Is the quality of tradesmen going downhill.

[nicro3]

As someone who started in the industry in 1974 am I right in thinking in general the quality of lads on the tools is dropping. In my day to day job I have to put these guys to work and am finding standards and work ethic is not what it was. Don't get me wrong there are some good-uns, but alot are worse than fu.

 

[newcastle phill]

Surprising how many installs ive been to by time served tradesmen are absolute rubbish and ncs from day 1.

 

[ShaunCorbs]

I do that as well, people look at me strange when I say 1.5-2 days to do a combi swap then I say I'm not the quickest but I allow myself enough time to do the job correctly.

And I love the little jobs, for some reason customers don't mind paying £40 per hour on small jobs but if you say £200 a day they almost pass out! Lol.

+1 i allow the same but plus half a day to commission and go through controls with customer

 

[plumben]

As I've only been in the industry 5 years, id say the main problem is money money money, its not so much weather you can do the job right its how quick can you do it for how much,
Where as I prefer to do a job once and do it right with no come backs,

example of this

Went to a leaking bath/shower in a new build 5 year old house
Bath seal split due to the bath not being supported correctly
And shower screen leaking due to no silicone behind the screen
So for the sake of an inch of silicone the shower screen had been leaking since new and due to the bath not being supported by the brackets provided the bath wobbled like duck.
And the main reason for this was probably because the plumber on site was most likely on price to get 10 baths in in a day

 

[Ray Stafford]

I wonder if you guys are suffering from rose-coloured spectacles regarding the standard of work in the past.

There were cowboys and corner-cutters, and couldn't-be-arsed council employees, just the same as there is now. Filling loops were expensive, so people would use washing machine taps and hoses instead. Chemical inhibitor? An expensive luxury. A good old 3mm bath will be fine love, don't you worry. And yes, this cylinder is tissue-paper thin, and has so little coil that it will take 3 hours to reheat, but it was only £39 + VAT.

Bit of spillage from the open flue? Never mind, a bit of duct-tape will sort it. Guess the ventilation, and size the rads based on square footage calculations. Leaded solder everywhere, don't worry, the Romans used it. And where are the Romans now? All bloody dead - from lead poisoning as like as not.

Uncovered CWS tanks where the rats swam around in the water, eating the bits of dead pigeon. Lovely!

Have a nice ascending spray bidet dearie, connected directly to the same water supply you're drinking. Water regs? Don't tell me about water regs, I've been doing this since the war you cheeky little whipper snapper. And a part 1 ballvalve was good enough for me old grandad, and its good enough for me. And of course the gold plate on those taps won't come off in 5 minutes love - it will last at least until my van gets to the end of the road.

Have you people never seen "Only Fools & Horses"?

<sings> no income tax, no VAT...</sings>

Honestly, if there ever was a golden age, it wasn't in my time.

 

[lame plumber]

I am sure merchants used to be better in years gone by

 

[Ray Stafford]

I am sure merchants used to be better in years gone by

Nah. Rubbish then, and rubbish now.

 

[Stanios]

From my experience older plumbers are determined to do every bit of work the "proper" way, but the "proper" way is different from plumber to plumber. There is reluctance to do anything thats not familiar. From what Ive seen older plumbers take more time and care to think a job through and to do each bit.

Younger plumbers tend to rush alot more, especially the planning part. But I think we are abit more flexible in terms of willingness to learn new things and try them out

 

[Millsy 82]

I wonder if you guys are suffering from rose-coloured spectacles regarding the standard of work in the past.

There were cowboys and corner-cutters, and couldn't-be-arsed council employees, just the same as there is now. Filling loops were expensive, so people would use washing machine taps and hoses instead. Chemical inhibitor? An expensive luxury. A good old 3mm bath will be fine love, don't you worry. And yes, this cylinder is tissue-paper thin, and has so little coil that it will take 3 hours to reheat, but it was only £39 + VAT.

