Electrician Fault Finding

1) When there are electrical problems in your home you need an electrician to come out and fix them for you. 

1.0.1) You may find that there is a trip switch that won’t stay on or something is popping in the fuse board / consumer unit.

A common question we get from potential customers is “How much is it to fix?” 

This question is asked before we attend the property and before we begin any investigation on site. Unfortunately, the brief description given on the phone to us describing a trip switch problem is not normally the whole story. It is IMPOSSIBLE to give a customer a quote based on this information alone. That is fact. 

That is where “ELECTRICIAN FAULT FINDING” needs to be carried out. What am I talking about? Well, in order to decipher WHY a trip switch is tripping, we need to visit your property and begin working to investigate the problem using our sophisticated test equipment, knowledge and the odd hunch. We have to actually carry out investigative work BEFORE we can tell you how much the repairs are likely to cost. In a lot of cases, the investigative work leads us to a simple low-cost solution such as a loose wire that needs tightening, a socket or switch that has gone faulty and needs replacing or something equally benign. In these cases, we charge for our time fault finding / first hour attendance and any parts used and everyone is happy. Our emergency attendance and fault-finding rates are on our website for our customers to see. 

When your electrician comes across issues that are more involved to fix or will require further labour and parts, a return visit and so on, they will normally tell you what has happened so far, what the issue(s) are and give you a quote to rectify the issues. This is the fairly standard way of doing things and everyone then knows where they stand. 

Fault finding is a specialised service and involves the use of various testing equipment, the knowledge to understand and interpret the results and the ability to trace the fault around the circuit logically. If you have an electrical fault in your home, it is wise to try and find a fault-finding specialist as they will be more experienced in fault finding than an electrician that specialises in outside lighting for example. This will likely save time and money on labour, parts and mis diagnoses. 

2) What types of faults are there?

There are various different electrical faults that can occur within a wiring system in your home. The consumer unit in your homes electrical system is designed to detect various faults (not all unfortunately) and switch off the power to the electrical circuits when it detects danger or a problem.
Faults can include things like the following:

• Low resistance faults leading to high fault currents and circuit breakers popping.
• Neutral to Earth faults causing an RCD / RCB to trip
• Insulation breakdown causing earth leakage and RCD / RCB to trip
• Damage to wiring
• Damage to electrical accessories
• Hidden faults that remain undetected by a consumer unit / fuse box
• Loose connections leading to overheating and fire

There are many more faults that can occur but these are the most common. 

3) Will my fuse box detect all these faults?

No. Your fuse box / consumer unit will not detect ALL these issues. The more modern and up to date your consumer unit is the better it is at detecting electrical issues in your home and the safer it will make the electrical installation. Even the most up to date modern consumer unit / fuse box CANNOT detect EVERY electrical fault. There are some issues that only an electrician can detect and put right. These issues may not necessarily affect the day-to-day operation of the electrical system but under the right circumstances can pose serious danger to the users of the electrics. 

4) What can I do to make my electrics safer?

We strongly recommend that every property over 10 years old has an electrical inspection carried out every 10 years. An electrical inspection will determine if there are any underlying issues that need to be checked regularly, repaired or altered. An electrical inspection will determine if the circuits are healthy, the earthing is adequate and the electric shock protection is working as the manufacturers intended.

5) What is an electrical inspection and how much does it cost?

An electrical inspection is a SERVICE not a product and as such the quality of the inspection VASTLY depends on the electrician carrying out the work and the time spent on site checking everything. A good electrician performing a thorough electrical inspection in a 3 bedroom semi detached house will likely be there for 3-5 hours. The electrician will produce a lengthy and detailed electrical report (EICR) which will detail any issues that are present and the lack of conformity with the electrical wiring regulations (BS7671). The report is a technical document and any electrical issues found will likely be detailed in a technical fashion. Your electrician should take the time to explain to you in plain English what everything means, what dangers (if any) there are and how they will affect the safe operation of your electrical system and the likely costs for correcting any issues. 

We recommend that you do not have the cheapest inspection possible carried out as this is likely to involve very little time inspecting or testing the electrical system in your home and may be a waste of money. Make sure to ask the electrician how long the inspection will take, their qualifications, insurance and so on. 

We have written more information on electrical inspections for your benefit on our website.

https://www.electricalfaultsfixed.co.uk/electrical-safety-checks-eicr

If you have any questions on “ELECTRICIAN FAULT FINDING”  following this blog then please do not hesitate to contact us using our contact form on our website. We will not sell your details on to anyone, we won’t call and harass you or try and sell, sell, sell. We will offer impartial advice and assistance so that you can make sensible decisions. 

You may have questions about the age of your fuse box and want some reassurance? You might be worried about some sockets or cables somewhere in your home? Whatever the issue, feel free to contact us.