Attention..AJS Heating!!!!

[Rupster]

I have come across this forum as i am,like a lot of others,toying with the idea of doing a fast track plumbing course.Even from my brief perusal of this forum,i've already noticed the slatings dished out from said member 'AJS Heating'!! I'm guessing he must be old school and doesn't agree with these courses,but what are we supposed to do? I need to re-train but cannot afford to be doing college courses for years,but on the other hand i am not blinkered in thinking i can become a 'proper plumber' in 10 weeks!!
Therefore Mr.AJS... What would you advise me to re-train as? Obviously there are too many plumbers,English or Polish,and no-one would employ a 'fast track' plumber,so i appeal to your wealth of knowledge and appreciate your advise. Am i now on the wrong forum!!!!

 

[ajs heating]

many are coming into this trade for the wrong reason. not knowing your age or what you have heard. but the common reasons are
£50'000 a yr
get up at 9 home by 2 etc

they are all rubbish, it takes yrs to built up your reputation and customers, and 5 mins to loose them

you say you need to re-train from what ?

what do you propose on doing when you pass or if you pass ?

if you go self employed you won't even scrap £10'000 thats before you have your van, insurance, tools, advertising, phone, stock, etc

so when you have your 10week course and you say you don't exspect to be a proper plumber, well when will you be ?
when you have charged someone £500.00 to experiment on their heating system and 5pm walk off job leaving them still no better off than when you turned up.

and as the 10 week course and the spotty kids that then walk on site thinking they know it all know nothing, sorry not got time for them.

you can't learn plumbing in 5 yrs let alone 10 weeks.

 

[snorkel1234]

Agree whole heartedly, however you like us that would have to start off at some point. I am also considering doing a fast track course. I know that I will have to build up expeience of on the job work.
I also know that I will never tackle a job that I feel uncomfortable doing, and would rather recommend that the client call someone else, us "oldfolk wishing to have a change in career will have to start off, we did not have the opportunity of doing a 3-4 apprentiship.

 

[Rupster]

AJS... Thanks for your reply.

I am 34 years old,and my trade for much of my working life has been Car Valeting. I have run 2 businesses,both Valeting,that i started from scratch and later sold on due to re-locating. I suppose the comparisons with plumbing is the simple fact that anyone thinks they can 'clean' a car properly and make a business out of it but it is very difficult.I lost count of the amount of 'fair weather' valeters that i used to see in the summer driving around in their beaten up little Fiesta van with a bucket and sponge in the back and then once the weather changed they disappeared!! Therefore i understand how tough it is building up a client base and a good reputation,and also the lack of work for the first 6 months and the expense of setting it all up in the first place.
The only way to make good money valeting cars is to run your own business as working for a garage or another company pays peanuts and the work is very physical and tiring and i've been there and done that etc. It is also a luxury item which in our present climate may be a problem,hence why i won't be setting up another valeting business.

I will become a dad for the first time in 4 weeks so i really need to be making the right choice concerning my future.I have the funds to re-train,i just need to pick the right route,if there is such a thing!! I feel that this is my last chance and really don't want to throw my money away so i am overly cautious about choosing the right option.

I take on board all advice so thanks for all your input.

P.S. If there is anyone out there that wants a trainee with common sense,a business brain,good with his hands,learns quickly and will re-locate anywhere......give me a shout!!!

 

[ajs heating]

you've picked an awkward time to enter the trade as things are slowing right down compaired with last yr.
many are leaving these courses and not finding work as soon as they mention 10 week coure companies don't want to know due to lack of experience.
i would rather take on someone that has experience in dealing with customers, problems, fault finding etc than someone with certs coming out their ears and been on a 10 week course.

 

[CharterGAS]

Ajs is spot on!!! - the word fast track and plumbing should not be used in the same sentence!!!!!


i personally believe that the only real way to learn the trade is via an apprenticeship !!!

even if yo u want to re-train the do an adult apprenticeship!!!!!
then you need another 5 -5 6 yrs to be really good!!

Plumbing is a life long decision not a part life - although i know people who have retrained and became brilliant plumbers!!!!


this is my personal opinion
but other may disagree!!

again you will not make big bucks and you will lose sleep at night !!! If you really are up for that then go ahead and best of luck

But like i said - there is no such thing s as a fast track!

