In terms of training and requirements for calibration frequency you need to comply with your repair cafe’s liability insurance to confirm what’s acceptable. Not actively complying and just doing something random could be a recipe for disaster. IME this needn’t be expensive but your specifics will depend on the specific requirements of your insurer.
Thanks Philip! Found this free online PAT Testing course and this official government guidance on PAT Testing from the Health and Safety Executive helpful.
This PAT Calibrator (which hopefully does not itself need calibrating…) is less than £200 - wonder if a group buy would make sense…
Thanks Ian - I’ve been looking at insurance and most people seem to have chosen a standard insurance package that makes no mention of testing equipment, let alone calibration frequency.
Guess Philip’s decision (above) to calibrate every two years makes sense?
From what little I know of metrology, I think even a PAT Test calibrator would need calibrating! Calibration labs need their kit calibrated (perhaps less frequently since it’s only used in controlled lab conditions) by a bigger calibration lab, or if they’re big enough by a Nation Standards Lab such as NPL.
Our PAT tester is showing signs of needing a new battery, so I was thinking a few weeks back of building my own simple go/no go PAT test tester with 5% resistors. Opening our PAT tester to change the battery would invalidate the calibration certificate, even though, with resonable care there’s no reason why it should actually put the calibration out. Such a go/no go tester would verify that it was still functional and with any error much less than could make a life or death difference. But I didn’t get around to it as I think the battery will just about hold out until the next biennial calibration date, and worst case, it’ll run off the charger. As with one or two other projects, I find that identifying a suitable box is harder than designing what to put in it! (It would need to be absolutely safe if some idiot pluged it into the mains instead of into a PAT tester!)
Really encouraging, thanks Philip! The electronics does seem straightforward - anything that makes it cheaper to test helps everyone.
There seem to be two tests
one is:
‘how close to zero is the resistance between any exposed metal parts and earth’?
and the other is:
‘if 500v or so is injected into both live and neutral, any voltage at all appears on exposed parts’?
I’m not sure how useful either are.
Consumer electronics seems mostly made in China with designs that flout many of the ‘rules’ of good design IMO. Mains-carrying PCB tracks too close together and underrated connection methods (notably ‘flimsy’ cabling) and nothing ever earthed and rarely fused internally all make me wince but the consumers don’t seem to give a stuff.
Hi everybody, I’ve just jumped into add this conversations to #community-repair with a #uk tag on it.
I tend to agree with all of the other advice given, thanks @philip @Dave @Ian_Barnard for your helpful contributions.
It’s important to recognise the overwhelming number of faults are detected by a proper visual inspection prior to actually using the PAT tester. Adding here that we do PAT testing for our own peace of mind, and ensuring our own process is safe. (I do feel that regular calibration is an important element of this. And while it’s not cheap, I think we need to be funding this through contributions of participants and local authorities.)
We do not offer PAT testing as a service. That is, the owner/participant is not offered a sticker and we do not maintain permanent record of the test. Firstly, we feel that would be more than we can handle at events, and secondly, it would also create more of the feeling of a transaction/service and would potentially heighten our liability.
We are very strong about these events not being a free service, but an educational event where ultimately the participant retains responsibility for their own device. Our disclaimers on every table and on our website reinforce this. Some groups have people sign a form acknowledging this.
I would also point everybody to our Wiki page - and ask if based on this conversation, it’s due any updates?
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That’s helpful. I think that it might be worth noting in the wiki that we shouldn’t be handing out PAT test stickers (if that’s what we’re considering best practice for a Restart event).
I’m happy to make some edits to the wiki page to incorporate some of these points if you like.
Thanks @Adam! I think @Ian_Barnard and maybe others have differing opinions on recording tests and stickers.
It’s definitely our best guidance for those getting started, especially in high-attendance events. Perhaps we can add this as a starting point, and something for your group to consider carefully.
