Qualifying party

[Precutmetal]

I've been asked to be a qualifying party from my ex employer we had an agreement of 400 a week. And I feel like it should be more I know he does good work but some of his employees do not there are certain responsibilities on his part however if things got real bad it could come back on me. Does anyone else Provide this service or know anyone that does I'm from New Mexico so it could be different in other states but any and all info is appreciated

 

[Dennis Alwon]

Try using some punctuations. I really am not sure what you are asking or what is going on.

 

[kwired]

Try using some punctuations. I really am not sure what you are asking or what is going on.

Sounds to me like he has licensing that his former employer is lacking, and they are paying him to be their qualified license holder even though he may not be actively participating in any of the installations.

May be legal to do this in some places, others may not, without the qualifying party being active in the day to day functions of the organization anyway.

 

[Coppersmith]

I've been asked to be a qualifying party from my ex employer we had an agreement of 400 a week. And I feel like it should be more I know he does good work but some of his employees do not there are certain responsibilities on his part however if things got real bad it could come back on me. Does anyone else Provide this service or know anyone that does I'm from New Mexico so it could be different in other states but any and all info is appreciated

I'm not sure of the laws in NM, but here is Florida if you are the "qualifier" for a contractor, you are personally responsible for the quality of the work performed and you are supposed to "supervise" the electricians. In practice, you would be "legal" if you visited the job site after the work was done and before the inspection was made and inspected the work yourself. This means your arrangement with the contractor must give you authority to require re-work until you are satisfied it is done correctly. You should also be aware of every permit pulled under your licence to assure yourself that the contractor is not hiding work from you. You should have a written contract with the contractor detailing these points (and many others) and also detailing your pay arrangement. You should be charging them at your labor rate for every minute of time involved including: site visits, signing paperwork, reading and replying to emails, phone calls. If you don't, you will get sucked into a vortex of giving them free labor.


Disclaimer: I am not a lawyer and this is not legal advice. Have a competent attorney give you actual advice.

 

[kwired]

I'm not sure of the laws in NM, but here is Florida if you are the "qualifier" for a contractor, you are personally responsible for the quality of the work performed and you are supposed to "supervise" the electricians. In practice, you would be "legal" if you visited the job site after the work was done and before the inspection was made and inspected the work yourself. This means your arrangement with the contractor must give you authority to require re-work until you are satisfied it is done correctly. You should also be aware of every permit pulled under your licence to assure yourself that the contractor is not hiding work from you. You should have a written contract with the contractor detailing these points (and many others) and also detailing your pay arrangement. You should be charging them at your labor rate for every minute of time involved including: site visits, signing paperwork, reading and replying to emails, phone calls. If you don't, you will get sucked into a vortex of giving them free labor.


Disclaimer: I am not a lawyer and this is not legal advice. Have a competent attorney give you actual advice.

Only thing I will say here is with some larger contracting firms the "qualifier" typically is an owner, but is a good chance there is a lot of (small) projects where they never step foot on the site. Their journeymen are qualified to be site managers and is part of their job. Owner still has the bulk of any liability here though, he is trusting his employees to properly represent him on those projects.

 

[Dennis Alwon]

I believe in most states that setup is illegal. In NC you must be employed by the company. I would never put myself in that situation because as you stated, it may come back and bite you in the ...

Easy money, I know, but you are taking some risks letting others do work under your license

BTW, thanks kwired- when I read your post I saw what was being asked. I think I missed the term qualifier.

 

[kwired]

I believe in most states that setup is illegal. In NC you must be employed by the company. I would never put myself in that situation because as you stated, it may come back and bite you in the ...

Easy money, I know, but you are taking some risks letting others do work under your license

BTW, thanks kwired- when I read your post I saw what was being asked. I think I missed the term qualifier.

The $400 a week, should be sufficient to call him an employee, especially if they take usual payroll taxes out of it and issue W-2. W-9 gets more complicated as he is more of a sub contractor than an employee under that arrangement. Now if he never steps in their offices or on their project sites that can possibly complicate things.

