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£30k fine for landlords who do not provide a valid EICR for their rental properties

Legh Richardson
Is this actually true or is it some estate agent cashing in on lost income?

The reason why I ask, what appears to be a daft question, is that a friend has just received notification from the estate agent who sold the property 15 years ago that their property, which is now being rented, must be inspected and tested for compliance to 18th ed. Not that I was unaware of this requirement!

I just thought the £30k punishment for disobedience was a little steep. Or maybe  'bribery and corruption' or  'threatening behaviour' was the new Inspection and testing idiom.?

Legh
  • 0
    Zoomup:

    Does F.I. really mean that an electrical danger is present?


    Z.




    No, but it does mean you don't yet know whether there is anything dangerous. And the whole point of a landlord's T&I is to become reasonably confident that the installation is safe.


  • 0
    For example.


    You cannot have a circuit marked as “unknown” on a satisfactory EICR, because that’s coded FI and requires further investigation.


    If you don’t know where a circuit cable goes or what it supplies there is a choice between disconnecting and safely isolating it or declaring the installation unsatisfactory. How can you say it’s safe?
  • 0
    Sparkingchip:

    For example.


    You cannot have a circuit marked as “unknown” on a satisfactory EICR, because that’s coded FI and requires further investigation.


    If you don’t know where a circuit cable goes or what it supplies there is a choice between disconnecting and safely isolating it or declaring the installation unsatisfactory. How can you say it’s safe?


    How can you say it's unsafe if the inspection and test has not been fully  completed? Surely in this case an F.I. is the lazy way out.


    Z.


  • 0
    Does F.I. really mean that an electrical danger is present?

    I think the original wording was something like F.I. where the result of the investigation could result in a C1 or C2.

        - Andy.
  • 0
    You do what you are getting paid for, if there’s a cable going out and you don’t know where it goes and what, if anything, it does you need to disconnect it or the installation is unsatisfactory. It could be a bare ended cable in the loft or under the floor that could kill a plumber or someone else, as has happened locally.


    Agreeing to do an EICR is not an open ended agreement to sort out all the issues you find, you report the issues and then they need to be dealt with as a chargeable extra or another contractor needs to come in and sort it out, including the issue of not knowing what the problem is, if there in one.


    So you report an issue such as a break in a ring circuit or failed insulation, but you do not do the fault finding and rectify the issue.
  • 0
    Zoomup:

    How can you say it's unsafe if the inspection and test has not been fully  completed? Surely in this case an F.I. is the lazy way out.



    You can't, but neither can you say it's safe - there are three possible states - "safe", "unsafe" and "unknown". Only "safe" allows the condition to be declared as "satisfactory".

  • 0
    keylevel:
    Zoomup:

    How can you say it's unsafe if the inspection and test has not been fully  completed? Surely in this case an F.I. is the lazy way out.



    You can't, but neither can you say it's safe - there are three possible states - "safe", "unsafe" and "unknown". Only "safe" allows the condition to be declared as "satisfactory".

     


    So should we continue to inspect and test until we have found the end of the unknown cable or disconnected it?  A two minute disconnection is preferable to a fail surely.  Does a single F.I. equal a fail? I have even corrected a wrong connection at a consumer unit where two ring finals are crossed over at two 32 Amp M.C.B.s in error. It is no trouble to do that as the ends are already disconnected for testing anyway.


    Edit. Add: I feel that we would be obliged to disconnect the unknown cable as not doing so would be negligent. To liven it up again could lead us into great trouble.


    Z.


     


  • 0
    I'm going to use the C-word again. It's all a matter of contract. FI should be pretty unusual. So if you have a circuit which is not labelled, I don't think that you could be expected to establish what it supplies; but of course that should not occur!


    This is where JP's standard spec. is useful - the customer knows what is and is not included.


    Rectifying minor faults as you go along is just good practice. You wouldn't fail an installation because the tails are loose at the main switch - the very act of checking for tightness means that they get tightened.


    I think also good to let the customer know that you have fixed a few little things, but no extra charge. That gets you back in 5 years. ?
  • 0
    It's all a matter of contract.

    Absolutely.

    Rectifying minor faults as you go along is just good practice.

    But only if that's been agreed with the customer. If they've asked you for an EICR because they suspect a previous electrician hadn't done a good job, they might not thank you for quietly sweeping problems under the carpet or 'destroying' the evidence.


      - Andy.
  • 0
    AJJewsbury:
    It's all a matter of contract.

    Absolutely.

    Rectifying minor faults as you go along is just good practice.

    But only if that's been agreed with the customer. If they've asked you for an EICR because they suspect a previous electrician hadn't done a good job, they might not thank you for quietly sweeping problems under the carpet or 'destroying' the evidence.


     


    And they certainly would not appreciate the flickering lights and intermittent appliance operation, or the house fire caused by the loose terminals which you left behind.


    Z.


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