All fair responses Wiz, and well 'thunk' out
However if we accept that inevitably some end users are going to get ripped off and that less than competent people are operating in the open market, and will continue to do so. What can be done to help the consumer avoid being caught out?
Rogue Traders, Cowboy Builders, Rip off Britain; it happens across the board not just fire safety.
Wiz you don't seem to disagree that standards need to be raised in fire safety and I dare say you know of people in the profession that would fit in to the categories above, but can you give us something tangible to deal with the above in the fire safety sector.
Speyside, it is fair to say that there are Rogue Traders & Cowboys within too many industries. I believe that it is also fair to say that if 'consumers' had to use service providors regulated and approved by a governing body created to maintain Standards then these Rogue Traders and Cowboys would soon be identified and dealt with.
What has to be determined is if the cost of providing the regulation benefits the consumers and industry in the long run.
The direct costs of annual membership and 'certification' costs per system, and the indirect costs of adminstering the scheme may be considered as fairly reasonable to begin with. But I'll wager these costs will increase exponentially over the years as the scheme gains a stranglehold on the industry, and would become so high as to threaten normal industry expansion if such scheme became obligatory.
For example, has research and development budgets of fire alarm equipment manufacturers been affected by the eye-wateringly high costs of third-party certification of products? I believe they must have and we are currently suffering from a real lack of innovation in the industry because of this.
As I said previously, surely the British Standards recommendations are enough. If a product or service providor claims to meet these and doesn't, then the legal system can sort it out (as it would still have to do even if the providor was TPC'd).
I believe Third-party certification does very little to raise standards relative to its cost, and mighthamper the growth of an industry if it became obligatory.
In respect of the fire alarm system industry, I can't believe any manufacturer would invest a large sum of money in a product and state it complies with BS knowing that it didn't. I also believe that standards for system designers, installers, commissioners and servicers could be most simply raised by gaining recognised qualifications. Not qualifications for the company but for the actual persons carrying out the work. However, I also believe, the exam(s) for the qualification(s) must be set by a body independent of those offering training in gaining that qualification (something like City & Guilds) for it to be worthwhile.
