A shock from a tool or lead?
If someone's hurt, call 000, and don't touch them until the power is off. Take the tool or lead out of use and keep it aside for testing. Electric shocks can be reported to Ergon Energy on 13 16 70.
Why Toowoomba's rules look different from the coast's
The capital of the Darling Downs
Toowoomba is the service centre for a big farming region: over 40 percent of the exports out of the Port of Brisbane come from the Toowoomba Region and surrounds, led by beef, grain and pulses. That puts a lot of local businesses under the regulation's rural industry rules.
Farm work includes the farm workshop
Rural industry work covers crops, livestock, wool, aquaculture, market gardens and preparing land for them. It also takes in repairing farm machinery and building sheds when that's done on the property, for the property.
Weather that's hard on leads
Winter brings frost, and fog and hail turn up more often here than in many Queensland towns. Gear left in sheds and utes takes the brunt. A cracked lead or a loose plug matters more when the yard is wet.
Rural industry: what the regulation asks of you
Look before you plug in
Every piece of plug-in equipment has to be visually checked for electrical safety defects before it's connected. That's a job for whoever is about to use it.
Assess the job for risk factors
The regulation names three: using plug-in gear in an unroofed or wet area, like a hose-down area; hand-held gear whose cord flexes while you use it; and gear exposed to damaging dust or corrosive chemicals.
Protect or test that gear
Equipment used with one of those risk factors must either run from a safety switch, or be inspected and tested at least once a year by a competent person and pass AS/NZS 3760.
Tag it and keep it honest
Gear that passes gets a durable tag with the test or retest date and who tested it. Gear that fails is tagged do-not-use and pulled from service straight away.
Workshops and packing sheds in town
The regulation's examples of manufacturing work include a welding workshop, vehicle repairs in a mechanic's workshop, and sorting, processing and packing food. If that's you, covered plug-in tools like a grinder or drill must be inspected and tested at least once a year if double insulated, and at least every 6 months if not. They also have to be plugged into a socket-outlet protected by a safety switch, and double adaptors and piggyback plugs are banned.
Where manufacturing is the main work on site, a fixed safety switch has to be installed for the socket-outlets rated up to 20 A before the work starts, with a few exceptions. That part is licensed electrical work, so it's one more reason to book an electrician rather than someone who can only test.
Hiring gear out
If you hire out electrical equipment, from power tools to leads and work lights, each item must be tested before every hire or fitted with a safety switch that can't be removed while it's running. On top of that, every item is inspected, tested and tagged at least every 6 months, and the test records are kept for at least 5 years.
Questions to ask the tester
- Which category does our work fall under: rural industry, manufacturing, service or office?
- Which of our socket-outlets are protected by a safety switch, and are those switches tested to AS/NZS 3760?
- What goes on each tag, and what written record do we get?
- Can you repair or replace faulty outlets on the same visit?
- Will you come out to the property as well as the town premises?
What we'd do on a Downs property
We'd get an electrician to put safety switch protection on every outlet in the sheds and yards where gear gets used wet or rough, because that covers the risk every day, not just on test day. Then we'd have the hand tools and leads tested and tagged, and make the look-before-you-plug-in check a habit for everyone on the place.
Want a specialist to sort it?
Tell us the job and your postcode. We match the licence-checked local electrician who does this kind of work, and they call you. No ring-around, and your number goes to them alone.