Electrical Competence

David Price
Member - 84 posts

Are we talking 3 phase or 240V?

I suggest that you contact NVQ and seek their advice.

Trevor Dyster
Member - 2 posts

By working live I assume you mean that the circuit needs to be energised to diagnose the fault.
You do not say whether this person is an employee or working for an outside agency.
I would expect that this person would be a JIB registered electrician or JIB approved electrican who probably would have also passed the C&G 2391 FOR Inspection and Test as a minimum.Being a NICEIC registered contractor we would also recommend that the person belongs to a registered trade body.
The should also be using appropriate test equipment with GS38 leads
I would also expect that they would be familiar with safe isolation procedures and that having carried out a risk assessment you would have concluded that working with this circuit energised was the only way to diagnose the fault.
You should also refer to the Electricity at Work Regulations 1989 Regulation 14 for working onor near live conductors and Regulation 16 Persons to be competent to prevent danger and injury
It is also possible that if the person was employed by the manufacturer of the piece of machinery that you have a problem with could also be deemed as competent as that person should have received apppropriate training to work on the equipment.
Hope this helps.

Graham Kenyon
Member - 39 posts

I do not agree that all maintenance staff are (or should be, for that matter), "JIB Registered Electrician". The skills required for electrical installation are very different from those of diagnosing and repairing machinery.

Some of the skills for this task may be found with a JIB Electrician registered as a "Maintenance Electrician", but possibly not by other categories.

The competence requirements can be satisfied in many ways, including training and experience.

If this is a sub-contractor/supplier working on your site, ask their employer for competence details. If this is in-house, you'll need to ascertain what tasks are to be performed and how best to prove employees - and their supervisors/managers - meet the relevant competence criteria.

Organisations like JIB, the IET (formerly the IEE), CIBSE, Institute of Measurement and Control are all able to provide advice on electrical competencies.

Claire Fuller - Workplace Law Group
Online advisor - 42 posts

The Electricity at Work Regulations says that:

“No person shall be engaged in any work activity where technical knowledge or experience is necessary to prevent danger/injury unless he possesses such knowledge or experience, or is under such degree of supervision as may be appropriate having regard to the nature of the work.”

A spokesperson for the HSE said it is down to the employer in terms of how they would actually judge a person’s competency, but generally he/she should have successfully completed an assessed training course that has included the type of work being considered, or had experience of that work.

Workplace Law’s health and safety advisor Bill Scholes agrees:

“If someone is testing the equipment then you would expect them to be is NICEIC registered, or have a City & Guilds qualification, or NVQ levels 3 or 4. You would have to look for some sort of evidence of them being on a formal training programme, but there is no hard and fast answer.

“The law says you can only work on machinery live if there is no reasonable alternative, and that is very rarely the case. You should look at the scenario and think: ‘How can we do this without the power on?’”

Graham Kenyon
Member - 39 posts

Individuals cannot be "NICEIC Registered". Also, NICEIC is not the only body that provides independent accreditation of firms providing electrical installation services. Others include ECA, NAPIT and BSI.

JIB ("ECS") is currently the only organisation that endorses the qualifications of "Electricians" as opposed to the firm they work for.

But we are talking electrical maintenance here. NOT "Installation Electrician".

Few (if any) of the qualifications mentioned in the previous post covers the specific requirements of BS EN60204-1, the standard for electrical safety of machines, which has many differences from BS7671 (the "Wiring Regulations") for good machinery-safety reasons.

In conclusion, whilst the accreditations recommended in the previous post could be used as part of the evidence of the required competence, I don't beleive it's the whole story by a long chalk.

As far as electrical tests go, the operation of some mains-voltage interlocks/inhibits, "RCD Test", "Earth Fault Loop Imedance", and more recently "Phase Rotation" are generally tests that must be carried out "live" - however, with the relevant competence, familiarity with equipment, and appropriate test equipment (EN-standard conformant, connecting with either standard plug-and-socket or appropriately rated and fused "GS38" test leads") may reduce these activities to the equivalent of "use of electrical equipment", rather than strictly "live working". But note that ALL the aforementioned needs to be in place, especially competence and familiarity.