Hobs and cookers
Connected, pressure tested and certified, with the ventilation requirement checked rather than assumed.
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Gas installation in Durban carries its own certificate, its own register and its own standard, none of which are the plumbing ones. Hobs, water heaters and bottle installations, done to the standard and certified on completion.
Tell us the appliance and whether there is already a gas supply in the building. Connecting to an existing compliant installation and creating a new one are very different jobs.
Domestic gas work, with the Certificate of Conformity issued on completion rather than promised for later.
Connected, pressure tested and certified, with the ventilation requirement checked rather than assumed.
Instantaneous units sized to the outlets they serve, flued correctly, and positioned where they can be serviced.
Housing, regulator and changeover, sited to the distances the standard requires from openings and drains.
Run in the correct material, supported, protected where it passes through structure, and pressure tested as a whole.
High and low, because leaked gas collects at floor level. The item most often missing on a domestic conversion.
For new work, and for existing installations being sold or insured. Issued against a test, not against a look.
A great many people who have had gas installed believe they hold a certificate for it. A smaller number actually do. The gap between those two groups is almost entirely a matter of which piece of paper was issued, and it tends to reveal itself at the worst possible moment: during a property transfer, or during a claim.
The two documents look similar and mean completely different things. A plumbing Certificate of Compliance covers a water installation and is issued by a plumber registered with the Plumbing Industry Registration Board. Gas work requires a Certificate of Conformity, issued under the pressure equipment regulations by a practitioner registered for gas specifically. Different register, different authority, different document. Competence at one does not confer the right to certify the other, and a genuinely excellent plumber who is not gas registered cannot sign for a hob.
The practical consequence is sharp. An insurer assessing a fire claim involving a gas appliance will ask for the Certificate of Conformity, and a plumbing CoC in its place is not a partial answer, it is the wrong document entirely. Conveyancers ask for it on transfer. And because the certificate is issued for the installation rather than for the appliance, swapping a hob does not inherit the paperwork of whatever was there before.
There is one more thing that catches domestic installations in this climate, and it is nothing to do with the pipework. Ventilation requirements are part of the certificate, and Durban kitchens get sealed up. An enclosed patio that was open when the gas went in, or a kitchen that has had air conditioning fitted and every gap closed since, can fail on ventilation while the gas installation itself is untouched and perfect. Gas is heavier than air, which is why low level ventilation exists and why closing the gap under a door is not a neutral act.
If you have gas in the building, go and find the certificate this week and read what it actually says. Check whether it is a Certificate of Conformity or a plumbing CoC, check the registration number on it, and check that the installation it describes is the one you currently have. Finding out it is the wrong document now costs you a phone call. Finding out during a claim costs considerably more.
Five things worth settling while you still have leverage.
Tested rather than inspected, and certified against the test.
Where the cylinder may sit and what ventilation the space needs is settled before anybody quotes pipework.
The whole installation is held under pressure and watched, which is the only way a small leak shows itself.
A Certificate of Conformity, with a verifiable registration number, handed over rather than posted eventually.
Where the valve is and how to shut it, because the useful part of gas safety happens before anyone is called.
Cost first, then the certificate, which is where most of the confusion sits.
It divides into the appliance, the installation and the certificate, and the middle one varies most. A hob connected to an existing bottle installation is a short job. A new installation with a bottle housing, a regulator, a run of copper and the ventilation the standard requires is a considerably larger one, because most of the cost is the pipework and the safe housing rather than the connection itself. Labour sits inside the published national band of R450 to R850 an hour before VAT. Ask for the appliance, the installation and the certificate as three separate lines.
No, and conflating the two is the most common and most expensive misunderstanding on this subject. A plumbing Certificate of Compliance covers water installations. Gas work requires a Certificate of Conformity issued by a practitioner registered for gas specifically, under the pressure equipment regulations. They are different documents, issued under different authority, by people holding different registrations. A plumber who is not registered for gas cannot certify gas work no matter how competent the pipework is, and a certificate from the wrong register protects you from nothing.
Yes for the installation, and you will need it in practice for two other reasons as well. Insurers ask for a valid Certificate of Conformity when assessing a fire or explosion claim involving gas, and conveyancers ask for one on transfer of a property with a gas installation in it. The certificate is issued for the installation rather than for the appliance, so replacing a hob on an existing compliant installation is a smaller matter than putting in a new supply, but the paperwork still has to reflect what is actually there.
The standard governs where a cylinder may sit, how far it must be from ignition sources, doors, windows and drains, and what ventilation the space needs, and a cupboard under a hob very often fails all four. This is the part of a gas installation that gets quietly ignored in domestic conversions and it is the part that matters most, because gas is heavier than air and collects at floor level rather than dispersing. If a cylinder cannot be placed compliantly inside, it goes outside in a housing and the supply is run in.
Because it is doing two separate jobs and both are non-negotiable. High level ventilation lets combustion products out. Low level ventilation lets any leaked gas escape at the level it actually collects at, which is the floor. A kitchen that has been sealed up for air conditioning, or an enclosed patio that was open when the installation went in, can fail on ventilation even though nothing about the gas pipework has changed. It is the item most likely to turn a simple appliance swap into a larger job.
Do not touch a light switch, a plug, or anything else electrical, because a switch makes a small spark and that is precisely the risk. Turn the cylinder valve off at the bottle. Open doors and windows. Get everybody out. Do not use a phone inside the building; make the call from outside. Once the space has cleared and the supply is off, the installation needs testing before it is used again, and the test is a pressure hold on the pipework rather than somebody sniffing around with a lighter.
Often, and on a rationed water supply there is a wrinkle worth understanding first. A gas water heater is instantaneous, meaning it heats water as it flows rather than storing it, so it gives you hot water without a tank and without electricity. But it needs flow to fire, so when the street supply is off you have no hot water at all, where a storage geyser would still hold a tankful. If you are on a zone with published outage windows, the sensible arrangement pairs gas with water storage, and that should be part of the same conversation.
Ask for the registration number and ask which register it is on, because gas registration is separate from plumbing registration. Then verify it rather than accepting the card at face value. The same principle applies as with geyser certificates: registration must be current on the day the certificate is issued, not merely held at some point. Do the check before the final payment, because that is the only moment at which asking the question carries any weight.
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Gas work in Durban? Tell us the appliance and whether there is already a supply in the building, and you get the installation and the certificate priced separately.