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Fail EICR because of partial RCD protection

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Hi Everyone,

I just had an EICR inspection, and in the picture you can see my CU, which shows the lighting circuits on the right side without any RCD protection. My house was built in 2000–2001. In my previous EICR inspection (2021), this was recorded as a C3 (partial RCD protection), but the new inspector today said I must replace the CU, otherwise it’s a fail of EICR (C2).

He told me that under the new regulations, the lighting circuits must be RCD protected — is that correct? I’m confused about whether older houses need to meet the latest standards, because if so, wouldn’t every landlord with an older property have to replace their CU? I thought new regulations only apply to new installations from the time they are introduced.

Where can I find the official guidance on this? The inspector only showed me some random Google searches, which didn’t look very reliable.

For context: the plastic CU is on the ground floor, and although it’s around 25 years old, it’s fully functional and looks almost new. All bathrooms are on the first floor, with a ceiling height of about 2.4m.

Do I really need to replace my CU? The quote I’ve been given is around £640 for a CU replacement include a 5-year EICR.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

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    I thought new regulations only apply to new installations from the time they are introduced.

    Generally the regs apply to work done, at the time it was done. So if you had a new addition to an old installation, the new work should comply with the current (new) regulations, even though the rest of the installation remains to the older standard.

    For a periodic inspection (which results in an EICR) normally it is the current regulations that are used as a benchmark, regardless of the age of the installation. However not every non-conformity with the current regulations should result in an "fail" (unsatisfactory) result. Different things are graded differently - for instance a simple lack of 30mA RCD protection for domestic lighting circuits or soft sheathed cables concealed in walls would typically be coded C3 and not of itself result in an unsatisfactory outcome. However it's not always straight-forward - for instance the lack of RCD protection to bathroom lighting combined with a lack of supplementary bonding may result in a C2 (and an unsatisfactory outcome). So it not easy to say at a distance whether your inspector was entirely wrong or not (although I'd suspect a lack of clarity in explanation at the least).

    There is indeed industry standard guidance on such matter - I'll try to dig it out when I've a bit of time unless someone else gets there first.

       -  Andy.

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  • 0

    I thought new regulations only apply to new installations from the time they are introduced.

    Generally the regs apply to work done, at the time it was done. So if you had a new addition to an old installation, the new work should comply with the current (new) regulations, even though the rest of the installation remains to the older standard.

    For a periodic inspection (which results in an EICR) normally it is the current regulations that are used as a benchmark, regardless of the age of the installation. However not every non-conformity with the current regulations should result in an "fail" (unsatisfactory) result. Different things are graded differently - for instance a simple lack of 30mA RCD protection for domestic lighting circuits or soft sheathed cables concealed in walls would typically be coded C3 and not of itself result in an unsatisfactory outcome. However it's not always straight-forward - for instance the lack of RCD protection to bathroom lighting combined with a lack of supplementary bonding may result in a C2 (and an unsatisfactory outcome). So it not easy to say at a distance whether your inspector was entirely wrong or not (although I'd suspect a lack of clarity in explanation at the least).

    There is indeed industry standard guidance on such matter - I'll try to dig it out when I've a bit of time unless someone else gets there first.

       -  Andy.

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