I have a wind farm under construction practically in my back yard right now. I did connect (under my own business and license) their temporary site buildings earlier this year. They have their own electrician crew that does wiring on the towers and distribution. Apparently nobody is licensed in this state though, they called me wanting to put me on their payroll to be their "qualifier" (my word not theirs) Problem is I know they are already being pushed by the state to do this. I don't think they necessarily need to have a contractor license, but do need journeyman or higher for supervision purposes - that means I have to be there, so I declined, because I wouldn't have time to take care of my other commitments some for frequently repeating customers that will still be here long after the wind farm is completed. Would possibly been a good temp job if it were winter months when I am usually slower with projects, but about the time they are expected to be finished with this project is getting closer to the time when I usually slow down for the winter.

 

[ggunn]

I've been asked to be a qualifying party from my ex employer we had an agreement of 400 a week. And I feel like it should be more I know he does good work but some of his employees do not there are certain responsibilities on his part however if things got real bad it could come back on me. Does anyone else Provide this service or know anyone that does I'm from New Mexico so it could be different in other states but any and all info is appreciated

I can't speak to the legitimacy of what you are considering, but do you carry your own Errors and Omissions professional insurance? If you don't and are not covered under your ex employer's policy, then my advice is to run like the wind.

 

[Fulthrotl]

I believe in most states that setup is illegal.

i believe you are right.

one would have to wonder why a contractor would need a responsible
managing person. and why they couldn't be responsible themselves.

the answer i'd need i found in the OP.

"And I feel like it should be more I know he does good work but some of his employees do not"

so, we have a balancing act between greed and risk. always a poor situation. how much legal
representation can you get on $400 a week, understanding that if things go south, the $400
immediately stops?

"what do you mean you defaulted on a $300k job, and walked away?" you ask after opening
the letter from the process server.......

 

[kwired]

$400 a week qualifies him as an employee of the company even if all he does is sweep floors, clean toilets and other general houskeeping tasks at the office- I don't intend to imply that is enough payment for the task performed/service provided or that it is worth any risk to his licensing status - but it is up to the "employee" to accept or reject that amount as well. This only applies to any jurisdiction where the license holder is not required to be an owner, if the owner must be a license holder then this just can't be done period.

but I think a lot of professional licenses only qualify the holder to do certain types of work - but do not limit who can be owner(s) of an organization. The larger the organization the more likely it is investor owned, some who may not participate at all in the day to day operations of that organization.

 

[Dzboyce]

Here in Washington state, an electrical contractor is required to have a person licensed as as the Electrical Administrator for that company. Only one person can hold that position. They are responsible for all electrical work done by that company. They must either be an owner(I believe with a minimum of 30% ownership, but I could be wrong on the percentage) or a FULL time employee.

 

[jaggedben]

I've been asked to be a qualifying party from my ex employer we had an agreement of 400 a week. And I feel like it should be more I know he does good work but some of his employees do not there are certain responsibilities on his part however if things got real bad it could come back on me. Does anyone else Provide this service or know anyone that does I'm from New Mexico so it could be different in other states but any and all info is appreciated

I would never accept the kind of proposal you're describing, for really any amount of money. Even if it's not illegal - (it would be illegal in California) - you leave yourself open to losing your license or being personally liable for huge sums of money if something serious happens on a job and you can't sufficiently prove that you were monitoring or supervising the work. Don't do it unless you are actually going to be regularly walking the job sites to make sure that the quality of work and safety standards are acceptable to you. You've indicated you have concerns about some of the employees; if you won't effectively have the authority to make them follow your standards then definitely walk away.

In California, for what it's worth, you have to be involved with the business for 80 percent of your working time or it's illegal. What you get paid, if anything, is completely irrelevant. You should look up NM law but I would be surprised if there isn't a similar intent.

 

[Coppersmith]

In Florida, a licensed EC is allowed to be the qualifier for up to five companies.

