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I'm with Steptoe on this one.
I would never never never use a volt stick, they are just too sensitive and light up to often when there's no "real" power there.
As a quick secondary check I use a NEON SCREWDRIVER
That will only light up if there's enough real juice there to give you a shock, it won't light up from capacitive coupling from an adjacent live circuit.
And just so I don't get flamed for suggesting a neon to "test for dead" I always test properly with a meter first, but the neon comes in handy as a final confidence check.
It's also useful for diagnosing faults on lighting circuits where often no neutral is available in the switch box.
EDIT
The futility of Volt sticks was illustrated to me many years ago when I was called to diagnose major problems on a 3 phase supply. When I got there, I found the power lines came down in a storm, and the DNO had hooked up a generator to supply the property until the linesmen came and repaired the overhead feed. When I got there I found the genny was connected wrong, putting 400V on one of the phases, causing lots of equipment in the property to blow. So I called the DNO.
I could not believe it when the DNO guy turned up, pulled out a volt stick from his pocket, "tested" each phase and said "what's your problem?" I then got my volt meter out and showed him what the problem was. Unbelievable that the DNO place such reliance on such a carp piece of equipment.
I would never never never use a volt stick, they are just too sensitive and light up to often when there's no "real" power there.
As a quick secondary check I use a NEON SCREWDRIVER
That will only light up if there's enough real juice there to give you a shock, it won't light up from capacitive coupling from an adjacent live circuit.
And just so I don't get flamed for suggesting a neon to "test for dead" I always test properly with a meter first, but the neon comes in handy as a final confidence check.
It's also useful for diagnosing faults on lighting circuits where often no neutral is available in the switch box.
EDIT
The futility of Volt sticks was illustrated to me many years ago when I was called to diagnose major problems on a 3 phase supply. When I got there, I found the power lines came down in a storm, and the DNO had hooked up a generator to supply the property until the linesmen came and repaired the overhead feed. When I got there I found the genny was connected wrong, putting 400V on one of the phases, causing lots of equipment in the property to blow. So I called the DNO.
I could not believe it when the DNO guy turned up, pulled out a volt stick from his pocket, "tested" each phase and said "what's your problem?" I then got my volt meter out and showed him what the problem was. Unbelievable that the DNO place such reliance on such a carp piece of equipment.
