Lazy Arse Tradies

A clients site I am currently working at needed a double power outlet on the wall near the switch, firewall and router rack, there is already one double outlet 3 feet away on an adjoining wall so being the good person I am I get a qualified bloke in to do a simple job I could have done myself in less than 30 mins.

2 hours after he starts the job he proudly says he's finished but couldn't do the full job as requested so I go and inspect the work and the pricks put the new double outlet next too the existing outlet, and yes it took him two hours to achieve this. As to be expected I quizzed him as to why he didn't do as he requested and his response was that he couldn't put it on the adjoining wall because it would mean he'd have to go through the roof and the roof doesn't have enough clearance to get into so the only option was to put it next to the existing. According to him he couldn't even run the cable from an existing point through conduit and around the wall like he'd done three weeks previous for the power outlets for the phone system.

Having spent 3 days already up in that roof running networking, phone and pa cables I know it's cramped but I also know it's achievable to run cables up there and there is also a man hole less than 2 feet from where the power cable would have needed to come through the roof.

Sure I've already been in touch with this pricks boss and told him there will be no bill paid because the job wasn't done as requested and that any further electrical work will be carried out by a company who gives a crap but the real pain in the arse now is that I'll be using a bloody extension lead instead of having an outlet because a sparky couldn't get into a roof space that a fat bastard like me can get into.

I understand why people, in my case companies I contract too, want qualified tradesmen and I have no problems using them when requested to do jobs I can do myself but when I request someone to do a job I also expect them to do it and do it as requested not make up some lame excuses. I don't ask people to do the impossible and I am happy to listen to better options if my option isn't viable yet dickheads like this seem to think doing the job in a half arsed manner is what the client will be happy with.

I've noticed a few forum members are sparky's and claim to be good ones and while I'm not going to doubt their word I would like to know why the hell don't you come down here so I don't have to keep putting up with these nufties.

Sadly there is a high percentage of tradies that just take the easies way out.
Prob didn't have the duct for surface work, had the shits in the ceiling then just went bugger it this'll do.
I'm a sparky (I claim to be a good one) and if I hadn't been able to do it how you wanted it i'd have explained first before putting it elsewhere.
I'd love to come to Gippsland to fit a powerpoint for you, although i'd have to charge for travelling time and you may well get the shits with the bill.
Deep breath, at least you won't have to deal with him again!

9 hours traveling time added to a bill to fit one power point might look a bit suss but I'd love to find decent sparky I could trust down here, I don't use them all the time cause some work I do myself but at times of need would be handy to have one on call.

But you're right atleast I wont have to deal with that same prick again

I had a sparky out to work recently because my cold saw shit itself. I thought it had dropped a phase like it had done before, as the symptoms were exactly the same. He checked it out and confirmed all phases were fine, spent 3 hours looking at it and pulling it apart and told me the electric motor was stuffed. Didn't really seem right to me, it's only 3 years old and does really get an easy life. I quizzed him on it and one of my tradesmen also quized him and we both were not convinced (and told him so) He got his multimeter out and showed us the variation between voltage (or resistance or whatever it was) and told us that shows him that the motor is buggered. He took the motor and sent it away to get rewound. Luckily the winders tested it first and sent it back to him saying it was fine. After 5 hours labour he found the problem was a $90 on/off switch. After a small discussion his boss agreed I will not be paying for him for his time. I hope they didn't pay him for it either.

The bit that pissed me off most is we had a week without the machine. Could have been fixed the first afternoon.

I remember helping a mate who is a sparky one friday arvo.

The electrician who wired up the house ran the oven circuit on a angle down the wall that had failed. Well the wiring was done with building wire on a 2 year old house and to save money they ran the cable on a angle to save money.

So a new circuit went in from the meter board back to the oven.

Dave.

Matt76 said:

I had a sparky out to work recently because my cold saw shit itself. I thought it had dropped a phase like it had done before, as the symptoms were exactly the same. He checked it out and confirmed all phases were fine, spent 3 hours looking at it and pulling it apart and told me the electric motor was stuffed. Didn't really seem right to me, it's only 3 years old and does really get an easy life. I quizzed him on it and one of my tradesmen also quized him and we both were not convinced (and told him so) He got his multimeter out and showed us the variation between voltage (or resistance or whatever it was) and told us that shows him that the motor is buggered. He took the motor and sent it away to get rewound. Luckily the winders tested it first and sent it back to him saying it was fine. After 5 hours labour he found the problem was a $90 on/off switch. After a small discussion his boss agreed I will not be paying for him for his time. I hope they didn't pay him for it either.

