AU Regulations on LAN Cabling?

An anonymous reader asks: "After getting a ridiculous quote for the cost of rewiring an office, I started investigating the possibility of doing all the phone/data cabling myself. About 40 RJ-45 ports all coming back to a central patch panel that would be patched into the phone or data switch as needed. My research found that doing this simple job would be illegal in Australia, according to the Australian Communications Authority's (ACA) website. According to them, they have the right to walk in at any time and demand an audit of your LAN, and if it was not installed by a registered cabler, you can be fined up to $13,000. My question is, how does this compare to legislation in other parts of the world? Also, has anyone in Australia ever been subject to one of these 'cabling audits'? Was it painful?"

Comments

Sounds like Pro-Union Legislation

[MikeDawg]

What it sounds like to me is that Australia has some pro-union legislation in place. I'm not familiar with Australia, or the job force down there; but after reading this article it sounds like there are some unions down there that got some legislation passed in their favor.

Re:Sounds like Pro-Union Legislation

[gl4ss]

exactly.

though, is it just for permanent installations? make yours 'non-permanent'... in other words, just leave the cables on the floor in one big mess.

and see how easy it would be to register yourself as a cabler..

Re:Sounds like Pro-Union Legislation

[Sparr0]

This is a perfect example of why groups of people should not be allowed to exert political influence, and how unions can turn bad (since, in their basic form (group bargaining for employment benefits), a union is a great thing).

Re:Sounds like Pro-Union Legislation

[4of12]

This is a perfect example of why groups of people should not be allowed to exert political influence, and how unions can turn bad (since, in their basic form (group bargaining for employment benefits), a union is a great thing).

I'd be more broad minded in my criticism.

Yes, unions can act badly, creating this obvious market inefficiency due to their aggregated power in the labor-selling marketplace.

But, just as concentrated power in the labor market can be bad, there are at least as many if not more examples of where market dominance by corporations cause inherent inefficiencies in the free market system.

The most efficient system is where there aer large numbers of buyers and sellers of labor (or anything else). As the number of either decreases, then one or the other side are in a position to take advantage of the market for their own gain, be they unions or employers.

In my world, the intersecting set of employees and stockholders would be much larger than it is today.

Re:Sounds like Pro-Union Legislation

[rmarll]

and see how easy it would be to register yourself as a cabler..

ding ding ding

Or...

Go wireless

Or...

Find a cable installer that works in a large company and pay your new buddy a reasonable sum to do the job off company time. You should be able to pay considerably better than his wage while paying considerably less than what the company would charge you.

Who paid them off?

[DamienMcKenna]

Sounds like an unfortunate joke. Anyone can string cables together, license or not.

Or gain the licensing yourself and start doing some side work.

Damien

Re:Who paid them off?

[Nutria]

but as far as I'm concerned, the government needs to keep its nose out of my electrical wiring too.

Do you have a clue as to why building & electric codes are necessary?

One Word

[Deanasc]

Wireless!

Lemme put on my Union Hat.

[clintp]

My father was a Unionized employee, and actually was part of the UAW hierarchy. He didn't believe it all, but since it was a requirement he had to push the propaganda. I can guess what it'd say:

*screws on hat tightly, to cut off circulation to brain*

"Union Cable Layers would have been trained as apprentices in this kind of work, and received whatever other training was necessary for local building codes, etc...

Your average Joe would do a slipshod job and your cabling would be sub-standard and not work as well. In addition, an untrained cable-monkey might lay cables in places that were dangerous to the rest of the building structures (across high voltage, etc..) and possibly causing disaster and lawsuits. You wouldn't want that, would you?

And if you even think of doing this yourself, expect to get a visit from the brotherhood of Electricians, Cable Layers and Egg Candlers Local 547."

Ahem.

Re:Pay off your lawmakers

[ottothecow]

Many yacht clubs these days are not the hangouts of the rich and famous.

They focus much more on competetive racing which for some boat desgins (j105 for instance) does require an owner with deep pockets (not to say the crew--and thus the majority of the sailors--have those same pockets) but others (smaller boats or crewwing) can be participated in with a fairly low investment.

Asked someone once about the price...

[actor_au]

...of having a full LAN installed in my house(four-five outlets, one hub on a one story building with plasterwood walls(I think, I know they aren't solid brick)) he said about $700 and it would take about 2 days.

I went and bought some wall mounts, screws, sockets etc, stole some cable from an industrial site(they were junking it and the guy on guard just let me take it before anyone asks) then sent my younger, and thinner, brother up into the roof to drag cables to the random holes I'd drilled into the ceiling inside the cupboards around the house, I had some problems with setting the wall ports(didn't know how to set the coloured wires right) and gave up on the project.

I left it for about five months, went back and using a newly acquired cable tester I set-up the sockets correctly, installed the hub and had a fully working LAN in about two hours.

Overall cost to me was about $70 and $20 for the cable tester which I gave to a friend as a Christmas present.
It took about six months from getting the cable to finishing the network but I believe I could have finished it in lest than a day if I'd given a damn about getting it done.

Essentially the asking cost was a rip off.

Another guy I know has a house they spent a summer networking, drilling through solid brick, hanging through air-con ducts and other random adventures until the ten of them and four other rooms were fully networked, their kitchen cupboard is four switches, two webservers/fileservers and some wheatbix no-one want to eat. It cost them a lot of spare time but other than a few drill bits, wall sockets and the cable their costs were non-existant, a cabler would have probably done it faster, but would have charged them at least $2000 for the work as well as a few hundred for the part.

I know about five other people that have networked their houses on almost no budget. Wires stapled to walls, running over rooftops and around the outside of buildings through walls and up attics.
Its a hobby and nothing anymore difficult or dangerous than putting up a painting and that you need some kind of certification for it is insane.

But what if they are right?

[azav]

As I read all the responses, and remember that I do live in earthquake central (SF Bay area), I wonder, "what if the govt is right - at least in principle?"

Sure, plugging in cables is NOT HARD but yes, there are other things to worry about - fire shielding, run through an area people will not want to nail or drill into, and probably more that we don't know about. Stuff that once is mentioned, makes perfect sense but wouldn't be thought up unless someone mentioned it.

Hey, in California, I can see why you would need to be licensed to install PVC pipes. These earthquake things don't happen all the time but when they do, you'll want good bracing and give in your plumbing.

And then again, other parts of CA, do tend to get washed out with mudslides or decide to catch on fire on a semi yearly basis.

All I'm saying is that there's proooobably more behind the scenes that we're dismissing because we don't know about it.