Changing an ordinary ceiling light to a pendant type; handyman or electrician?

Whilst there are probably some good handymen out there, the risk of getting the connections wrong is high unless you know what your doing. Similarly its doubtful that any handymen would have the necessary electrical test equipment to check that the circuit they are working on is safe and correctly earthed etc as per BS7671:2008. So it would be best to hire a registered electrician rather than take a chance.

According to the 17th edition amendment 3 of the wiring regulations any one carrying out installation work in a domestic property should be electrically trained. I personally would also want them to be a member of a part p registration scheme such as the NICEIC. I have been called out numerous times where people have tried doing their own light fittings only to get stuck as the lighting circuit is the most complicated in a house. Always get an electrician.

my most common phone call on a sunday aftenoon is someone who has taken down a light fitting and now has 3 cables one of which is the swichline and they dont know what to do, i would ask an electrician, it should be a quick simple and cheap job