cscs ticket query

lucky-colm

hi

not to sure if this is the right place or not
but i have a ticket for driving a teleporter but its the english equivalant have been driving and using it for the last 18mths here with no problems but can i get it changed ffor the irish equivalant and where do i go about changing it

dunsandin

I should know the answer to this, cos I was a cscs instructor for years, but hated it and have tried my best to black that job out of my mind! A F A I R, you will have to take the renewal test with FAS, they will then issue you with a fresh Irish card. If the English card has been accepted so far, and im pretty sure it should be cos our system is based on the english one, then it might be easier to keep using that until it nears expirey and then go in to fas or whoever and do the renewal to get a cscs(fas)card. There is a lot of new confludicktionation about having to keep full records of your driving hours on the machine, with verification by your employer, and it is a pain in the whatsits. The test is supposed to have got a bit tougher to pass as well, but that really depends on who you get to test you, and the mood they're in and wether they are being monitored by fas that day.
Basically, prob best to keep your english card, worry about renewing it when it hits it sell by date, or a safety orificer queries and rejects it on site.

lucky-colm

dunsandin wrote: »

I should know the answer to this, cos I was a cscs instructor for years, but hated it and have tried my best to black that job out of my mind! A F A I R, you will have to take the renewal test with FAS, they will then issue you with a fresh Irish card. If the English card has been accepted so far, and im pretty sure it should be cos our system is based on the english one, then it might be easier to keep using that until it nears expirey and then go in to fas or whoever and do the renewal to get a cscs(fas)card. There is a lot of new confludicktionation about having to keep full records of your driving hours on the machine, with verification by your employer, and it is a pain in the whatsits. The test is supposed to have got a bit tougher to pass as well, but that really depends on who you get to test you, and the mood they're in and wether they are being monitored by fas that day.
Basically, prob best to keep your english card, worry about renewing it when it hits it sell by date, or a safety orificer queries and rejects it on site.

why did you give up tthat job were you working for some sort of training provider?

would have thought if you were self employed in this it would be the business as regards a job.

i will probably hold onto it so ftm if its that much bother to change. just thought if it was easy to transfer i would do it for the sake of coming up against hassle with it some day

911s

In my opinion whole system is a money making racket, in the same way as safe pass.
When I moved back from England years ago they said my English ticket was invalid,luckily
company I worked for paid for me to re-sit a test in each category of machine (a costly and time consuming exercise). After all the paperwork was processed I received my ticket
which was identical to the ticket I already had!
I recently had to renew my ticket and they refused to renew it as it was out of date by 4 months and I hadn't the aforementioned logbooks and records of driving.
I had never heard of them and when I explained I was self employed and operated/rented/sold my own equipment and didn't have an employer to sign log books
(may have used an expletive) they refused to deal with me and hung up.
It seems strange that I can renew my HGV licence no problem (apart from medical) and drive low loader on public road but I am not 'qualified' to drive a 1 ton mini digger in a field.
Sorry for rant but this type of 'officialdom' really annoys me.

dunsandin

Hmm, as a boomtime cscs instructor you would have been doing very badly if you earned less than the high thousands per week. I certainly did, and I was an instructor on a large number of categories. I however hated the work, it bored me shilly and I found the whole massive emphasis on form filling and box ticking a pain in the nodes. I was a long way ahead of most in the game in that I got in early, didn't look for the job, just went to do my test and was asked if I would be interested, so kind of fell into it. I enjoyed the early few years, but when it became just a torture of boredom to stand up every day giving the same old spiel and watching another batch of lads murder a trench or whatnot, I decided that id rather be happy at what I did for a living rather than just put in the hours and bank the dough. A lot of other lads loved the job, I hated it. It takes a certain type i suppose. There was a big cull of instructors at one stage, with english testers brought in to test all of the instructors-it turned out a lot could talk the talk but could not walk the walk, and many were binned. They are probably all BER inspectors now! I passed the tests by the way, and the rates for instructors shot up. Scarcity and all that.

buckshotbrolan

911s wrote: »

In my opinion whole system is a money making racket, in the same way as safe pass.
When I moved back from England years ago they said my English ticket was invalid,luckily
company I worked for paid for me to re-sit a test in each category of machine (a costly and time consuming exercise). After all the paperwork was processed I received my ticket
which was identical to the ticket I already had!
I recently had to renew my ticket and they refused to renew it as it was out of date by 4 months and I hadn't the aforementioned logbooks and records of driving.
I had never heard of them and when I explained I was self employed and operated/rented/sold my own equipment and didn't have an employer to sign log books
(may have used an expletive) they refused to deal with me and hung up.
It seems strange that I can renew my HGV licence no problem (apart from medical) and drive low loader on public road but I am not 'qualified' to drive a 1 ton mini digger in a field.
Sorry for rant but this type of 'officialdom' really annoys me.

I feel your pain brother! Im in the same boat, been out of work for nine months now and my licence has expired. Broke and got to find 1600 Euro to only do a 360 excavator ticket! Been driving plant for over 20 years now and have to do it all again like a cherry. Crap like this is what has broke this country!

911s

Just a quick question, maybe DUNSANDIN as an ex-trainer has an answer, is the machine
operators 'ticket' a legal requirement like a driving licence.
Driving licence is issued by Government department, a legal requirement and enforced by the Garda but the machine operators ticket seems to be a CIF/FAS/ANYBODY ELSE WHO WANTS A QUICK BUCK set-up.
I wonder if you could bring a case against a safety officer/site operator who stops
you from doing your job and earning a wage (assuming you have at some stage held a
ticket, which is now out of date, your operating skills have hardly disappeared)

dunsandin

Much the same as the safepass, it is regulated by Fas and fetac are the accrediting agency. Is it a legal requirement? No, not strictly speaking, if you want to drive a digger you own yourself on land you own, you can bang ahead. The renewals thing is certainly a seriously grey area, and IMOHO a total and utter money making scheme. In the past, like with a drivers licence, it was a case of do the test and fire ahead for as long as you liked. Not much money in that though, so sombody dreamt up(Uk in fairness)the whole having to renew thing. If you want to work on a site, and they have a safety officer, you need a current ticket, and you can roar all you like, you wont get too far. If you are a safety officer on a site, you have to justify your existance, and you have to come up with big ideas every now and then-s.p.a's would be one such example, the same goes for FAS, a lot of lads and lassies sitting around dreaming up layers to add to their pet schemes. I have dealt with an awful, awful lot of safety officers, and an awful,awful lot of P.S high-ups who have to do somthing with their time.Safety officers- generally they are there to protect their boss/clients ass from expensive claims/fines. Some are fine. Some are not. Rather than go off on another pointless rant, I will leave it at that. I think the acronysm spa is appropriate.