Telecommunications Training is up and Running

Telecommunications courses are up and running at NECA Training and we’re already being inundated with enquiries.

Our prices are competitive but more importantly we’re striving to be the highest quality telecommunications training provider. We’re engaging the best people in the industry and constantly looking for improvements.

We’re sometimes asked why our courses are slightly longer than our competitors. The simple answer is that we don’t take shortcuts and we want to ensure students leave our courses confident they’ve gained the skills and knowledge needed to get the job done.

It’s important to highlight that NECA Training is a not-for-profit industry association. We’re not a training provider that sets up a training facility to push students through as fast as possible and maximise profits. We’re constantly looking for ways to improve our training and meet the ever changing needs of industry.

If you have specific telecommunication requirements that we are not meeting please get in touch and we can discuss your training needs.

Please email or call –Cidalia Freitas at NECA Training for all your telecommunication training requirements.
E: skills@necatraining.com.au
T: (02) 9188 4424
W: www.necatraining.com.au

2017 Federal Budget Update – What it means for your Super and Retirement

Measures to tackle home affordability were a key focus of this year’s Federal Budget, along with a company tax cut, an increase in the Medicare levy, changes to school funding models and the introduction of a new bank levy.

Two of the measures on home affordability directly involve superannuation – a newly announced First Home Super Saver Scheme and a scheme to faciliate downsizing among older people. Importantly, the first home saver scheme relates to voluntary super contributions, not existing compsulory super savings (see below for further details).

There were no other major superannuation changes announced, though it is worth keeping in mind that most of the 12 super changes announced in last year’s budget are still to come into effect on 1 July this year.

While not directly related to superannuation, the reinstatement of the pensioner concession card for those who lost part-age pension this year is a welcome move in this year’s budget.

Click here to find out more about the new Budget measures outlined above and how NESS Super can help you.

 

Following a fire in a Malaysian home caused by a cable similar to the Infinity brand, this issue is firmly back on the table.

Some Australian states and Territories have been able to identify close to all the cable used in their markets. But NSW still has close to 50%, and ACT almost 30%, unaccounted for – which is a major concern now we are in the period when deterioration could potentially kick-in. We therefore ask all members to do three things: Advise your clients as soon as possible if you think you may have used this cable in their homes. Share this information with the supplier you purchased the cable from, as it is their responsibility to remedy the situation (and they carry any costs involved). Ask the owners of any homes where you do work from here on if you could just check to see if this cable has been used. If it has, there is a process to follow (clearly notated on the ACCC and Office of Fair Trading in NSW’s websites). This is a serious issue now and we must do everything we can to remedy the situation as soon possible in NSW and the ACT. But please remember that if you do come across this cable anywhere, the first step is to try to identify who supplied the cable and not just to replace it. If you simply go ahead and replace it, the home owner forfeits the right to have it replaced at no cost by the original supplier. Instead they will need to pay you and they will not be able to claim that cost back – even if they know who initially installed it. In NSW, 2384 kilometers of Infinity cabling was laid between 2010 and 2013. 433 properties have been declared safe, however 74 per cent of the dangerous cabling is yet to be remediated in homes. Up to 50% is still to be identified. NSW Fair Trading is the regulator responsible for the recall in NSW (the ACCC has overseen the issue nationally though). A recent house fire in Malaysia this year – with a similar cable being blamed, has brought the subject back to our agenda. NECA recommends that home owners who are not sure if they have this cable should have an inspection (undertaken by a licensed electrician), and it will cost up to $200. Remediation is still the responsibility of the supplier of the cable (if that company can be identified). If a home owner simply asks the electrician who does the inspection to replace the faulty cable the home owner must pay for this work. The ACCC and Fair Trading have both instructed electricians to make contact with any previous clients if they suspect they may have installed Infinity cables (this is not optional). NECA is pushing for a national register but there is push back from Fair Trading – who believe their existing state-based system is adequate. Queensland, Victoria, Tasmania, Northern Territory and Western Australia have made good progress. WA, TAS and NT have accounted for 100 per cent of the cable laid. Queensland has accounted for 96 per cent, Victoria has remediated 80 per cent, South Australia and the ACT have accounted for 70 per cent. So NSW is well below every other State or Territory in the remediation process. However NSW Fair Trading Commissioner Rod Stowe says the mandatory recall of 25 NSW traders would continue until 100 per cent of the cables sold or installed were accounted for. He also said that NSW has an established electrical approval regime, adding that all electrical cable will require additional testing and approval from January 29, 2018. Masters, Thrifty and Mitre 10 were among the major homeware retailers to supply Infinity cables and are meeting most of the recall costs. The Supreme Court fined the Infinity importer, Lu Luo, $18,000, plus an additional $15,000 in court costs, for selling the non-compliant electrical cables.

Designing Networks for Intelligent Building Systems

Zone cabling is a good alternative to LAN for supporting multiple building device connections for improved security and high performance in Intelligent Buildings. These zone cabling systems are supported by Service Concentration Points inside zone enclosures over head or under floors in buildings.

Zone enclosures should be limited to 96 ports so that they are not overloaded by cable bundles of >100 cables at Cat 6 particularly when Power over the Ethernet is being used to avoid excessive heat causing fire or reducing performance.

Zone cabling allows twice as many configurations for intelligent building devices than LAN which supports rapid reorganisation and deployment of new devices and applications.

Zone enclosures need to be positioned logically in buildings to increase coverage area of devices such as routers, cameras and sensors. A 13-metre radius for each zone enclosure will allow overlay for typical routers to provide continuous wi-fi. Therefore, zone enclosures should be placed around 26 metres apart and 30 meters from the telecommunications room where devices can be directly connected.

This positioning may be greater in areas where fewer devices are being used such as in parking areas or storage rooms. Zone enclosures will need to closer together in service and equipment rooms where electromagnetic disruption may require a better overlay of wi-fi to be effective.

Dedicated zone enclosures for POE lighting are recommended due to the amount of ports needed to light an average building and support lighting and movement sensors. This because PoE lighting zone enclosures will need between 36 and 72 ports to support a radius of 13 metres of lighting.

It is true that zone cabling can be more expensive than traditional LAN systems however with the rapidly changing automated world we live in today the savings of being able to reconfigure and add devices will exceed these cost very quickly when the cost of not having to run a whole new cable with every change is assessed.

Registered cablers and contractors who want to learn more about zone cabling should contact their local NECA office to discuss which Registered Training Organisations in their area offer training on designing and installing these systems.

ELIMINATE THE RISK OF BIG FINES – KEEP ACRS INFORMED OF ADDRESS AND EMAIL CHANGES