Thinking of a new career, talk me off the ledge.

Archimedes1988

Archimedes1988

Member
Location
New York
Occupation
Electrical Contractor - Master Electrician
I started my "first" electrical company in California. Work was great, and it was very easy working with the local AHJs. California has a statewide contractor license that is renewed every two years. It was just "easy". Most everything could be done online and relatively quickly.

A couple of years ago, I moved to New York with my wife. The plan was to keep the business running in CA remotely, and I did for about a year, but then my J-man quit on me. I moved the company to NY and restructured it. Got my van shipped out here, the whole kit and kaboodle. Working in NY is the polar opposite of CA, and it is a PAIN in the keester. Every county you want to work in requires its own license. And each test for the license is different. Then each license needs to be renewed each year. And it isn't cheap. Each little town or village has its own building department that transports you back 40 years with how old and outdated their processes are. It has only been about a year and a half since I moved the business here, but I am ready to shut it down and move on.

Help me reason on this. I may just apply to be a manager somewhere, like Starbucks.
 
New York State is completely corrupt therefore there is no statewide licensing. There are towns or villages with their own license that require you to take a test and pay through the nose just for the right to work there. Then there's the places where their system was designed by Barney Fife and still being used 6 decades later. Home rule is prevalent and it's a terrible place to do business if you come from a state where there is a more fair statewide license program.

Here in NJ we have a statewide license which at least in theory levels the playing field. I live one mile from the NYS border and I never thought for a second to cross that divide and be a contractor there so I can understand your pain.

Welcome to the Forum. :)
 
infinity said:
New York State is completely corrupt therefore there is no statewide licensing. There are towns or villages with their own license that require you to take a test and pay through the nose just for the right to work there. Then there's the places where their system was designed by Barney Fife and still being used 6 decades later. Home rule is prevalent and it's a terrible place to do business if you come from a state where there is a more fair statewide license program.

Here in NJ we have a statewide license which at least in theory levels the playing field. I live one mile from the NYS border and I never thought for a second to cross that divide and be a contractor there so I can understand your pain.

Welcome to the Forum. :)
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Man, you definitely get it. This is ridiculous here. I never thought of all things I would miss about CA, it would be how easy it was to work and run a business. Your description of the work here is spot on. Gotta love the old ladies behind the desk that have been slinging permits for 30 years. Well, if you ever need help over there, let me know 😄
 
Seven-Delta-FortyOne said:
I’ve lived and worked in California my entire life, and while this place drives me nuts sometimes, the stories I hear about other places blows my mind. It can definitely be worse.

I think every contractor seriously thinks about hanging up the sign and working for someone else. Personal decision really.
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True. I think I might just look elsewhere in the electrical contracting space. Maybe trying to get into more commercial work and/or government jobs. I just need to figure out how to charge/estimate for the government jobs with all the requirements they have.
 
AC\DC said:
I can give you push off that ledge if you need…

Even if I make less I’ll never go back to working for some. I can choose what misery I want, not forced to do it
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That's the tough thing I go back and forth on. I like being my own boss and doing my thing when I want to. But the misery of it here in NY is making me want a consistent job where I don't have to deal with all this junk of a broken state system.
 
We have some of that license issue in NC but smaller scale. Lots of towns make you get a general business license but not literally a separate contractor license. License fees were usually 20-30 dollars, not sure about now. You are in a nightmare for sure. I sure wouldn't want to deal with all that and outdated systems everywhere. A few attitudes and personalities thrown in? Could you make it just working a smaller radius from home or not enough volume? Maybe work in a supply house or manage a warehouse for a large EC? Drive a forklift somewhere?
 
jmellc said:
We have some of that license issue in NC but smaller scale. Lots of towns make you get a general business license but not literally a separate contractor license. License fees were usually 20-30 dollars, not sure about now. You are in a nightmare for sure. I sure wouldn't want to deal with all that and outdated systems everywhere. A few attitudes and personalities thrown in? Could you make it just working a smaller radius from home or not enough volume? Maybe work in a supply house or manage a warehouse for a large EC? Drive a forklift somewhere?
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Good idea, I might explore some of those options. It is a little difficult to stay busy enough in just one county. I live in Ulster county and that is the only license I have now and it is around $150 a year to maintain it. Plus 6 hours of CEU each year and an application for renewal that is filled out by hand and then has to be notarized. If I were to get a license in a different county it is closer to $500.

I pulled a permit on two separate occasions for EV installations from the same town building department within a couple months of each other. Each time they required a copy of my license, them to be named on my COI, and my workers comp exemption. They don't keep any kind of file for my company. It's all a joke.
 
Archimedes1988 said:
Good idea, I might explore some of those options. It is a little difficult to stay busy enough in just one county. I live in Ulster county and that is the only license I have now and it is around $150 a year to maintain it. Plus 6 hours of CEU each year and an application for renewal that is filled out by hand and then has to be notarized. If I were to get a license in a different county it is closer to $500.

I pulled a permit on two separate occasions for EV installations from the same town building department within a couple months of each other. Each time they required a copy of my license, them to be named on my COI, and my workers comp exemption. They don't keep any kind of file for my company. It's all a joke.
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Sounds like it just ain't worth doing business there. I'm a little surprised to hear this. I always heard NYC was a hard place to do anything but I've known a handful of people from all around NY State. Most were solid, sensible people. I would have thought the towns there wouldn't be so difficult. But I guess the smell of money produces monsters, in fact I know it often does. Making you jump lots of hoops is also a politician's power trip, like a cat playing with a mouse. Sad when you put your life into something and have that to deal with.
 