The bit that pissed me off most is we had a week without the machine. Could have been fixed the first afternoon.

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I will start by saying i am not defending the electrician ... But what most non electricians may not be aware of is that most (domestic)electricians learnt about 3 phase power at apprenticeship school - that's where their experience ends.
I believe there are two basic electricians - domestic (house wiring) and industrial (3 phase) - I trained as a industrial electrician - very different than domestic. Maybe your guy was a domestic.
Having said that i now make a healthy living testing and tagging power tools (the lowest form of life for an electrician) - more money - less responsibility

Just my opinion ...many may disagree

KraftyPg said:

I would like to know why the hell don't you come down here so I don't have to keep putting up with these nufties.

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Because 'The Valley' is a closed shop that does'nt take kindly to out of town sparkies comming in,
but find it their right to come out of the valley and work where they like.
Double standards.

Anyway, would you like me to come over and do a professional job for you.
Will be on the desal soon, not to far away.



Oh, almost forgot, and I'll throw in a free test & tag on the 'Salon'

tagMan said:

I will start by saying i am not defending the electrician ... But what most non electricians may not be aware of is that most (domestic)electricians learnt about 3 phase power at apprenticeship school - that's where their experience ends.
I believe there are two basic electricians - domestic (house wiring) and industrial (3 phase) - I trained as a industrial electrician - very different than domestic. Maybe your guy was a domestic.
Having said that i now make a healthy living testing and tagging power tools (the lowest form of life for an electrician) - more money - less responsibility

Just my opinion ...many may disagree

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Yeah I fully understand that, the sad thing is though it is a commercial electrician business and they sent him because apparantly he knew these things back to front. I will be looking for someone else next time.....

Matt76 said:

Yeah I fully understand that, the sad thing is though it is a commercial electrician business and they sent him because apparantly he knew these things back to front. I will be looking for someone else next time.....

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simple incompetence than!

I run the operations of a fairly large electrical contracting company in commercial fitout & construction sector, and also an electrician by trade. On the whole I think most guys out there (in all trades) are good, but I agree it's hard to find the really good guys. Believe me, I get some total muppets come through this place, but I promptly free up their futures.... I consider myself to be a very good electrician (on the rare occasions where I actually do electrical work these days rather than paper pushing) but I get so frustrated at people who don't care about what they're doing, and that's the biggest problem. Being dumb or incompetent is one thing, but not taking pride in your work is what really pisses me off....

Matt76 said:

Yeah I fully understand that, the sad thing is though it is a commercial electrician business and they sent him because apparantly he knew these things back to front. I will be looking for someone else next time.....

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Just give me a ring mate.

Actually I have a little job I might get you to look at Jason, the electric motor on my compressor is playing up. I wouldn't mind a pro's opinion before I start throwing money at it. I don't think it is anything major (thats my professional evaluation lol) Its in at work so either one arvo or at the weekend? Sounds a good excuse for a beer anyway haha

Sounds good!

Krankin said:

Because 'The Valley' is a closed shop that does'nt take kindly to out of town sparkies comming in,
but find it their right to come out of the valley and work where they like.
Double standards.

Anyway, would you like me to come over and do a professional job for you.
Will be on the desal soon, not to far away.



Oh, almost forgot, and I'll throw in a free test & tag on the 'Salon'

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Holy crap Krankin you do have an opinion about everything thanks for livening things up. Although not sure where you get the closed shop thing from, this area is teaming with imported tradies from the city because it's been a huge growth area for the past 20 years. We've had all the big building companies set up shop in the last 10 years and along with them they've brought the larger tradies companies to the areas. There is still plenty of work for the little bloke as they probably spend most of their time fixing up the stuff ups made by bigger companies but you can't always get the small bloke when the job is urgent.

The Desal is still a fair way away from me and from what I hear you'll be so busy down there you wont have time to scratch yourself, and thats just avoiding the protesters. As for the tag and test my bro already does that for the costs of his hair cuts so I should be fine with the salon.

I've found Adelaide to be the biggest "closed shop" of them all. I can't even get electrical contractors down there to sub-contract to me as they find the idea of working for another electrical contractor a "conflict of interest."

Works out worse for them because now I just fly my own tradesman down from Brisbane or Sydney. I would rather support the local guys and not cut their grass but if they are that closed minded then I have no choice.

