Starting and Running a Pat Testing Business - Seggy T Segaran

PAT testing as a business seems to be attractive to many people. Most people have come across it in their working life, it seems fairly easy to do and generates a reasonable income. It also has the added benefits of something that companies have to do (to meet their Health & Safety obligations) and has the possibility of repeat business every year. At the in-depth PAT course that we regularly run at First Stop Safety, we get many delegates intent on starting their own PAT testing business. On the course they learn all the technical skills necessary to provide the service to their customers. They also get a grounding on managing the system and the required paperwork. However there is more to running a successful PAT testing business than attending a course. A successful business needs to take many other things into consideration such as pricing, competition, marketing, customer service and the boring bits such as bookkeeping. What I have set out to do with this book is to provide a useful background to all these other activities which contribute to the success of any business. Most of this is based on 20 years of running my own business as well as many years of presenting the various PAT testing courses and listening to hundreds and thousands of delegates. Whilst it is possible to set up a PAT testing business that will generate thousands of pounds a month in income, this will need a lot of investment and employing many engineers to carry out the PAT testing service. This book is aimed more at individuals setting up a PAT testing business at a local level to generate a reasonable level of additional income. While reading this book is no guarantee of success, it will certainly help the budding entrepreneur to build a robust and successful business.