Hello - I am a newbie, having just signed up. We are buying a residential mobile home in Lot-et-Garonne and we will need an Electrician to fit Air-Con and also, a Joiner to fit some Decking around the Home. Can anyone suggest an English person who could do this for us please?
Thank you - I have accepted!
Hello Irene -
Thank you so much for your message - and yes, we will probably be looking for someone in July (that's when we hope our Mobile Home will be handed over to us - it isn't built yet!!!) - and although, when I looked on the "Auchan Supermarche" website, re Air-Conditioning units, they do state that Auchan can arrange for one to be fitted - BUT I am still a bit nervous in case, for whatever reason, a French Electrician would not agree to fit it, because our Mobile will have English wiring and sockets etc. and I know how "picky" they can be about things like that!!
So if you could supply this English electrician's contact details I would be greatly obliged to you.
Thanks again for getting in touch.
A good electrician (we have a really good one fortunately) will not even blink an eyelid about the difference. As long as you have all of your AC connections connected to a French standard fusebox, otherwise you are NOT covered and actually are breaking the law, then you are fine. Sadly, a lot of so-called electricians from our side of the Channel will match up with UK standards, which is not advisable. It is as simple to be caught as the ERDF meter man/woman calling to do a reading, seeing something not regular and telling EDF and then you are in it up to your necks :-(
Anyway, best of luck with it. back to work for me...
Thank you Brian for your words of wisdom! Although I am a newbie to this particular site, I am aware of the type of scam artist you mention! We shall certainly take all the necessary precautions, and hopefully will avoid being caught out. I was just thinking that there must be genuine English guys working in France, trying to make an honest living, and maybe we could support their enterprise. And since the mobile home has English electric wiring etc, I didn't want to get involved in a French National saying "I won't touch it with a bargepole!" or words to that effect!!
Just a tip, be very careful with this. If you use an 'English' electrician and joiner, you should thoroughly check them. Get their siret numbers, look them up to see what they say they are to begin with. There has been some tell of one installer of X who also goes as a builder who registered an an auto-entrepreneur AE, fair enough, but it transpired he registered as something like a circus performer. So, the point is making sure you get what you actually need and not somebody who says he/she will do it. You need to consider the devis, bill and all that give you some assurance. The bill, if properly made out, gives you a warranty of so many years, for construction work 10 years. Anything goes wrong and the person(s) who do the work have to cover it from their own insurance. If not then your insurer will simply say 'No' to any claim you try to make. The air conditioning, even (and perhaps especially) for a mobile home, will have to be insured. If it goes wrong and burns the place down and causes any damage to anybody else's property then you would be saddled with the bill. The decking, so quite so dodgy except if there was, for instance, a fire and then in the knock on of not being properly insured... Also, as some French friends found two summers back, have the ground looked at. They had termites who immediately went for the treated wood installed by a bona fide company. Luckily the company covered that one and paid for part of the extermination.
So, the point is that unless you have an established and 100% above board person for either job then simply do not bother. There are plenty of companies where somebody will speak enough English for you to place your order and even a fair few electricians whose English is not bad. Unfortunately there are far too many foreign artisans who are either not what they say they are or covered by all they should be, so looking for an English speaker may not save you a penny in reality.
Sorry if that seems so dismal, but read back over some of the posts on here, chat around with other people on here and you will probably pick up much the same. There are far too many people who think we are all a soft touch and do pretty well off the proceeds. Just do not fall into that trap. If you ask around you will find a good French electrician who works to French standards and is covered, plus some perfectly good joiners. We have both locally but you are just a bit too far for either, otherwise I'd recommend them.