The Datum Report

Occupation 5225 · Skilled trades occupations

Air-conditioning and refrigeration installers and repairers

Half of full-time air-conditioning and refrigeration installers and repairers in the UK earn more than £41,166 a year, and half earn less.

Air-conditioning and refrigeration installers and repairers install, service and repair air-conditioning and refrigeration systems in factories, offices, shops and homes.

How people enter it

There are no formal academic entry requirements although some employers may request GCSEs/S grades. Training is via an apprenticeship, or BTEC, City & Guilds or other specialised qualification.

What the work involves

• examines the proposed site to establish if installation plans are practical
• plans layout of the system (pipework, ducts and control panels)
• produces detailed estimate of costs of the work
• plans work schedule and installs the system
• inspects and tests the installation
• carries our maintenance checks and repairs

Also called

Air conditioning engineer · Air conditioning fitter · Refrigeration engineer · Refrigeration technician · Service engineer (refrigeration)

What it pays

How pay has changed

Median gross annual pay for air-conditioning and refrigeration installers and repairers, full-time employees, 2023 to 2025. Each point is that year's ASHE April snapshot as published — revisions are not backfilled into earlier years, and a year ONS withheld is a gap rather than a joined line.

ONS, ASHE Table 14 - occupation by four-digit SOC (national). Table

Year-on-year change

The change from each year to the next, in per cent, computed from the figures in the chart above — so the two cannot disagree.

ONS, ASHE Table 14 - occupation by four-digit SOC (national). Table

Pay by region

Median gross annual pay for full-time employees, ranked, against the UK figure. 5 of 11 regions are published: ONS withholds a cell where the survey sample cannot support it, and those are shown as gaps rather than dropped — an absent region is not a region without the work in it.

ONS, ASHE Table 14 - occupation by four-digit SOC (national). Period 2025. Table

Every regional figure

ONS does not publish occupational pay below region. Cells the survey could not support are shown as withheld, with its reason — adding a region split to a specific occupation leaves roughly a tenth of cells publishable.

Common questions

Classified alongside this

Metal machining setters and setter-operators · Metal working production and maintenance fitters and technicians · Precision instrument makers and repairers · Tool makers, tool fitters and markers-out