Plumbers Prosecuted for Illegal Gas Work

In order to avoid hefty legal bills, and save lives, it is important for any plumber who wants to work with gas appliances, such as installing boilers, to be a Gas Safe registered engineer. Something these plumbers didn’t do when going to work in people’s homes.

Plumbers from Hertfordshire and Middlesex have recently been sentenced for working illegally on domestic gas appliances.

When installing a boiler in a property the boiler had not been adjusted to run on liquefied petroleum gas (LPG), which supplied the property. The property owner then contacted another Gas Safe engineer who found that the boiler was producing more than 200 times the recommended level of carbon monoxide rendering the boiler extremely unsafe.

Following a Health & Safety Executive (HSE) investigation, Bury St Edmunds Magistrates’ Court heard that neither the Hertfordshire plumbers were registered with Gas Safe. Both admitted breaching Regulation 3(3) of the Gas Safety (Installation & Use) Regulations 1998 and received a two-year conditional discharge including paying costs of £250 each.

Another Enfield based plumber was found to have lied to homeowners about being registered with Gas Safe. The plumber poorly installed a boiler which the homeowners complained about to Gas Safe. Inspectors then visited the property and found the boiler to be in a dangerous condition.

HSE found that the plumber had been falsely claiming to be Gas Safe registered, carrying out work and then fooling registered engineers into signing off the installations by asking them to carry out annual gas safety inspections.

He was fined £2,500, ordered to pay full costs of £902 as well as a victim surcharge of £15.

Health & Safety executive inspector Stephen Manley, said:

“Working with gas appliances is difficult, specialised and potentially very dangerous. Only qualified and registered engineers should attempt it.

It is illegal for an unregistered person to carry out work on a gas appliance. When unqualified workers try to bypass the law in this way they are not only putting themselves at risk of prosecution and a large fine, they are also putting their customers’ lives at risk.”

Here at RF Training we provide Gas Safe Training for people who want to become a heating engineer in our full time 6 week training program.

New and previously qualified plumbers also have the opportunity to upgrade their skills to become Gas Safe registered with our Fast Track Gas Course which takes 4 weeks.

RF training helps you build your experience portfolio by working on site with a Gas Safe registered engineer.

Registered Gas Safe engineers can also renew their CORGI/Gas Safe membership with ACS gas training and assessment, which needs to be renewed every 5 years to keep you up to date with changes in the industry.