 

[fuzzy]

any trade is very difficult to master, i dont mind people wanting to retrain but they need to be realistic, to get anywhere near 50k will take years of working up skills, knowledge and reputation. 10 week course gives you underpinning knowledge, an apprentice takes 4 years before he is qualified, that gives him 4 years on the tolls aswell as his/her quals. how does anyone propose to gain the relevent experience after a 10 week course? i know many people who have taken jobs for penuts after a 6129 course to try to break into the trade, often they go back to their own jobs. less than 10% of newly qualified adult plumbers go into the trade, so think carefully before spending around 10k for this privalige, at least from a college you pay far less

 

[joebaxi]

ok correct me if i,m wrong
a 17 year old decides to go to college to learn plumbing.he/she will go to college one or two evenings a week and a full day for 2 to 2half years minus holidays etc.this amounts to something like 12 to 16 weeks tuition.A firm will take on he/she at the beginning of course even though they know diddly squat and probably never done a days work and still relies on mum to drag them out of bed every morning.
Meanwhile somebody else who has worked for 20 years doing something they hated suddenly decides to have a go at learning something they want to do.Theyre too old to get a college apprenticeship but find a way to get the same qualification albeit a lot more expensive.They can learn it in a lot less than 12 to 16 weeks because they have life experience and probably don,t have to spend a couple of months bashing a lump of lead like they do in college.
But can they find a firm to take them on afterwards?....not a chance....even though they already have the knowledge,the experience of a work environment and will be on hand more because they don,t have to swan off to college 1 day a week.Said firm would rather take on the seventeen year old to vent their anger on and make the tea and bend the pipes and pay them peanuts for three years because they,re "still learning".Then the now 20 or 21 year old can turn round and say they learnt the "proper way"and so the cycle begins again.
"5 to 6 years to learn plumbing" do me a favour....i could become a qualified GP in 5 years.C,mon lets be honest all you apprenticed trained plumbers,how many weeks or months did you spend doing the crappy jobs that you nprobably had sussed after a couple of days and were chomping at the bit to have a go at something else.How much useless knowledge do you have that you,l never get the chance to put into practice because times have moved on.
If i,ve put anyone,s back up with this post i really don,t care...i,ve put up with this kind of attitude from people in the many jobs i,ve done in my working life.I was`a lorry driver for 2 years and used to get ribbed by the 20 year plus drivers for looking in the atlas before i set off on a morning.They waited till they got round the corner before checking theirs.
Anyway thus concludes the interview...have i got the job

 

[mehera]

They dont want us to learn cause we will nick their customers more like!

Apprenticeships should be wiped out like the dinosaurs man!

Oh look another dinosaur 'yawn!'

 

[John t]

Hi ajs, here's my response to some of your concerns regarding fast trackers.

many are coming into this trade for the wrong reason.

Redundant at 48 and not prepared to go on the scrap heap, good enough
not knowing your age or what you have heard. but the common reasons are
£50'000 a yr
get up at 9 home by 2 etc
After 30 plus years in engineering 6/7 days a week I know what hard work is and don't expect to be rich, ever!

they are all rubbish, it takes yrs to built up your reputation and customers, and 5 mins to loose them
80% plus of my customers are word of mouth


so when you have your 10week course and you say you don't exspect to be a proper plumber, well when will you be ?
when you have charged someone £500.00 to experiment on their heating system and 5pm walk off job leaving them still no better off than when you turned up.

Would never dream of ripping anybody off, I never do anything I am not 100% sure of and pass on heating work to more experienced plumber mates.

and as the 10 week course and the spotty kids that then walk on site thinking they know it all know nothing, sorry not got time for them.
Does this mean you are going to stop helping out fast trackers on this site? or just the spotty ones!

you can't learn plumbing in 5 yrs let alone 10 weeks.

Under no illusions here mate but I intend to be around for a while yet! So keep on helping us fast trackers out!

 

[razal]

So repetitive on the job learning is not the way to go eh, why do you think they 'bash bits of lead' for months at college, have you learnt nothing ?
I would go learn to be a GP if I were you , cant be that hard, and easily done for you eh , as you can drive a big lorry LOL.
As for dinosaurs , maybe, but lets not forget they ruled the earth for years, eating all the less able critters....go ahead, do your fast track re-training, and then regret finding out you know less than you thought when you walk into that house.

 

[mehera]

Of course the problem with dinosaurs is that they may have been dominant, but are now dying out fast!

Apprentiships into a secret society of tradesmen is also outmoded - we need to spend less time doing funny handshakes and brown nosing. Lets face it most 4 year apprentiships envolve at least 3 years of making tea . . .

What you old fosils want is a cheap form of slave labour. Fast track will become the way in the future mark my words . . .

ha!

