we reveal the average weekly pay for subcontracting electricians we hear more grumbles from homeowners about their smart meters and we meet ihor the electrician who dodges russian bombs to reconnect power to villages in the ukraine welcome to electrical news weekly in association with schneider electric whether you're listening in the van on site down at the wholesale counter or if you're a designer and you've made it safely to your desk wherever you are i hope your week is off to a great start i'm joe robinson and i've been through the best of the electrical industry news to save you the trouble and as always don't forget to listen out for the two words that i've been challenged to slip into today's show comment below or tag us on social media if you think you've spotted them and of course if you've got a story you'd like to feature in the news then please click the link in the show notes for more information on how to do so and if you're watching on youtube you may like to know that an audio only version of this video goes out on all major podcasting platforms so you can listen to us while you're in the van or on site and if you're already listening to the audio version why not check us out on youtube for some extra visuals as well smart meters are in the news again and for all the wrong reasons the guardian newspaper asked its readers for their experiences of the devices and it was deluged with a postbox packed with problems the main complaints they can become uncommunicative and they sometimes stop working when the householder switches energy supplier there are now smart meters in half the nation's homes but experts fear as many as four million may be operating in dumb mode this means they're not talking to the energy companies and have to be read manually to make matters worse manufacturers of smart meters say they can't make any more because of a global shortage of semiconductor chips now spare a thought for an elderly couple from scotland who have been reading their two electricity meters manually for years the household consists of a three bed semi with electric storage heaters in nether bridge last week the couple received a statement from their energy supplier ovo estimating their bill for the coming year to be a whopping 40 000 pounds a few days later ovo wrote again this time to say that their original estimation was wrong what a huge relief that must have been the revised calculation was now a truly spectacular fifty-two thousand pounds when the stunned george picked themselves up off the floor they contacted the firm who told them yes the correct charge was indeed 52 grand the couple then wrote to the newspapers and a subsequent investigation revealed that the home had one meter for peak energy and one meter for normal use it turns out they'd mixed up the two readings leading to the heart stopping estimate what a relief but even with a correct reading of your electricity meter you'll still need to be on a pretty tidy salary to pay your energy bills comfortably according to a recent survey self-employed sparks are getting just that in fact they have seen their salaries rise significantly this year and they're now getting an average weekly pay of 1021 pounds according to sis payroll specialist and audit firm hudson contract earnings for self-employed electricians grew by 3.8 percent in may alone the company says that none of its clients are telling it that they are struggling for work however some are reporting there are fewer tenders coming through the door this could be a sign that a bit of heat is coming out of the market in some parts of the country at this point in the show we like to give a shout out to one of our social media followers last week we were in far flung australia where the wallabies and the emu rome but this week we're much closer to home in fact just down the road in keithley where they definitely don't as we say hello to ashley rothery of agr electrics he's active on instagram and twitter and tagged us in a tweet with a picture of himself and his trusty hound standing next to our medium red van parked up outside our accommodation of choice the railway in skipton thanks ash for saying hello and if you're walking your dog in the evening pop in and say hello we'll be happy to buy you a pint go and give ashley a follower agr electrics and if you spot any of us or the van out in the wild give us a shout out on your social media returning to the news now one firm which appears untouched by any slowdown is property certificate specialist simple it says it can boost your monthly earnings without a big commitment the company is looking for a thousand electrical contractors to conduct electrical safety tests pat testing and energy performance surveys for its customers it works like uber if you sign up you'll receive a text message or email about an inspection which has been booked with the firm you can then respond if you're in the area and want to attend it promises easy admin and payments within seven days into your bank account there's no sign-on fee and contractors are free to make their own decisions about whether or not to carry out an inspection when it's notified to them i'll pop the link to the app in the show notes in case you want to check it out another app we love and we've mentioned here before is fergus a special admin platform for tradespeople this week it arrives in the uk all the way from new zealand fergus was founded in 2014 by dan pollard who's a plumber but we won't hold that against him dan set out to solve the admin problems that had plagued his business for years fergus lives on your phone and takes care of quotes invoices and reports you can shed your jobs on it track them and even manage your team with it it also integrates with accounting software such as xero quickbooks and stripe now i'm just going to pause the podcast for a moment to say a big thank you to schneider electric for supporting today's show you all know schneider electric they're the manufacturer of all kinds of electrical products from clips to panel boards and pretty much everything in between we've used their distribution equipment pretty extensively at line side studios in the north and the installation went off smoothly and efficiently thanks to the great design embodied in all their gear on top of great quality products schneider are also focused on energy efficiency and sustainability which is extremely important at this time so thanks again to schneider electric for making this week's podcast possible okay on with the show next up is the result of this week's e-fix survey we asked you if you're offering solar pv panel installation as part of your services 1 300 viewers responded with one in five of you saying you're already putting them in thirty percent of you say that you're still thinking about it and half of you are taking a more lackadaisical approach saying you're leaving it to the specialists anecdotal evidence suggests that those specialists are increasingly roofing companies who are making the switch to what they see as more lucrative work instead of solar