Bit of spillage from the open flue? Never mind, a bit of duct-tape will sort it. Guess the ventilation, and size the rads based on square footage calculations. Leaded solder everywhere, don't worry, the Romans used it. And where are the Romans now? All bloody dead - from lead poisoning as like as not.

Uncovered CWS tanks where the rats swam around in the water, eating the bits of dead pigeon. Lovely!

Have a nice ascending spray bidet dearie, connected directly to the same water supply you're drinking. Water regs? Don't tell me about water regs, I've been doing this since the war you cheeky little whipper snapper. And a part 1 ballvalve was good enough for me old grandad, and its good enough for me. And of course the gold plate on those taps won't come off in 5 minutes love - it will last at least until my van gets to the end of the road.

Have you people never seen "Only Fools & Horses"?

<sings> no income tax, no VAT...</sings>

Honestly, if there ever was a golden age, it wasn't in my time.

Whilst I agree with you there does seem to be a lot more about now. Or possibly it is easier to here about them now.

 

[hammers4spanner]

I had to laugh today in the merchants two young plumbers never knew you could buy a brass ball valve!!!!!

There was a golden age in plumbing its when combis first come out , a few of us realised quite quickly that you can bang them in sharpish and walk away with nice sum of money.This bubble burst about 10 year ago but not before a select few earned hell of a lot of money.

 

[ShaunCorbs]

I had to laugh today in the merchants two young plumbers never knew you could buy a brass ball valve!!!!!

There was a golden age in plumbing its when combis first come out , a few of us realised quite quickly that you can bang them in sharpish and walk away with nice sum of money.This bubble burst about 10 year ago but not before a select few earned hell of a lot of money.

+1 and you can even get extend brass ball valve

 

[TFGplumbing]

There were some guys banging about how they could change a combi in 3 hours on the 'elite tradesman' fb group.

Well, it takes me on average 2 days on my tod.

There's like this mentality to shame the guy taking his time and doing a tidy job, well screw that i'll take my time after all its all paid for.

 

[newcastle phill]

From my experience older plumbers are determined to do every bit of work the "proper" way

From my experience older plumbers can be some of the most complacent and lazy people going.
Most seemingly cant be asred in my experience.
I am presuming you are referring to old as been in the trade for years and years

 

[hammers4spanner]

From my experience older plumbers can be some of the most complacent and lazy people going.
Most seemingly cant be asred in my experience.
I am presuming you are referring to old as been in the trade for years and years

Old or young both can be shocking .
My biggest nark is certain firms around here advertise specialist gas and heating and yet put in some of the worst installs i have seen.Be interesting if gas safe done something like 10 points (3 points a complaint)and you get a year ban like driving.

 

[nicro3]

I can't speak for 1974 Nicro, because I didn't come into the industry until the mid 80s. Still nearly 30 years though.

My read would be this.

Firstly, the total amount of technical knowledge in those days was miles less than it is now. Just take filling a tank or cistern - there were maybe 5 or 6 common ballvalve types, and another 3 or 4 uncommon ones. Everything was manufactured to be repaired, reseated, re-washered etc. Back in those days, a ballvalve cost about the same as an hours labour, so there was an incentive to repair it. Now there are about 200 different fill valves on the market, its impossible to keep track of how they all work, and most were not manufactured to be maintained. Even if they were, you couldnt carry all the spares in a juggernaut, never mind a van. A replacement costs about the same as 10 minutes labour. So they get replaced, not repaired.

On the other hand, the degree of craft skill required then was way higher than it is now. Whether it was wiping a lead joint, caulking cast iron soil, threading barrel - all that got killed off with timesaver this, plastic that, and pushfit the other. This tempts people to believe that "this plumbing lark is easy". And if you don't care how neat it looks, it pretty much is easy. Until something goes wrong.

Back in the day, if you had a good understanding of first principles, and well practiced craft skills, there was nothing that could go wrong that you couldnt fix. Nowadays, that simply isnt the case. Why isnt the boiler firing? Back then, it was either the thermocouple or the gas-valve, or no money in the meter. Now it is as likely to be that the wi-fi is down, so the app can't talk to the smart controller.

