[iamthemonster]

This approach may vary by country. Not a single sparky in Australia will sign off on someone else's solar/battery install.

[fouc]

Isn't there a distinction between the house wiring and the solar/battery stuff?

P.S. I've never heard of sparky being used as slang for an electrician, sounds very aussie.

[selcuka]

> P.S. I've never heard of sparky being used as slang for an electrician, sounds very aussie.

When I moved into a new house in Australia I asked the real estate agent if I could extend the fence, and he said I'd need a cheapie to do that.

I said ok but scratched my head as to why it needs to be cheap, only to find out later what he actually said was chippy, slang for a carpenter.

[marcus_holmes]

Chippies are also known as "wood butchers" apparently. Amused me ;)

[Scoundreller]

Next you’ll need a roofie

[unwind]

Why, though? Is there some kind of requirement that only fully trained carpenters can build fences?

[roygbiv2]

Just about everything in Australia needs a license to do. Even down to network cabling.

[gambiting]

The rule is - if it's going inside the wall, only a licenced electrician can do it. Yes it also extends to things like speaker or HDMI cables. It's mad.

[qubitcoder]

Mad, indeed. It's hard to imagine those rules are followed, especially for speaker wires and HDMI cables.

[whatevaa]

HDMI cables? Sounds like protectionism. Invent rules to make yourself more work.

[old_hat]

Yeah, it's all fun and games until you're at Macca's and someone says, "Oi, can you pass me a chippy?" and they get real confused when you go find a carpenter.

[fennecbutt]

Maccas is nz, maccies is Aus

[selcuka]

It's definitely Maccas in AU. Maccies must be a UK thing.

[soci]

in Spain we call them “chispas”, which literally means sparks. An electrician is someone who knows the home electrical wiring stuff, while a chispas is someone who is skilled in repairing home appliances.

[happymellon]

We use sparky in the UK for an electrician too.

[lelanthran]

> P.S. I've never heard of sparky being used as slang for an electrician, sounds very aussie.

I'm surprised to find out it's aussie slang; I always thought it was slang local to South Africa :-/

[Lio]

We say the chippie in the UK too.

We also use sparkie for electrician.

[SideburnsOfDoom]

It's local to UK and more recent British colonies

ZA and AUS included. USA less so.

[mrexroad]

In the US, sparky is common slang electrician among the trades, but far loss-so for end customers who are looking to hire one.

[throwaway81523]

Sparky=electrician is common in the US too. I had previously thought of it as meaning a radio operator e.g. on a ship.

[Arrath]

I'm currently in a pickle in this regard, as my new house has solar on Net Metering, but no ATS or battery. While its nice to only pay the base connection fee, I still go dark when the line power does.

I'd love to add at the very least an ATS to keep my fridge and freezer going when the power goes out during the day, if not a battery but I have little to no documentation on the existing solar install, so i'm reaching out to the county to see if permits have any info. Fun times!

[nicoburns]

It will, but I suspect this will get a lot easier everywhere as more of the problem gets packaged as units that you can just buy off the shelf (and the prices of such units come down).