 

[kwired]

I would never accept the kind of proposal you're describing, for really any amount of money. Even if it's not illegal - (it would be illegal in California) - you leave yourself open to losing your license or being personally liable for huge sums of money if something serious happens on a job and you can't sufficiently prove that you were monitoring or supervising the work. Don't do it unless you are actually going to be regularly walking the job sites to make sure that the quality of work and safety standards are acceptable to you. You've indicated you have concerns about some of the employees; if you won't effectively have the authority to make them follow your standards then definitely walk away.

In California, for what it's worth, you have to be involved with the business for 80 percent of your working time or it's illegal. What you get paid, if anything, is completely irrelevant. You should look up NM law but I would be surprised if there isn't a similar intent.

So you can't have a wealthy person that is a numbers cruncher that is the major shareholder of a large contracting firm, but knows little about how the work (be it electrical, construction, mechanical...) itself is done, yet hires contractor license holders or master license holders, etc. to manage it, or it's separate divisions?

 

[jaggedben]

So you can't have a wealthy person that is a numbers cruncher that is the major shareholder of a large contracting firm, but knows little about how the work (be it electrical, construction, mechanical...) itself is done, yet hires contractor license holders or master license holders, etc. to manage it, or it's separate divisions?

Not sure if you really completed your question there. In California the type of person you describe could be the qualifying individual if they pass the trade related test(s), which may not be easy for them if don't actually have knowledge of the trade. Otherwise, they'd need to partner with or hire someone who has passed the tests
If a partner, the partner has to own more than 20 percent of the firm. If an employee, that person has to work with that company for more than 80 percent of its operating time. Different individuals can qualify the same company for different license classes.

 

[Precutmetal]

Well I'm concerned about the risk and yes I want the money. I guess what I'm asking is does the money match the risk. He has me covered under his insurance and I also have my own insurance we also wrote up a contract stating I own 30% of his company however I dont have any idea how much he makes. I could imagine in on the scale of 500k or better with 100k in overhead maybe more.

 

[Tony S]

This sounds like a “QS” in the UK, signing off work by a 3^rd party as tested and compliant. There’s not many over here willing to put their neck in that noose.

QS = Qualified Supervisor of the work/contract, (AKA some fool willing to put their signature on a fictitious test sheet/report).

X000’s of miles away and we have the same problems.

 

[Tony S]

Well I'm concerned about the risk and yes I want the money. I guess what I'm asking is does the money match the risk. He has me covered under his insurance and I also have my own insurance we also wrote up a contract stating I own 30% of his company however I dont have any idea how much he makes. I could imagine in on the scale of 500k or better with 100k in overhead maybe more.

25+ years ago I had combined public liability and professional indemnity for £8,000,000.

You need to seriously look at your liability in the event of accident, loss, damages and every other thing your insurance company will try to wriggle out of.

Personally I think you're been taken as a mug.

 

[Adamjamma]

This sounds like a “QS” in the UK, signing off work by a 3^rd party as tested and compliant. There’s not many over here willing to put their neck in that noose.

QS = Qualified Supervisor of the work/contract, (AKA some fool willing to put their signature on a fictitious test sheet/report).

X000’s of miles away and we have the same problems.

Yeah, many of them will not even come for a service call out to inspect someone else’s work..lol.. they don’t want the paperwork headaches now with the new code

 

[Strathead]

Well I'm concerned about the risk and yes I want the money. I guess what I'm asking is does the money match the risk. He has me covered under his insurance and I also have my own insurance we also wrote up a contract stating I own 30% of his company however I dont have any idea how much he makes. I could imagine in on the scale of 500k or better with 100k in overhead maybe more.

Contrary to what many others have said here, I would jump on $400 a week for this service. As Coppersmith stated, in Florida it is perfectly legal. The one caveat is to make sure the owner acknowledges in writing that you have absolute authority to direct work or rework on any project your license is used for. Regarding liability, I feel you have more control than an employee who works for and qualifies a company because the coercion of being an employee is not there.