KraftyPg said:

Holy crap Krankin you do have an opinion about everything thanks for livening things up. Although not sure where you get the closed shop thing from, this area is teaming with imported tradies from the city because it's been a huge growth area for the past 20 years. We've had all the big building companies set up shop in the last 10 years and along with them they've brought the larger tradies companies to the areas. There is still plenty of work for the little bloke as they probably spend most of their time fixing up the stuff ups made by bigger companies but you can't always get the small bloke when the job is urgent.

The Desal is still a fair way away from me and from what I hear you'll be so busy down there you wont have time to scratch yourself, and thats just avoiding the protesters. As for the tag and test my bro already does that for the costs of his hair cuts so I should be fine with the salon.

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For u Krafty, my pleasure.

re the growth there, thats the price you pay for progress.
Re the closed shop, thats not an opinion but a fact/experience for some of us trying to get into the valley power/gas plants and well known in the elec trades, which in Victoria and if one has worked all over it, and if you've been in the time i have, you'll find its a small world.

Of course, i agree, in recent times growth is happening there, as is everywhere else, which allows others to enter, just as an example, the loggers from Orbost are felling here as opposed to a local group.

Keep in mind these large projects you mention that have brought the large contractors in, such i have worked for, have to , as many are aware,
tender for these projects just as the locals have the same right.


And as for the protester's, these would'nt be the same ones that worked alongside me on the 'Eastlink' whining bout this and that, desal this bla bla and are now trying to work on the project...funny that, money talks and bullshit walks, as they say.


And with the mobile salon, i still reckon you should go the D22 as that spare din space could be a twin holding port for your hair driers,
imagine, two clients at once...extra dosh for you.


Keep up the good work.
Cheers.

Krankin said:

Of course, i agree, in recent times growth is happening there, as is everywhere else, which allows others to enter, just as an example, the loggers from Orbost are felling here as opposed to a local group.

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Orbost is pretty much closed now thanks to the Greens. The "Premier Timber Town" is on its knees so they have to go somewhere.
Not what it was. My old man ran Smith Bros for 18 years on the Brodribb 20k's n/e of Orbost. It's now closed like so many others. TJ Andrews bought it and sold out so many people. Newmerella is still operating but Nowa Nowa was shut down when I went past last.

I've got no problems with growth down here we've needed it for years, we don't need to become a suburb of Melbourne but there is more than enough industry down here to make the place a viable source for the future.

Large national and multinational companies have always been large contributors to the power stations and the mill down here, they hire many locals as well as city dwellers but as a small business the little bloke still doesn't get a huge look in no matter where they are from. My old man has been down here since W station and pretty much orchestrated the electrical side of Loy Yang A but he only got down here because the Melbourne based multinational company he was working for got the electrical contracts over and above any local mob and that was over 20 years ago so any closed shop mentality in government industry isn't really a new thing.

When you first said closed shop I thought you were referring to the private sector which it most definitely is not. If you're a qualified chippy, sparky, brickie, tiler or concreter you could nearly start up a business down here tomorrow and have enough business to live off in a few months. But a lot of that is due to the number of tradies who have left their own business to secure themselves single contracts with other bigger companies.

I know plenty of loggers and have been there and done that myself several times and we send bucket loads of drivers down to other regional areas of Vic just to cut timber but once again that is mainly due to national or state wide contracting negotiations not just one company being let into another region. The logging company puts in a tender to clear a set area no matter where that plot is and they just send drivers and equipment as needed. The mill down here imposes such restrictions (and I'm not suggesting they are bad restrictions cause the greenies might find me) on each company that they can't afford to keep all their workers in one area so they spread them out and use different mills under different contracts. We've probably got as many imported loggers down here as we have home grown and there is work for all of them.

Apparently if I go the D22 I wont have the salon any more, besides I'm not working two driers at once it's just too much work. Although I was never employed by the SEC I've always lived by the moniker Slow Easy and Comfortable, also I've never had an exploding arsehole, and definitely not an orange one.

Aido said:

Orbost is pretty much closed now thanks to the Greens. The "Premier Timber Town" is on its knees so they have to go somewhere.
Not what it was. My old man ran Smith Bros for 18 years on the Brodribb 20k's n/e of Orbost. It's now closed like so many others. TJ Andrews bought it and sold out so many people. Newmerella is still operating but Nowa Nowa was shut down when I went past last.

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Did he know Slim Dusty?

Not sure if his family still own the property but Slim used to own a holiday spot down there, was south of Orbost though not North East but it's a small town, and the super market manager used to really annoy a mate of mine when he did deliveries so we liked him all the more.

Wasn't Slim's holiday house in Mallacoota?