Journeyman's card

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LostinFL

Member
Location
Sanford,FL
I have been a non licensed Electrician since 1992 worked untill 2006 when the bottom dropped out on the housing market. I have not worked as an electrician since 2006. Now I'm wanting to take my Journeyman's Exam In Florida. I see that the last 4 years of w-2 forms are needed along with affidavits from previous company's. with that said showing my last four years of w-2's do not show any electrical employment. Does this mean that I have to start all over and get employment for the next four years with an Electrical contractor to take my exam? or is there a time limit on previous employment w-2's? Any help would be greatly appreciated. By the way I did get all my books needed for taking the exam from Mike Holt.
 
Sierrasparky

Sierrasparky

Senior Member
Location
USA
Occupation
Electrician ,contractor
Welcome to the forum!:thumbsup:

What state were you working in all those years?

I would pay a visit to the agency that is in charge of these licensces with all your past w2 and even tax returns that show your work as a sparky. That should get you going.
With that amount of work I see no reason not to let you apply.
 
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LostinFL

Member
Location
Sanford,FL
FL does not have a state card. The card is only good for the county you apply in, if you make 70% if you make 75% or higher it applies to the 3 surrounding counties
 
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LostinFL

Member
Location
Sanford,FL
Mostly, self respect. More money. In the long run, my masters. Start my own company. I'm not getting any younger at the wage rate I'm at now I will never be able to retire.
 
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LostinFL

Member
Location
Sanford,FL
Florida sucks so bad there is no such thing as a journeyman's card in Florida its either your unlimited(ec) or specialty(alarm) why did I ever move back here.
 
growler

growler

Senior Member
Location
Atlanta,GA
LostinFL said:
I have been a non licensed Electrician since 1992 worked untill 2006 when the bottom dropped out on the housing market. I have not worked as an electrician since 2006. Now I'm wanting to take my Journeyman's Exam In Florida. I see that the last 4 years of w-2 forms are needed along with affidavits from previous company's. with that said showing my last four years of w-2's do not show any electrical employment. Does this mean that I have to start all over and get employment for the next four years with an Electrical contractor to take my exam? or is there a time limit on previous employment w-2's? Any help would be greatly appreciated. By the way I did get all my books needed for taking the exam from Mike Holt.
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Most people don't know this but the state employment office (unemployment office) keeps records of every job you have ever done that paid unemployment insurance.

The last time I was at one of these offices was 1987 and they already had everything on computer back then. If you can show 14 years of work as an electrician that should be enough.

Get a job with an electrical contractor, take some classes and go for your master's license.

The reason I suggest getting a job with a contractor is that things have changed and it's getting harder to make a dollar so it's easier to figure things out working for someone else.
 
J.P.

J.P.

Senior Member
Location
United States
I had hours from 1990s in Michigan. I sent the Michigan contractor a forum with the hours I had earned under him, he signed it and sent it back to me.

I applied for my Unlimited Journeyman's in OK 2008 and those old hours from Michigan counted.

So print off the forum and fill out everything but the contractors signature. Send it to him with return envelope all stamped and ready to go. Call them first if you still have their number.

Old hours count.

Why couldn't you show the W2's from the applicable years instead of the non-relevant current ones?
 
kwired

kwired

Electron manager
Location
NE Nebraska
W-2's, department or labor (employment, unemployment, etc.) can prove you earned a wage and when you earned it, but they can not prove that work experience was qualifying experience in a particular trade. Just because the W-2 says you worked for XYZ Electric Company doesn't mean you did electrical work, you could have been office help, truck driver, or other non electrical worker position. But it still helps to find such records if you can't find anything else just to establish when you worked there and hopefully you can contact that employer to have affidavits completed if needed.

If apprentice registration is not required that doesn't help either. Just having an apprentice registration program helps verify experience to some extent, though one could still be registered and not really gaining any true experience.
 
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growler

growler

Senior Member
Location
Atlanta,GA
kwired said:
W-2's, department or labor (employment, unemployment, etc.) can prove you earned a wage and when you earned it, but they can not prove that work experience was qualifying experience in a particular trade. Just because the W-2 says you worked for XYZ Electric Company doesn't mean you did electrical work, you could have been office help, truck driver, or other non electrical worker position. But it still helps to find such records if you can't find anything else just to establish when you worked there and hopefully you can contact that employer to have affidavits completed if needed.
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A lot of those companies that did mostly residential are out of business now.

You don't really have to get anything from the company but from the master whose license you worked under. In some areas you can even use affidavits from general contractors that you worked with but a certain amount has to be confirmed by a master electrician. They may even accept out of state work if you get a master electrician to sign the affidavit.
 
kwired

kwired

Electron manager
Location
NE Nebraska
growler said:
A lot of those companies that did mostly residential are out of business now.

You don't really have to get anything from the company but from the master whose license you worked under. In some areas you can even use affidavits from general contractors that you worked with but a certain amount has to be confirmed by a master electrician. They may even accept out of state work if you get a master electrician to sign the affidavit.
Click to expand...

License holders can be deceased as well. Hopefully the agency granting you your "experience" can work with you somehow in some of those situations, if not you basically do have to start out as if you had no prior experience:(

Here all you need is 5 years experience suitable to the State Elecrical Division to be eligible to take the Journeyman exam. If you attended a two year educational program (community colleges are most common) they give you an extra year of experience so you could take your journeyman exam a year sooner in that instance. I've seen guy's get to test that have pretty questionable prior experience, but they still need to pass the exam which is generally more important then the prior experience IMO. Most of those I've seen with questionable experience don't pass the exam the first try.
 
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