roofs though what about installing solar windows that's the tantalizing prospect held out by scientists in hong kong boffins in the former british colony have built a solar window that can generate its own power this is all down to a special device on the window exterior that sounds a bit like something doctor who would use do my best tom baker impression here illuminous and sooner concentrator this harvests the light energy from the sun meanwhile another device on the internal window gathers the thermal power the scientists from hong kong university of science and technology claimed that their prototype was able to generate 6 watts per square meter of power and a thermal power of around 150 watts per square meter it's a promising start but the many in the white coats say more research is needed to perfect the technology so don't expect them to turn up in a bar at home near you anytime soon in ev news this week octopus electric vehicles have launched an all you ev package that provides drivers with their car charger and energy tariff the company has opened up its electric car offering to millions of new drivers in the uk ev experts will help drivers pick the right car answer any questions and guide them through the entire process the octopus team has also pre-ordered popular evs to help drivers beat long lead times you pay a monthly fee which covers the car the tires servicing repair and breakdown assistance from the aaa everything a driver needs to take to the road the offer also includes the intelligent octopus tariff and the free ome home pro charger the plan is set to boost the take-up of electric vehicles even further in fact the number of electric cars sold in the uk has just smashed the half a million mark motor industry analysts even say that the number of electric cars in the country is likely to overtake france later this year a fifth of the electric cars on british roads were made by tesla the us electric car company run by the entrepreneur elon musk before we get carried away though let's remember that pure electric cars account for just 1.2 percent of the 40 million cars on british roads however that share is expected to rise rapidly as manufacturers roll out cool new models that the public wants to own charging all those vehicles just became a little easier this week with the news that fuse the company which writes the operating system for charging points has teamed up with ev comply the firm whose app helps installers commission the charges together they say they can provide lots of support to electrical contractors and help them take on more complex installs over 750 installers are currently registered with ev comply the two brands say they will be working together to educate electricians about the opportunities around ev charging especially since the government ended the home charge grant another factor which holds out the prospect of easier charging is a scientific breakthrough from america scientists at the university of california in san diego have come up with a new design for lithium-ion batteries they say the advance could make the batteries perform better in high temperatures after all the batteries sit under the floor of the car and very close to the road which can get very hot by using a special electrolyte the batteries performed much better than standard ones and finally we bring you a true character of the trade ihor the electrician this brave individual dodges russian bombs to keep the lights on in rural villages in eastern ukraine when the russian artillery regiments take a break ehor gets to work and he must work fast before the next salvos come flying in he needs to be finished the repair and get back on the road he travels everywhere by bicycle weaving in and out of the bomb craters on the road to his next job some badly bombed areas need the cables reconnecting again and again but that doesn't put ihor off in fact since the war began he has reconnected nearly 20 kilometers of power lines that were cut by shelling one time he was up on top of a pole when russian tanks came around the corner and because they weren't sure if it was an ambush they gave him a wide berth and the hall lived to work another day he also trains villagers in the basics of electricity to help him in his task the locals say that ihor risks his life to keep the lights on and they say he deserves a medal for his work coming up this week on our youtube channel we look at riot from rf solutions we also show how to connect your ev charge point to the internet demoing powerline control using the zaptech charger we'll have more content featuring and explaining the philips hue system and it's a live stream week with all your usual favorites however with one key difference i'll be heading oop north to line tide studios as gordon's left me and gary in charge this week so who knows what chaotic fun we'll be having up there tune in on wednesday at 8pm to find out if you think you know the words that we've smuggled into today's show pop your guess into the comments and we'll dig out a goodie bag prize to the first to get the right answers last week's words were hopscotch and geranium and a few people had a stab at it including peter l deegan who actually said germanium instead of geranium but someone beat you to the punch anyway peter so fortunately i don't have to make a ruling on the effect of autocorrect on comments liam calvi got it right on his second guess he took a bit of a wrong turn initially on the floral theme with dahlias to start with and along with dr cpc who guessed the same regular commenter and friend of the show paul tipton got hopscotch but went with playing for his second guess so this week's winner was kevy427 so well done to you please click the link in the description to claim your prize we also said we'd send a prize to our favorite comment on last week's story about annoying habits of customers and we've selected this one from someone who simply goes by the username steve he must be so famous that he doesn't need a surname like rihanna steve's comment was bad customer habits are when they offer you the biscuits nobody else in the house would eat stale rich teas come on customers give us the good stuff chocolate hobnobs not only a truly irritating customer habit but also an excellent call back to the previous week's podcast on tradies favorite biscuits although to be fair we all know plain chocolate digestives are the best but we didn't let that biases so steve please click the link in the show notes to claim your prize and on that subject our apologies to fishbait 075 who's still waiting on his previous win joe 2.0 is back in the post room this week and should be able to get your prize shipped shortly we've not quite got the logistical heft of amazon just yet but we're working on it thanks for listening to this episode of electrical news weekly in association with schneider electric make sure you subscribe to receive the next update thanks for listening and until next time have a great week stay safe out there and remember there's no such thing as a torque calibrated on