Starting up

[drew13]

Has anybody got any ideas about the best way to get started in the plumbing game?

I am currently doing a plumbing/heating course at tvu in reading and am in my first year. I want to know the best way to get started.

Im 34 and would like to do it as a job but do I get a placement with someone and will my age affect me. Also how much should I expect to earn starting as im currently a landscaper and earn 25k.

I expect a pay cut but hope its not to much. I have put a few bathrooms in and changed rads and stuff but how soon should i start looking
cheers
Andy

 

[gas4you]

Not wanting to sound negative, but I hope you haven't gone on this course beleiving all the hype about the shortage of plumbers etc and their fantastic earnings

Reality is there are too many out there, with many now being laid off.

If I was you I would stick to landscaping @ £25K

 

[seco services]

not a wise time to be changing jobs when your earning 25k at the moment.

 

[Paul Barker]

Did you no £25 is about the basic for a British Gas bloke who services gas appliances?

Did you know that self employed as a new starter in plumbing you will when you look back over the first year have been on less than minimum wage?

Did you know 25k is a very good wage?

Did you know the media tells huge lies, one of the biggest is about plumbing?

Did you know that the world is full of complete idiots (the majority of people where plumbing is conscerened) which think you are earning a fortune all year round every day because you charge them £30 to stop a tap dripping? When in reality their pension/benefits/factory job is twice what a new starter in plumbing will achieve in the first year?

Did you know that there are people industriously aiming with serious intent to take as many pennies off plumbers as they can. it swtarts with the gvernment who legislates, then the manufacturers of the evr increasing list of specialist equipment, then the callibrators of said equipment then there are all the training organisations to support and all the registering bodies. There are the extra insurances and the increased cover required in this day and age.

You see there's this cake and we don't get to eat much of it, but we carry the world on our backs to the table where the cake is set out as a banquet to be ravaged by vultures.

my advise is avoid a regulated profession if at all possible. If you haven't already paid for the rest of your course leave now and rejoice that you have been snatched from the snares of bankruptcy.

You might think I am dramatising this or trying to put you off for personal gain, but if you continue on your present course one day you might remember this post and think to yourself belatedly, that idiot over on diynot was right!

 

[muggles]

You'll earn b*gger all as a new starter, probably little more than minimum wage, and maybe less as you'll be a 'trainee' and are therefore exempt from the minimum wage scheme for the first 12 months. Out of this you will probably need to purchase all your own tools (budget about £2000-£3000 for this if you're buying power tools as well).

You should do a City and Guilds 6129 course and get an apprenticeship with a firm. As you're over 19, you will have to pay for the C&G course, unless you can persuade a firm to pay for it for you, which is unlikely. The theory course will cost you about £6000+VAT (reference http://www.trainingbyreactfast.co.uk/6129_plumbing_training_course.htm others available but similar cost) and last about 10 weeks if you do it full time, or two years if you're on day release. On top of this you will need to build up a practical portfolio, and have onsite assessments which will almost certainly cost you more money.

Sooo...let's say you're working 45 hours a week, and work 40 weeks of the year (52, -10 weeks' training, -8 bank holidays which you'll be lucky to get paid for, and a fudge factor of two days off sick, for which you will receive nothing) and you find a company who will pay you min wage of £5.73 an hour. That's 1800 hours, amounting to a gross income of £10314 in your first year. Out of this you will lose 20% in tax, so let's call that £8000 takehome, less national insurance which I really can't be ar$ed to work out. You've paid £8000-£9000 for tools and tuition, so at best you leave with nothing, and you may make a £1000-£2000 loss in your first year, or £26-£27k less than you're currently earning.

Good luck, and I hope you have a lot of savings and a very understanding bank manager...

EDIT: Incidentally this is just for the first two years, to get you to NVQ2. If you want to go on to NVQ3 and do your gas, unvented HW cylinders, water regs, energy efficiency etc etc then I know for a fact from a friend of mine who's a college lecturer that your 12-18 months doing NVQ3 could cost you somewhere in the order of £6-7k+VAT (his college charge £6800, probably +VAT although not sure on this)

 

[sooey]

Steady on lads, you'll put the poor lad off like that.

 

[muggles]

Hey, he may have very deep pockets and a real love of plumbing, just giving him the facts

 

[drew13]

cheers for the info guys is there anybody out there that thinks its a good idea i really like plumbing and after 12 years of landscaping i feel the same as you lot do about plumbing to many hours ect i didnt think would be making millions but a bit more than i am now .im still working at the mo and just making my hours up so i think i am going to complete the course for the first year and then see where i go from there

 

[seco services]

cheers for the info guys is there anybody out there that thinks its a good idea i really like plumbing

i really like doing a lot of things but doing them all week is a different issue.

 

[Paul Barker]

cheers for the info guys is there anybody out there that thinks its a good idea i really like plumbing and after 12 years of landscaping i feel the same as you lot do about plumbing to many hours ect i didnt think would be making millions but a bit more than i am now .im still working at the mo and just making my hours up so i think i am going to complete the course for the first year and then see where i go from there

the stark reality is that many of us have not made more than 10 grand profit in this trade for six 11 hour days. And that is being corgi registered.

The rest of society has not got a clue.

I speak plainly clearly and bluntly about my actual experience, which is horrendous.

There are others with the same experience but who are so ashamed they daren't go public.

There are some family firms run by sons and grandsons whose best bet would be to close the business. But pride keeps them entrapped.

25k for an unregulated profession is a small fortune compared to our over regulated hell.

i am ok though because i have achieved a degree of specialised skill is now paying off, but the cost was the last 5 years of less than minimum wage and quite a chunk of our savings.

The best thing
i ever did was give up attem[ting to be a business and sub contract. Probably better still to be employed. But

i don't fit the lay over tenplate human resources" departments impose on decision makers. Though i might be the best person in the role they may ever get a look at.

 

[corgiman]

Bad time to be training to be a plumber mate?

 

[roguetrader]

I'd actually like a change too, landscaping sounds great.

the stress of this business is starting to take its toll of late, just over 80 hrs in the last 7 days, knees shot to bits at 34, head spinning with so many rules and regulations. I have to prove myself again next year, oil in jan, gas in july. the next level is customers, who think its ok to demand you change your diary and upset your day so they can get their heating fixed AND get their hair done, everyone thinks you earn a fortune, it simply isn't true, the outgoings these days are frightening. seriously mate, its not all that.

 

[andytheplumber]

Good luck. Wish you all the best .

Whats wrong with plants , there better to work with.

Theres no bullshit with plants you stick them in the ground, they either grow or die, They dont complain they take it on the chin..

I wish some of my customers would die.