Stupid Regulations

Yep can feel the pain:

Just got my self bunged up and classified handicapped for the next few months. Verizon sent over a rather stallwart - healthy rep to put in our new TV service. Which is I might say 5 times better programming than what we were getting from the Dish.

This rep could see my incapacity and that two women were arms & legs. He flatly refused to move the telivision. My youngest mustered up the HP and did the deed. You are quite lucky, the guy did eventually do the job. What is service comming to when the service is not complete??

When I had a service career I went the extra mile, this thought pattern must be Old School now.

See Ya

I get really riled by jobsworths who know less than me, and couldn't do my job spouting regulations that they don't undersand, don't make sense and are beyond their remit anyhow.

Jeez you think that guy could have moved your TV...

A while back I had a window installer insisting I needed extra vents in the kitchen windows...I told him 'do what I want or lose the order'.
I'm fully aware of the ventilation needed...I know for a fact that there are no regulations stopping you fitting an extractor fan, which could turn your kitchen into a chimney if your gas boiler is in the same room...But these guys just have no understanding of the real issues.

Whoops, sorry off onto a rant.

Del

Sorry Del but you know the saying about the one bad apple spoiling something.

Because of the increase of regulations the service man gets his hands tied. Where he was able to make a judgement call on the space he now has a set limit. With lawyer chasing ever mishap and some people looking for a free ride the service man is not willing to risk his job. I am glad hear that the Corgi man took it upon his self to step in and help. I hope that you dads okay. Times change some things for the better some for the worst.

Some of the regulations are really dumb but sometimes the interpretation is the problem. There may be qualifying provisions that has to be taken into account. I would get a copy of the regulations first.

As for myself, I have always been fighting dumb regulations.

When I was studding I was building a house in a dolomite area (that was the best I could afford). Because of some dolomite boulders rather close to the surface I was ordered by regulations to dynamite the rock up to the regulation depth. Because I did not had money for the blasted blasting I confronted the man in charge at the municipality. After some slide rule wiggling on both sides I left there with the authorization not to blast. (I still think it was the best - No cracks in that house yet.)

Just for interest sake - about six months later I met the man from the municipality again - He (Prof) was the lecturer in a subject I had to take.

All of these posts seem to support the US Government motto : If it ain't broke, fix it until it is.

Well, at least that's what I read on a bumper sticker.

It would appear that we haven't cornered the world market on silly regulations and laws, though!

the problem is these people will say "you have to do this it says so in the regulations", only rarely have they read them. What often happens is they repeat what they have been told, or picked up from someone else. A favourite example of mine is bonded plastic pipes in a bathroom, "why" "it says so in the regs" "but they are plastic" "it doesn't matter the regs say they have to be bonded, plastic or not"

No they don't, I've read them.

Is this 50mm gap actually written down somewhere, Del?

That one should be findable. But with our privatized worlf, find a building code on line, free. Even something as supposedly universal such as the Safety Glazing Act of 1971. Or even your state's pre-empting version. ANSI, UL, NEC, NEMA, GAMA, welding, water treatment, you name it. ANSI 1985 is refed in a lot of building codes. Find it anywhere without spending a couple Cnotes, and just sit home and wait for it so some regulatory agency can make money.

The one failing of the internet is the inability to access what should be public domain in the first place. UL is supported by the cost of the testing to get their sticker, why do I need to pay a fortune for the manuals which I want some very specific information from, to verify compliancew with their approved system?

RichH

Hi Dell,

I do appreciate there is an overly heavy bureaucracy who delight in justifying there positions by making more & more regulations, in Australia we are buried in them. I must confess I ignore a lot of what I consider useless regulations that does not mean I ignore safety just a lot of the other mind blowing rubbish and if any body wants to jump on me for that I would suggest they probably lack the for-site to work out what is important and what is not and would accept any type of regulation without questioning it. One has to only look at the complete stuff up our government and its minions is making of our economy to realise not a lot of intelligence is being applied to there decisions.

However re your stove I don't know what type it is but over here gas stoves require a distance off the wall for ventilation and avoiding heat build up. The gas pipe for LPG installations were smaller because of higher delivery pressure if you are still on LPG and have not altered your system the size should be ok.

distance off the wall for ventilation and avoiding heat build up.

The wall in my parents house is brick...an oven with no heat build up...now there's a concept .

I still think it's daft, if it needs a gap, then that distance should be incorporated into the cooker with vents in the top face, a lot of most cookers are built straight ito timber (chipboard) carcasing. (eg under the worktop between two units).

I agree with the old adage.

'Rules are for the guidance of wise men and the obedience of fools.'

Cheers
Del

You've all just reminded me what I hated about the military. One cannot appreciate the the extent that thinking can be suppressed by the autocratic tiered military. The US marines brag about destroying you so they can build you right. Abu Grahib, 5 enlisted received courts martial, and one officer received a written reprimand. Those who are responsible for you are not responsible for themselves. The more you are responsible for the issue the less responsibility you have for what you did. Ask a grunt what happens if he doesn't obey an illegal order, such as firing on civilians, from a psychotic officer. The only hope the grunt has is to follow the officer with his gun blazing. Straight ahead. Then you can understand the term friendly fire.

RichH

When I was in NCO school, there was a special class, conducted in the woods, on when to shoot the lieutenant.

That's one advantage of the Navy... the petty officer can always be persuaded to jump overboard .

A friend of mine had a kitchen fire in which everything was condemned and a new kitchen required. The insurance company assured her that the building company doing the job was highly thought of and used skilled tradesmen. On fixing a new gas/electric cooker the 'multi skilled' jobsworthy doing the job sited the cooker fuse immediately behind the cooker. Any failure of the fuse required the cooker to be withdrawn over the lower plinth by two men ( note - lady lived on her own), which, when it did fail collapsed the plinth completely and required replacement. As a marine engineer I complained and stated the fuse should be sited in an accessible position for replacement. 'Nah, mate, it's got to be behind the cooker, the regs say so'. I bought the IEE regulations (16th edition) at £47.00, and found that it states that basically fuses should be placed in a serviceable, ie accessible, position.

That, together with about 30 other errors by 'the skilled tradesmen' requiring major repairs is still being debated by the ombudsman two years later.

Corgi trained maybe; common sense trained? mmmmmmmm, well, eeerrrr, uummm, well, eeeerrrrrrr

'Nah, mate, it's got to be behind the cooker, the regs say so'

Yeh, this seems to be the catch-all, get out of scoundrels and bounders these days.
Del