here at efixx we love tackling the subject of how to become an electrician and I'm joined
today by jake hardcastle that took a route that sometimes you hear us
i got myself a jtl apprenticeship that's what you did did you work for jtld did it work for jtl no
they just uh basically I applied for JTL you registered with JTL they oversee your
apprenticeship if you like okay so jtl was established in 1990 and there's a non-profit
organization which effectively is a charity and they help you get an apprenticeship so
you would have had to have done something when you registered maybe online you normally ask
them to do a skills test is that what you had to do yes i had to go do a basic maths and english
test as well as a colorblind test okay you've passed all of those so you got a job with jtl
nope not got a job at that stage okay so we've done that in the process of trying to become
an electrician and that at the moment maybe hasn't been fruitful for you so you're 16 you
left school what did you end up having to do so as well as looking for apprenticeships myself
handing out cvs making phone calls emails actually enrolled on a full-time level two course right
okay so you've taken it that you haven't got a job when you've left school you've decided to get some
some experience of bending conduit clipping cables and some of those qualifications you're gonna need
up the road but you were luckily in that time at college the first six months you actually did get
contacted about an apprenticeship can you talk me through that process and how it links to the jtl
yep so probably uh just over half a year into my full-time course at leeds college of technology
which is now leeds city college i got a phone call from the company where i started my apprenticeship
invited me in for an interview they had been in contact with JTL and had a list of people looking
for an apprenticeship in their area invited me for an interview and that where it got the job
okay so if you got to this part i'll just take a deep breath there that sounds too good to be
true and often things that aren't too good to be true are in my experience it's wonderful and
i've seen people in the past do that route but it is incredibly difficult to sit on a course or sit
at home hoping the phone rings because somebody happened to contact the JTL and happen to choose
you off a list it does happen but don't rely on it i think you still need to pursue companies
that then might send you through the jtl route so jtl effectively become your broker yeah and they
will then decide whether they're going to do the underpinning knowledge themselves and the on-site
visit or split it up now you didn't do your underpinning knowledge with JTL who did do your
underpinning knowledge with no so i did it with leeds city college so they gave you what a level
two and a level three qualification yes and it was the sitting goals two three three all that i did
okay so you're doing that knowledge is that one day a week or were you on block release i was
on block release so I went to college two weeks every eight weeks I think it was okay to take that
knowledge and did it take three years does it take most people yeah three years at college yeah so
you did three years at college and got up to level three two three three oh yeah that's not enough
though is it because we know that often called the NVQ you need to build that site evidence
in order to get another element of it now, that was that managed through JTL or was that done through
the college that's right so that was managed through jtl so they would come out and visit me
on a job from inception to compilation that'd be quite a large job uh so it would start with
all your health and safety through to first fix second fix on inspection and testing so
you've got a large job you're obviously having to gather evidence do you take photographs and things
like that yep so photographs at each stage and information going through what i'm carrying out
so you start building that up and he's one job enough did with one large job enough as evidence
of obviously passing that NVQ that was two larger jobs when I did it so that's also going to take
a good while so that's all part of the bigger program so is that making your apprenticeship
effective about four years yeah so for four years just over four years i think it was for me okay so
let's go for it i've completed what they're going to call the mbq they've come out on site and
proved that i can do the work i've got my level three at college am i now an electrician no not
yet what i've now got to do so i then had to do my am2 assessment when i was ready and when you
say when you're ready that's a cooperative isn't it i think isn't it jtl you and your college have
to decide as a collective that you're ready for it yeah that's right so once my employer and college
think i'm ready then that's when i was put in for it yeah because there's a thing that we now know
having taught ourselves now that there's a thing called timely completion yeah in order that jtl
can draw down your funding they're your broker so the government give a funding to train apprentices
they've given some of their money to your college yeah they've kept some of their money so they can
do their in-house on-site assessing element of your course and they've got a vested interest in
you completing it in time to draw down the maximum amount of funding so let me go for
it you've completed your level three at college you've got your NVQ and you've got your AM2 jake
are you an electrician now a qualified electrician yeah brilliant and you're a qualified electrician
what's the first thing you're probably going to do once you've got your qualified status so
first thing i did was apply for my ECS Gold Card which everybody wants thought there absolutely so you've
got a gold card and on there it says electrician yeah brilliant now that's not the end of the
gold card route for you because you can get an approved electrician status is generally the one
people want to go to next what's the advantage of being an approved electrician over an electrician
yep command money symptoms of that it's all about the money so they change the rules all the time so
make sure you look into it as and when you apply for your ecs gold card now it's a number of years
have to pass between being an electrician and applying for approved and they normally expect
another qualification we expect to do another one yeah so i think it was three years as experience
as an electrician and the two three nine one inspection and testing qualification so you had
to get the testing qualification and a number of years past yeah then you applied a are you now an
approved electrician now an approved electrician okay and then obviously increases the amount of
money that you could earn so let's peel that back then so jtl if we've gotten a jtl apprenticeship
you don't actually work for jtl they broker your apprenticeship you still have to go to college
you still have to build effectively an mvq or a portfolio of work you still have to complete
an am2 it's changed now it's am2s isn't it now yeah and that links into nicely why are
you wearing a red t-shirt so i've been working with efixx been working with you guys for the week
okay i thought these were exclusively for uh the founders of efixx but you've got a redwood on
so you've been doing some still conduit with us yeah yep so i've joined you guys doing the doing
a series of videos on steel conduits starting with the basics looking at all the accessories and the
conduit bender going into actually fabricating 90 degree bends sets and so on and what's really
helpful is actually we're leading to a video where you have to put a bend and a set in a piece of
conduit which is very poignant when you're doing an am2s which is the new version of m2 isn't it
yep definitely the is uh i've got to fabricate a bend of steel conduit which like you say is
a set and a 90 bend in the m2s okay and jake's going to show you how to do that and i'm going
to stand there all in the camera so check out the video and how do you check out those videos
well they're in the link in the description there is a playlist on our efix youtube channel
all about steel conduits i recommend you check those out but again we've left that to the end
because people who invest in themselves will get to the end of the video you're the sort of person
that will go out and take every opportunity in order to get yourself an apprenticeship it's not
an easy task don't rely on somebody else doing it for you so you didn't rely on it effectively
on jtl getting your apprenticeship because you went to college and did that level two why you
were still pursuing that attention it's not easy there are different ways in order to become an
electrician and we're exploring as many of those ways as we can here at efix if you've
got a different route into the industry please leave us a comment maybe that's something that
we can investigate if you've got any questions you'd like to ask me or to jake especially in
the conduit series okay please leave them below and i'll let jake get back to as many as he can