 

[buster]

Joebaxi, Please go down to your local college and find out what a modern plumbing course involves. I would have thought that anyone thinking of spending £5000 on a course would have got off their backsides, done a little research and looked at the alternative ways to train and what most companies in the plumbing industry would be looking for before employing someone.Then perhaps they could take a more qualified decision. But if sending off a large check is the easiest option, then why bother researching what for most people is a life changing decision. Just to help out and add a little fact to this thread I will list what a college course for a 17 year old involves;
firstly, They will have to attend college for a full year every day, monday to friday. Where he or she will have to complete all the practical work and exams from a N.V.Q. 2 course in one year. They will have to study and sit 12 exams and must achieve a pass mark of 60%. once they have completed this and have kept within the standard set by the college. They get nothing! A big fat zero! Then they are allowed to come back the next year and if they can find employment in the plumbing industry are then put through the course again to achieve a N.V.Q. level 2 but must achieve a pass mark of 80% over 13 exams and complete 12 units of practical work that is accessed under exam conditions and have a tolerance of + or - 2mm and have 5 on site visits at your place of employment. If they can not find work in the industry they can only sit the level 2 certificate in plumbing and will have to do their N.V.Q. 2 at a later date. when they have finished they will have a;
level 2 certificate in plumbing
level 2 NVQ in plumbing
level 2 NVQ in mechanical engineering services
Then they can go back to college and study for another 2 years to achieve their N.V.Q. level 3.
If you go back to college as a mature student it's much easier because they know you want to become a plumber and are making the decision for yourself. you can do the same course on day release or block release but you will have to meet the same high standard's that the 17 year old does. This is where your life experience comes in to it and the lecturers expect you to take a lot more responsibility for your own course and you set your own deadlines. But if you miss them you fail! You can only do a level 2 certificate in plumbing on a night course over two years. most employers know the system and short cuts so you won't pull the wool over there eyes. But that doesn't mean you won't get your chance at one time or another. It's a bad time in the industry at the moment so you have to keep plugging away. If you want to know how much a employed plumber is paid and the sort of hours they works, take a look at the J.I.B. website (joint industries board) as most companies stay close to this. But as in all industries if a unscrupulous employer can get someone to do a job for a lot less money because they took a fast track course but are perfectly capable, he will!

P.S. If you don't bash lead about on a ten week course how will you know how to safely handle and identify what type (cast or rolled) or code (3 to 8) of lead your dealing with. How will you be able to follow any plans if you don't know if the lead is to BS12588. How will you know what is the correct code you will need for a back gutter or soaker's? Or what code you need for bossing? how will you know about the characteristics of lead? Malleability, thermal movement, durability, patination, fatigue and creep, rate of corrosion and fire resistance? How will you know that the chemical composition of lead is governed by BS1178 which controls the grain structure? How will you know that lead has a high coefficient of expansion at a rate of 0.0000297 for 1 deg. centigrade? How will you know that lead is incombustible, but melts at 327 deg. cent.? How will you know how to anneal lead? How will you know about bossing techniques to repair or replace sheet lead? How will you know how to fusion weld lead? How will you know about capillary action and that water can climb 62mm with just atmospheric pressure and that what the tenant is telling you is a leak when it's incorrectly fitted lead? And most importantly how will you know that lead is poisonous to you and the residues on your overalls can be poisonous to your family and that lead can build up in your system and cause severe illness even death if handled incorrectly! Ho, and just in case like many you tell yourself that I'm not going to work with lead, Its not wise to go in to a trade and rule out working with a material that can earn you a lot of money in the business also The Latin word for lead is, Plumbum which is where we get the word plumber!

 

[fuzzy]

They dont want us to learn cause we will nick their customers more like!

Apprenticeships should be wiped out like the dinosaurs man!

Oh look another dinosaur 'yawn!'

bitter,

why is this man so bitter?

because he wasnt clever enough to get an apprenticeship? and now wants to rubbish them and do a 6week course

 

[ajs heating]

this is the man who runs a ltd company and is going to have a web site for all the ccc's to learn the tricks of the trade.
the only place he'll make it big is rogue traders.


this is all i have to say on the situation.
YouTube - Supertramp - Dreamer (live 1974)

 

[Mushybees]

Hello, i've been reading the forum a while but I believe this is my first post.

I'm retraining. I'm 25 now and i've been doing it for 2 years and it's been hard with a mortage and other outgoings though I was fortunate that we haven't started a family yet. Were we to have had kids at the time I wouldn't have retrained.


I attended college 3 days a week for my first year. On the back of that I was able to find an apprenticeship which i've been doing for a year.
I've completed my 6129 level 2 and working on my NVQ 2 folder now. In september i'll be returning to tech one day a week to do my 6129 level 3.
The year after i'll be in a position to crack on with my nvq 3 evidence.
That'll be 4 years on the tools before i'm qualified to a level 3 standard. 5 years counting my year of workshop and theory.

