I know another question on PAT testing. My understanding is that PAT testing is not a legal requirement, though you may choose to do it. However I have just had a conversation with a manager of a charity shop who seemed to think it is for them and they said someone from the Council ( EHO ?) checks they have been doing it when they visit. My question is this, although it may be a good Idea to formally PAT test items you are about to sell which are second-hand, is it actually a legal requirement to do so? PS I was there to volunteer, not sell a service.

Hi Chris, I think the issue of PAT testing has been well explored on this site and in recent HSE clarification re 'duties'. It is clear that the Electricity at Work Regulations 1989 DO NOT specifically require PAT testing. The duty to MAINTAIN electrical appliances is clear but this will be on a risk based approach that COULD INCLUDE visual inspection and some PAT testing. I think that as you mention a charity shop proposing to SELL second hand goods the issue will have been raised by the Council under their Trading Standards(Sale of Goods) responsibilities rather than as a H&S at work regulator? I do not think electrical appliances can be sold at auction/second hand without an electrical safety check? The attached link may help? www.tradingstandards.gov...ice-business-sfsum18.cfm

Hi Chris42 I work in the charity sector - so I'll share what we do. Brand new I know what you mean when you say this, but our EHOs take a strict line on this. When we sell items in our second hand shops they are no longer brand new. An important point is that we cannot tell what has happened to the goods before reaching us and we have not been involved in a quality control process before we get them. I know I am straying into Trading Standards here but it does involve Health and Safety too. Fit for sale "If you sell second hand electrical goods which are unsafe or incorrectly labelled and you haven't taken reasonable precautions to avoid this, you may be prosecuted." Your question - Is is actually a legal requirement to do PAT testing? We take the view that we will do our best to make sure that an item is safe by the usual visual inspections and getting it PAT tested. Getting £5 for a hairdryer which subsequently sets itself on fire in someone's home isn't worth the damage to someone and their property, our profit line, staff time spent in investigating etc etc and our reputation. So we PAT test. Hope this helps. Good luck with sorting bags if you are involved in this as a volunteer. Seeing what people put into donation bags has been an eye opener to me! Regards Sara

Chris 42. The guidance does come from Trading Standards and not H&S. You have to drill down from the link provided earlier. When you open the webpage you then enter your post code and it will take you to your local TS unit website. Search on 'selling second hand electrical goods'. You should then find the guidance note. One key para which is most likely the source of the comment reads. "If you sell second hand electrical goods, which are unsafe or incorrectly labelled, and you haven't taken reasonable precautions to avoid this, you may be prosecuted and/or face civil litigation. You could be fined £5,000 and/or imprisoned for up to six months." This is the link to my local TSD. It may not work as it is a long link. If it doesn't p.m me and we will sort it elsewhere. p48 http://www.somerset.gov....D=122653&frmShared=1

One national charity which runs a shop in my area has trained some of its volunteer shop assistants to carry out visual examinations and then use a proprietary testing device to do the electrical testing of items which are classified as appropriate for selling to customers, i.e. mainly double-insulated items such as DVD and VCR players, radios and keyboards. By contrast another charity shop nearby operated by a regional charity apparently uses a local electrician to check donated items. At both shops apparently, the items which either aren't suitable or fail and cannot be readily repaired are rendered safe/unusable and suitably labelled for disposal or recycling. It's disappointing to observe that some charity shops have notices advising prospective donors that "Due to health and safety requirements we cannot accept electrical items" or similar. Sometimes it's also interesting to casually ask, without initially revealing any involvement with OS&H, which requirements forbid such shops from accepting such items!

Thanks Sara Yes my relative has said the operatives have found hunting knives, syringes and dirty nappies. One man had a needle stick injury from a syringe and had a very worrying time waiting results of the test (all ok). They have accepted me as a volunteer, Saturday Afternoon 9 I guess nobody else wanted that shift. As I have no life it does not bother me. Quite looking forward to it. Thanks again for everyone's input shame they have to live with the costs of testing. I have to go on Monday for my H&S induction !!! I understand why, but seems so odd. Chris

Mmm, yes well, back in about 2002 I think, before I joined the Charity that employes me, we got a conditional discharge for knocking out dodgy electricals from our Charity shops. One of the conditions was that we reached an agreement, with Babergh District Council (prosecuting), on a protocol for selling electrical items from our Charity shops. This requires us to PAT test all second-hand electrical items, and then subject them to a visual check by the shop manager before they are passed for sale; this is because we had been testing but the tester in the shop in Suffolk had been fiddling his records. We still turn a decent profit on second-hand electricals, and we do it by training one of our workers (usually a van driver) to PAT test and to keep the required records, John

You can't earth test double insulated products Graham. I agree that it's irritating that charity shops refuse to accept electrical items on some spurious H&S claim. Personally I don't give to charity shops anymore as years ago when we were combining two houses and needed to get rid of a load of stuff we had duplicates of, we gave it to a chairity shop. Lots of really good quality stuff. The next day we went back and it was all in a skip round the back. If they didn't want it they only had to say not bin it. Nowadays if I can't sell it on ebay I pass it on to someone else who needs it through Freecycle.

Electrical testing doesn't consist solely of earth tests Clairl.

This is getting silly It is so easy to do PAT testing that is why the C&G run courses that last three days and have external exams. It's so electricians can know as much as H&S consultants :-) They teach things like electron leakage between conductors, what things like 'Ohmic values' insullation tests (needed if class 1 or 2) are, if fuses open circuit in required times, max limits of currents, inrush etc. I wish I knew all that!

Thanks everyone for your input. The charity shop has trained two people to do this and have their own kit, so no real issue. It was just a discussion with them on legal requirement or best practice. Turns out a Trading Standards requirement. From the above I'm getting that someone who has been on the PAT course is accepted as the appropriate person and test. Again thanks

Chris and Frank -two enlightened people :-) The correct choice both.

Claire; it's not a 'spurious Health and Safety claim'. Please read my earlier post, we got a conditional discharge. Councils and the courts are very keen on this kind of thing, and although we were prosecuted by TSOs the grounds for prosecution were very clearly related to safety, John

Claire, bear in mind that most employers (and here I include Charities) treat their workers like mushrooms. If you're told by your local Charity shop manager that they can't sell electrical goods for safety reasons, that's probably only a very small part of the picture. Many of our shops 'can't' sell electrical goods, because our protocol with Babergh involves us having to designate suitable outlets for electrical goods, other shops can't stock them. Charity shops managers are usually employed to sell stuff, at a not terribly high wage, and are treated like mushrooms. If you asked one of our managers why they couldn't sell electrical items, they would say 'because of H&S'. It's not spurious, they just don't have all the information, and even if they are told what the real reasons are (and we do tell ours) it's not interesting or worthwhile enough for them to remember, John

quite right Grizzly