CORGI, Gas Safe Register, and the
Building Regulations are probably the areas that is
most confusing to the majority of people who either work with gas,
or use it.
The purpose of this page is to give you a rough idea about how
things stick together without prejudice.
As a Registered Gas Installer, I have more knowledge and
experience related to these subjects than most, but I am not a
lawyer. This information is meant to give you a bit more insight,
not to use as evidence in a legal dispute. As a central heating engineer, I have a working knowledge of the rules governing gaswork, but I am not a lawyer.
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How are CORGI, Gas Safe Register and the Building
Regulations related?
Until 1 April 2009, if you wanted gas work to be carried out
safely and legally, you would look for a "CORGI plumber".
The Council for Registered Gas Installers was the organisation that
kept the records of people that were adequately trained and
experienced to work on gas.
From 1 April 2009 this job was taken over by Gas Safe
Register, and CORGI is no longer involved in
English gas safety.
It is very important that you check if the engineer has a Gas
Safe Register card. A CORGI card has absolutely no legal meaning any more in terms of being a registered gas installer. People can still be a member of CORGI, but apart from promotional
benefits, it has precious little value when it comes to legal
gaswork.
CORGI sell their membership partially on the merit of
gas safety, but do very little to end the confusion. They do state
somewhere that they are NOT the registrar any more, but you have to look long and hard.
The best way to make sure that whoever comes to look at your boiler is actually legal and properly qualified, is to contact Gas Safe Register
If you have any doubt anyone working safely and legally on your
gas installation, call:
0800 408 5500, press option 3, and ask for verification
One of the legal documents that forms the backbone of every day
gas safety is the GSIUR 1998, which is short for:
Reading of it is only recommended to the very brave. The summary
of it is that it spells out what you must and must not do. It spells
out what central heating engineers and landlords must do for example.
It also applies to owners of gas appliances like home owners, to
users which could be home-owners or tenants.
That brings us to the last part of the clarification of how
CORGI, Gas Safe Register, and the Building Regulations stick
together.
What is commonly referred to as the "Building Regs2 covers most
of the things that are not dealt with in the previous parts.
One example is the installation of condensing boilers since 2005,
which is covered in part L1.
This all part of what now officially is called: the Local
Building Authority, or as most of still call it: The Council.
These documents give practical guidance on what builders or
heating engineers should, and should not do.
When someone like myself comes across gross violations of these
approved codes of conduct, we are held to notify the Health And Safety Executive
(HSE)
under the Reporting of Injuries, Diseases and Dangerous
Occurrences Regulations 1995 or RIDDOR for
short.
A typical example of this would be where a "cowboy" has left a
dangerous gas leak, and when a bona fide heating engineer finds
this, he must report this to the HSE.
As a householder, you can contact Gas Safe Register who
will send an impartial inspector out to you, free of charge. These
are the people that will do the reporting to the relevant
authorities for you.
If you are a home owner, and you have any doubt as to whether or
not the plumber has worked on your gas installation safely,
If you smell gas, or you just THINK you might smell gas, you must
call
0800 111 999
DO NOT CALL British Gas, they are now a private company and are NOT involved with the gas emergency services.
The people that will respond to a 0800 111 999 call are Southern Gas Network, or their subcontractor Morrison.
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These are the people that should be dealing with it, not the gas
board, not British Gas, and not the council.
The number should be on your gas meter, and it would not hurt to
keep it near your phone at all times.You can call them free of
charge, 24/7, 365 days a year. They will show up promptly, and more
often than not within 30 minutes.
One thing CORGI, Gas Safe Register, and the
Building Regulations have in common, is the misconception
that they form the cornerstone for prosecution of dangerous
situations caused by incompetent or negligent workers.They don't.
Prosecution comes mainly under the HSE.
Hopefully this page has given you some sort of an idea how
CORGI, Gas Safe Register, and the Building
Regulations stick together.
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