not qualified. I believe that every home or business owner should be free to burn his own property down but before a sale is made there should be a thorough inspection to make sure he doesn't injure the unwary.