Plumbers hold about 7% of ‘occupational shares’ (i.e. proportion of all plumbers in all occupations) in the construction sector. The proportion is likely to expand to 7.7% in 2007.

The plumbing and heating industry has a wide range of career roles which can be divided in:

• plumbing
• gas installation and maintenance
• refrigeration and air conditioning
• heating and ventilation

Source: CITB-ConstructionSkills 2003 and BPEC 2000c

Occupations include:

• building services engineer (managing projects and designing installations)
• heating and ventilating fitter/welder (installing industrial heating and cooling systems and associated pipework)
• domestic heating fitter (central heating fitter) (installing central heating and plumbing systems in domestic and small business premises)
• ductwork installer (installing ducting to circulate hot and cold air around large buildings)
• refrigeration engineer (installing and maintaining refrigeration equipment)
• air conditioning engineer (installing and maintaining air conditioning equipment)
• service and maintenance engineer (servicing and maintaining a wide variety of electrical, heating, ventilating and air conditioning equipment, including energy management systems)

Source: BEST website 2004

Opportunities for progression:

• plumbers can work towards technician or supervisory levels, or specialise in a specific area of work such as ventilation, refrigeration, electrical or air conditioning
• self-employed plumbers develop specialist firms
• plumbers with vocational qualifications and appropriate experience can apply to the Institute of Plumbing for recognition as master plumbers.
• there is a need for employees to be multi-skilled so that they can perform multiple jobs and functions. This is particularly evident in industrial and commercial installation, and refrigeration and air conditioning

Source: ESTTL 2002b