The old uns think the young uns are idiots because they can't re-washer a portsmouth ballvalve with their eyes closed. The young uns think the old uns are idiots because they can't install an app for the phone to control the heating. Who's the idiot?

In terms of attitude, I think it has polarised. We used to open at 8 am, and if I turned up to work at ten to eight, there would be a couple of vans waiting outside. Now we open at 7 am, and there are often 6 or 7 vans waiting at twenty to 7. Equally, there are more really idle barstewards.

Life moves on...

As usual a well considered and constructive reply Ray. I understand your point about the limited types of fittings, valves etc and the replacement of like for like that goes on today. My sphere of knowledge is in commercial installation and sometimes the school boy errors by so called tradesmen make today would embarrass a first year apprentice of thirty years ago. With ref to the technical know how today and skill remember there were more persons checking the quality, clerk of the works, drainage inspectors and non working foremen. Money talks today and I think the work ethic is slowly dying. But what do I know, Im just a moany old c--t

 

[newcastle phill]

Its not only the younguns, alot is to do with the training criteria.
Once upon a time an old school plumber would also do leading such as lead flashing around stacks etc. Now its more down to a roofer.
Year on year the roles are being redefined and old skills dropped and passed onto another trade

 

[Best]

Plumbers used to do all the guttering, down pipes, & any lead work. Probably often sewer work also. I always remember many years ago an attempt to be introduced to an old plumber who was well into his 90s. Thinking about it, he was probably really of Victorian era.
When we were introduced to him as he walked past, he just said " not plumbers nowadays, just fitters!" and kept walking. :smile:

 

[plumben]

Plumbers used to do all the guttering, down pipes, & any lead work. Probably often sewer work also. I always remember many years ago an attempt to be introduced to an old plumber who was well into his 90s. Thinking about it, he was probably really of Victorian era.
When we were introduced to him as he walked past, he just said " not plumbers nowadays, just fitters!" and kept walking. :smile:

I get customers being surprised that I do gutters and Drainage, when questioned they always say I didn't think that was a plumbers job

 

[Millsy 82]

I get customers being surprised that I do gutters and Drainage, when questioned they always say I didn't think that was a plumbers job

Shhhhh! Keep it quiet!

I don't want to be hanging off a ladder doing guttering all day! Especially with the wind down here. Lol.

 

[hammers4spanner]

plumber still do guttering on site think last I done it quid a meter lol

 

[Leo21]

plumber still do guttering on site think last I done it quid a meter lol

Old money?

 

[plumben]

Shhhhh! Keep it quiet!

I don't want to be hanging off a ladder doing guttering all day! Especially with the wind down here. Lol.

I don't mind guttering as long as I can reach it off my hop up, the high up stuff gets a bit hairy when your on your own swinging 3m of gutter in the wind

 

[newcastle phill]

I have had bad luck. Been on 2 roofs in two days GRrrrrrrrrrr.
Im not as bendy as i used to be....or as light !

 

[hammers4spanner]

urggh roofs don't swear at me

 

[ShaunCorbs]

dont mind being on roofs but hate being in lofts

 

[Stanios]

We've had to do steel pipe as part of apprenticeship practical and ever since then i always look with amazement at old systems piped in steel. It must have taken days to do just few pipe runs

 

[Dotty]

Not at all, Stan. We still do shedloads.

 

[Stanios]

Took us half of first year at college to do 2 steel square frames lol

 

[ShaunCorbs]

Not at all, Stan. We still do shedloads.

+1 doing more now than before, and most people are asking for it to be welded instead of ss

 

[ShaunCorbs]

We've had to do steel pipe as part of apprenticeship practical and ever since then i always look with amazement at old systems piped in steel. It must have taken days to do just few pipe runs

tbh it doesnt take much longer than copper prob about 20 mins a length extra (complicated bends)

 

[Stanios]

tbh it doesnt take much longer than copper prob about 20 mins a length extra (complicated bends)

But you can do a whole house in 20 min with poly