My local area it's about $450 for the business license PER City, per year. Pure taxation.
And if you don't cancel, the "subscription" automatically "renews" with fines year after year,
if you don't pull any local permits or do any local work.
 
infinity said:
New York State is completely corrupt therefore there is no statewide licensing. There are towns or villages with their own license that require you to take a test and pay through the nose just for the right to work there. Then there's the places where their system was designed by Barney Fife and still being used 6 decades later. Home rule is prevalent and it's a terrible place to do business if you come from a state where there is a more fair statewide license program.

Here in NJ we have a statewide license which at least in theory levels the playing field. I live one mile from the NYS border and I never thought for a second to cross that divide and be a contractor there so I can understand your pain.

Welcome to the Forum. :)
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I am certainly not saying it is a great system, but I really haven't found it to be that bad. Almost every body reciprocates with everyone else, so as long as you have a license somewhere, you can pretty much work anywhere. The exception is New York City, which will not take a license from anywhere else as far as I know.
 
electrofelon said:
I am certainly not saying it is a great system, but I really haven't found it to be that bad. Almost every body reciprocates with everyone else, so as long as you have a license somewhere, you can pretty much work anywhere. The exception is New York City, which will not take a license from anywhere else as far as I know.
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From a few fellow electricians I know their horror stories are mostly from places in Long Island. They all tell that the same story about having to take a test to get a separate license to work in a certain village and the local contractors run the licensing board. Not to mention shelling out hundreds of dollars a year for a license to work in only one town.
 
Sounds like the OP is not far enough north. Most have no license requirements and don't have to know anything about electrical. Only problem is your most pressing competition is the handyman of GC. GC might be bothered to get a permit but the handyman is "what is a permit?".

You will find a large percentage of "what were they thinking?" installations and a fight with HO to correct until it causes a fire. the POCO do a fair job at requiring inspections when a service replacement is done, but there is a fair chance of getting an inspector that will just take a payment and never look at anything until they get caught and kicked out of the area.
 
infinity said:
From a few fellow electricians I know their horror stories are mostly from places in Long Island. They all tell that the same story about having to take a test to get a separate license to work in a certain village and the local contractors run the licensing board. Not to mention shelling out hundreds of dollars a year for a license to work in only one town.
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Ok, I'm not at all familiar with LI. Just in my experience, everyone north of NYC reciprocates with another city or county license. Of course I haven't tried every permutation though .
 
Similar to Illinois but the corruption in Chicago is worse. Virtually no construction of any type can be done without paying off some politician first. Then you have to pay off every petty official and inspector along the way. Fortunately, most of them don't ask for a lot. The bad part is they have become aware that there is some risk associated with taking bribes directly, so generally you have to pay off a crooked lawyer who than passes the bribes on to all those that are entitled to be bribed so you can earn a living. And the crooked lawyer gets his cut.

Believe it or not, there are some south suburban suburbs that are even crookeder than Chicago. Cicero used to be the king od corruption but over time some suburbs to the south went past them and kept going.

By the way, if you get a traffic citation you can no longer bribe the cops directly. You have to bribe the crooked lawyer who bribes a crooked judges clerk who bribes the crooked judge. Then your citation will just disappear out of the system. Used to be a lot cheaper. Just hand over a $20 bill with your license. But the city wanted the revenue from traffic fines so they made it much harder to bribe cops. Now it is several hundred bucks to the crooked lawyer. He gets his cut, the clerk gets his cut, the judge gets his cut. It now costs almost as much to bribe your way out of the fine than to just pay it.

Used to be even if you didn't bribe the cop, you could go down to the city court and give $50 to the clerk and he would take care of it for you. But, now they only work thru middlemen.
 
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electrofelon said:
Ok, I'm not at all familiar with LI. Just in my experience, everyone north of NYC reciprocates with another city or county license. Of course I haven't tried every permutation though .
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To my knowledge Utica does not reciprocate with others. But Oneonta even though it reciprocates with others it still only allows to the extent you don't have to sit for the license test if you have a license from one of the reciprocal areas but still have to pay the annual fee. Green county seems to have the widest range of others it reciprocates to.
 
petersonra said:
Similar to Illinois but the corruption in Chicago is worse. Virtually no construction of any type can be done without paying off some politician first. Then you have to pay off every petty official and inspector along the way. Fortunately, most of them don't ask for a lot. The bad part is they have become aware that there is some risk associated with taking bribes directly, so generally you have to pay off a crooked lawyer who than passes the bribes on to all those that are entitled to be bribed so you can earn a living. And the crooked lawyer gets his cut.

Believe it or not, there are some south suburban suburbs that are even crookeder than Chicago. Cicero used to be the king od corruption but over time some suburbs to the south went past them and kept going.

By the way, if you get a traffic citation you can no longer bribe the cops directly. You have to bribe the crooked lawyer who bribes a crooked judges clerk who bribes the crooked judge. Then your citation will just disappear out of the system. Used to be a lot cheaper. Just hand over a $20 bill with your license. But the city wanted the revenue from traffic fines so they made it much harder to bribe cops. Now it is several hundred bucks to the crooked lawyer. He gets his cut, the clerk gets his cut, the judge gets his cut. It now costs almost as much to bribe your way out of the fine than to just pay it.

Used to be even if you didn't bribe the cop, you could go down to the city court and give $50 to the clerk and he would take care of it for you. But, now they only work thru middlemen.
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Are you kidding sound like a movie??
 
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