Its probably GaSafes and the HSE's job to tell people about things related to their safety.
Lets be honest a gas fitter doing a 12 month gas check and that applies to tenanted property only not private, private may never have had a gas test done at all at anytime, is not enough. Suppose a problem develops between tests?
How are people to recognise one if they know nothing about gas testing?
Smelling gas? Not very likely in a big house and you can't smell carbon monoxide.
So a house owner knowing how and why a gas test should be done would seem a good thing.
Lets be honest, it doesn't follow that just because somebody knows about your job they are going to put you out of work all of a sudden.
A doctor will usually tell you all about what is wrong with you, my own doctors in the past have even explained and shown me pictures of what my balance problem is.
But no way am I going to open up as a doctor tomorrow.
What I think has happened in the gas industry, is that the info sellers have been allowed to get away with all kinds. A gas training course is now part of a vast training industry, which going by the costs of the courses must be making a packet.
Even a basic gas book is something ridiculous like £90.
This is also possibly linked to the point that there are not many living wage jobs about that people can get into, except the likes of gas fitting.
So if you have spent thousands on a course, you may feel its not fair for people to be getting the information they gave you on the course for free and so perhaps not require your services.
Not only that, by handing over thousands you would probably feel you had been taken for a ride by the trainers.
But if you consider that the gas industry flourished for what must be 150 years or more without any sort of compulsory training courses, it may be goes to show, info can be made free without putting people out of work.
The industry itself is dripping with cash. The big players make profits perhaps running into billions yet its the gas fitter through training costs and the customer through installation, repair and fuels costs, that makes those profits possible get the rough end of things it seems.
When BG was nationalised, as a Plumbing tutor I could ring them up or send a letter and get for gratis virtually any sort of gas information I wanted.
Today I would probably have to take a mortgage out to get info about how to do a basic drop test. That is part of what is wrong with the industry.
Gas fitters should be able to show anybody who wants to know, what they are doing, providing its on safety grounds, so they can make sure its done properly.
Incidentally, I was once told that CORGI when it was in charge, had its work cut out trying to sort problems out between gas fitters and their customers, in point perhaps to many of their staff where appointed to dispute and problem solving rather than looking after customers interests, which wasn't really CORGI's job.
GaSafe is intended to work for both sides. But it does seem to show trained or not gas fitters, like everybody else can make mistakes. The thing is perhaps we should give the customer more info to base their idea about whether a mistake has been made or not? Seems fair.
Lets not be afraid of loosing work instead of promoting safety they do not compare.