But in a way, every case is a case, and we’re definitely not qualified to give advice on liability - only your local pro-bono lawyer can do that 
Ah yes. When we started I enthusiastically put stickers on everything we tested, but after discussion with Janet I now only put stickers on mainsy things we use in events - i.e. extension leads - so I know to retest a year later. We record on the repair sheet that PAT testing was done, and the result. Testing is always done on the item coming in (which may also be the point where 13A plugs without plastic pins for L/N are replaced with modern ones, and fuse checked/changed to appropriate current limit for the item) and if fixed then on exit it’s tested again if it was in any way disassmbled or mains parts modified.
The vast majority of failures are during the physical check part of the PAT test - if that fails there’s no way I’m plugging it into mains without the physical problem being fixed first. IIRC I’ve only had one electrical failure for leakage current (i.e. detected by the PAT tester after passing the physical check) which was on a very old projector which looked like the fan motor had coils made from cotton-covered copper wire. Leaky like you wouldn’t believe.
I bought the PAT tester myself (IIRC it was £100 on ebay, a Kewtech KT71) for the repair cafe to use on the basis that donations cover the £50-ish cost of annual calibration. Donations have also covered the £30/person PAT test training, possible because our insurers were happy with online training.
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Wow, great info Ian, thanks!
Can you please say how much you pay for which insurance policy with whom?
We are lucky to get liability insurance through in the end Devon CC, via Community Action Groups (CAG) Devon - this is used for all Devon’s Repair Cafes, and happily doesn’t come to us a cost. I’m sure there’s at least one topic on here about getting liability insurance. It’s one reason for working with a sustainibility or other charitable group because they may already have cover you can benefit from by joining/partnering with them?
See here Sign our letter to get a fairer deal from insurers - #5 by Luc_Deriez
Might be worth contacting @Repair_Cafe_Wales to see what happened from their letter?
We have more detailed info on risk and insurance here @chris_setz:
Chris, if you are in London, which I believe you are, we offer London groups that we have a handshake agreement with cover under our insurance. Please message or email us.
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Messaged you, thanks Janet. Maybe publish a range of actual insurance policies in the wiki, from working repair cafés?
PAT units can occasionally be found cheap, its the annual calibration that’s expensive. Under UK law the unit has to be calibrated, and quite extensive records for each electrical item tested are required to be kept: some expensive PAT units do this digitally.
Technically the individual testing has only to fit the requirement “component person” which can be misleading, I’ve bought from a charity shop a type II electrical item, certified as tested: it was faulty (easy repair) and the transformer wasn’t marked tested (every seperate component must be tested, if the power lead unplugs, it must be tested separately).
I’m a retired NHS Specialist Electro-mechanical Engineer: everything I did had to be tested.
All that is true if you’re doing it officially and professionally, and sticking green labels on stuff implying liability if the device kills someone. And I’m sure the NHS is very hot on all that.
But that’s not where we are in a Restart context. What we’re doing is simply reasonable endevours to protect our volunteers and punters. If the same laws or regulations applying to PAT testing in the NHS were applied to Restart we’d be instantly reduced to working on low voltage devices, if not shut down altogether!
Thanks Ian!
Under UK law the unit has to be calibrated
Would you kindly help me locate the law concerned?
If PAT Testers must be calibrated, does that mean the calibration must be done by calibrators who can show they confirm to specific calibration standards, a bit like only garages certified by the government can conduct MOTs?
Absolutely wrong: it’s a legal requirement: you may have a point if the items in question are not for resale, and are used in domestic situations.
Your attitude, and response, and responsibility are abysmally flawed.
Ian Deare TMIET MIMIT FRSA
Items brought to Restart Parties are domestic items and are never for sale.
Such intemerate responses are not what we expect on these forums.
As I stated above, we do the tests for our own peace of mind.
By doing so, we are not acting as professionals, or providing a service to the end user. At our free, educational events participants take responsibility for their own possessions, which remain theirs. Nothing is bought or sold.
PAT testing in a professional capacity or as a paid service is an entirely different endeavour.
We’re closing this thread.
Again, anybody who wants to know our guidance about risk, liability and safety is pointed to