Hi All
Wondering if I could get some advice here. I am selling my house and had an electrician round today to complete a periodic inspection certificate. As I am selling the house, I obviously need to get any unsafe issues rectified, but I got the feeling I was being taken for a ride as some of what I was told didn't seem right!
- The house lighting is on a single ring - this is "not up to regs" and needed split into two rings. When pressed he said it was not unsafe, but it still needed doing?
- New consumer unit to accommodate the additional lighting circuit
- There are thee plug circuits in the house. Ring 1, which overs the upstairs with two spurs to downstairs sockets (solid floor in rear of house, presumably why these sockets are spurred from upstairs). 5 double sockets ring, 1 double and 1 single on two spurs. Ring 2 - which covers the downstairs front of the house where there are suspended floors (3 double sockets). A third circuit which covers the kitchen at the back (3 doubles). Apparently having sockets split across floors is not to regs and needs rectifying? This would be a huge job and would mean lifting all my carpets, floor boards etc throughout.
- He told me the kitchen sockets are all spurs. I pointed out that they are all switched off by a single RCD so how could they be spurs? Then told me it was defective ring main with no return (radial circuit?) and it was unsafe. There are 3 double sockets on this circuit. Gas cooker.
- No earth bonding on incoming water (correct) though there is bonding on gas and supplementary bonding in bathroom. He advised this is unsafe.
- He charged £170 and was in the house for 1.5 hours. He would not give me a periodic inspection cert as he said I wouldn't understand it, but he would flag up the required remedials on his quote. I said I would pay him when I got the certificate as I needed that to get quotes from other people!
- He said he cannot do any work on the installation as it is "not to regs" due to above and would need to bring it up to current regs first before he can do the work required to make safe.
I appreciate you don't know the details, but I was just wondering if the above makes sense as it seems a bit much! When I pressed him to try and understand the faults in more detail he got quite defensive, kept saying "its full of faults", and seemed very keen to leave!
Cheers, Richard
Wondering if I could get some advice here. I am selling my house and had an electrician round today to complete a periodic inspection certificate. As I am selling the house, I obviously need to get any unsafe issues rectified, but I got the feeling I was being taken for a ride as some of what I was told didn't seem right!
- The house lighting is on a single ring - this is "not up to regs" and needed split into two rings. When pressed he said it was not unsafe, but it still needed doing?
- New consumer unit to accommodate the additional lighting circuit
- There are thee plug circuits in the house. Ring 1, which overs the upstairs with two spurs to downstairs sockets (solid floor in rear of house, presumably why these sockets are spurred from upstairs). 5 double sockets ring, 1 double and 1 single on two spurs. Ring 2 - which covers the downstairs front of the house where there are suspended floors (3 double sockets). A third circuit which covers the kitchen at the back (3 doubles). Apparently having sockets split across floors is not to regs and needs rectifying? This would be a huge job and would mean lifting all my carpets, floor boards etc throughout.
- He told me the kitchen sockets are all spurs. I pointed out that they are all switched off by a single RCD so how could they be spurs? Then told me it was defective ring main with no return (radial circuit?) and it was unsafe. There are 3 double sockets on this circuit. Gas cooker.
- No earth bonding on incoming water (correct) though there is bonding on gas and supplementary bonding in bathroom. He advised this is unsafe.
- He charged £170 and was in the house for 1.5 hours. He would not give me a periodic inspection cert as he said I wouldn't understand it, but he would flag up the required remedials on his quote. I said I would pay him when I got the certificate as I needed that to get quotes from other people!
- He said he cannot do any work on the installation as it is "not to regs" due to above and would need to bring it up to current regs first before he can do the work required to make safe.
I appreciate you don't know the details, but I was just wondering if the above makes sense as it seems a bit much! When I pressed him to try and understand the faults in more detail he got quite defensive, kept saying "its full of faults", and seemed very keen to leave!
Cheers, Richard