I know people who have done a fast track course and they are absolutely clueless. I can't stress enough that you positively cannot learn plumbing in a workshop and you can't learn plumbing without someone on site showing you how it's done.
What you learn in tech only scratches the surface. Anyone who claims you'll be even close to competent is lying and has an agenda.
I looked into fast track, of course I did. I thought i'd missed my chance to do an apprenticeship and, like everything else in our society these days, I thought throwing money at it would give me my instant results.

Fortunately my dear old dad, who's a brickie of 40 years experience, explained in no uncertain terms that i'd be wasting my time.

The 6129 does not make you competent. Not on paper and not in reality. All it does is give you a foundation knowledge of basic plumbing which is fine as an essential component of thorough training. As a fast track course it just give you false confidence.

My advice is do it right or not at all.

You can call me all the names under the sun now. Just bear in mind that I have no attachment to traditions and have no agenda.
If you do feel compelled to berate me consider for a moment that it may be because i'm confirming someone you don't want to believe.

Apologies for any typos. It's late and I need my kip.

 

[snorkel1234]

Good on you John I am also going to do fast track i am 50 was in police in South Africa for years I work hard train hard and on my off days (shifts) I work with the Council plumbers without payment, most of the guy's I have worked with let me do most of the work and say I will have no problem in the industry. I am under no illussions that I will never have the experience of AJS and others but hell it beets the dreary job of being in the Security Industry.

 

[fuzzy]

mushybees good post

 

[Rupster]

I bet fast track plumbers can spell though!!!

 

[John t]

Now then girls, can we call a truce and get on with earning a living.

 

[spacethegas]

I bet fast track plumbers can spell though!!!

i think you will find spelling is hardly a prerequisite.

 

[dennis.bailey]

hi, new to this site but to be honest i agree with ajs

I started plumbing working weekends with my dad at 14. when i was old enough to start college (16) i did, and completed my nvq level 2. I then did my nvq level 3, energy efficiency, corgi, and unvented. This was on a day release basis, where by every thursday i would go to college and learn the in's and out's of the jobs i did on site. as for the practiacal side of things, the only way is the hard way, hands on! working for my dad, we both addopt the same attitiude, that is we only give each other jobs we are happy to do our selfs. this meant that as soon as i started college/work, i was given responsibility. not sweeping up all day and making tea like people assume apprentices to. colleges can teach you how things are suppose to work, how to install pipework etc, but they cant teach you anything like the things i picked up on the tools.

from a future employer's point of view, the only people i will be employing are trust worthy, confident, willing to learn types regardless of age. the problem is, that most 25+ people want good money for nothing, whereas young 16+ people will graft and earn there wages, and such are more employable. not people who come from behind a desk wanting a fast buck.

i dont know many accountants etc who would swap there office job to work in someones loft for a day, in 30degrees+ heat, rubbing fibre glass into there skin as you rub the sweat away, trying to earn your '80K' a year.

where i live, (on the east coast) there's no shortage of plumbers. the only shortage is of good, honest plumbers. every day i see the here one minute gone the next plumbers, they dont last five minutes because there lack of experience and knowledge rubs off on there quality of work. i love it, it gets us loads of work!

 

[ajs heating]

good on ya dennis, glad to see we are getting somewhere with this topic.

 

[TerryH]

I'm an ex-fast-track man, 20 weeks, C&G at the end.
At 50 I have a good deal of experience and come from a practical background in property maintenance and aircraft engineering.

What do I want from plumbing?
£50k a year.... not gonna happen.
No, I'd like to become a tradesman, good, reliable clean tidy and pleasant to my customers. Finding help and information is the hardest part.
As AJS intimated, we can't charge someone £500 for an try-out at the job. This is real life and people's hard earnings, we have to respect that.
I don't really care how someone learnt the trade, as long as they did it well, are responsible and honest; that's one reason I spend a lot of time researching jobs here and I thank people like AJS who are willing to share some of their knowledge.
As in any walk of life 90% of people you meet are good people, 10% are ars###les; it's the 10% wwe need to worry about.
T.

 

[Rupster]

i think you will find spelling is hardly a prerequisite.

Just the result of a decent education and a bit of common sense.

I may not be able to spell but i can do plumbing ,gas ,central heating , bathrooms,boiler repairs ,run my own business and make shed loads of money !!! What can you do??

Already made a lot of money,not that that matters too much, and about to embark on my third business.