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- 27 Jan 2008
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- Llanfair Caereinion, Nr Welshpool
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Assuming the straight swap, which mine was is prescient here. Obvously wouldn't comment on a more complex situation
Unfortunately a straight swap is rare. And for most consumer unit changes the customer expects to get a price up front. So pricing has to be an average well I suppose the clever ones could complex maths with normal distribution to work it out but if the basic job would take 2 hours one would charge for at least 3 hours to cover for the job which takes 8 hours.
In theory one could test each circuit and any that file just not connect and report it as requiring further work. But most house holders would not accept that and unlike when my Dad's house was done where one could simply not RCD protect any problem circuits now anyone working under one of the schemes has to protect most circuits.
Not to protect leaves the electrician open to prosecution should anything go wrong and to say one does not need to upgrade is really a brave approach as it is the very houses which have problems that need the RCD protection most.
I have been lucky and fitted RCD's with no problems. I have also had the reverse where someone complains it trips out every day and it takes a week before one finds it's a faulty washing machine and it only trips when on super fast spin. There comment is valid "It was all right until you changed the consumer unit" and one would have to be heartless to charge them for 5 call outs even though it was not my fault.
So most electricians look at what happened in past and if 10 CU changes took 50 hours then they charge 5 hours for a CU change even though 7 of them only took 2 hours. The guy charging 2 hours will have ceased trading by time you have problems and gone to work cards in as he can't make it pay. He will also fail to write out the installation certificate and as far as the Part P completion certificates you can forget that.
We see on here again and again someone got their CU changed and has no paperwork and wants to know how to get it. Or only the Installation Certificate was issued with no completion certificate and then to sell house they have to fork out another £100+ to LABC.
So prove me wrong what was the PSC and ELI figure entered in the paperwork and what was the earth system? Electrician can cross reference these so easy to assess if they are real figures.