Dangerous conditions found during CU change.

[Whitbreadz]

First post so bare with me, and apologies if this isn't in the right place!

Im a quite "wet behind the ears" electrician, qualified about a year ago and recently changed firms. New firm is getting me to do board changes, often without a prior EICR which my previous firm always did first.

My understanding is when finding conditions during the testing following CU change that would warrant a C2, the client should be made aware and to either have the conditions rectified or the affected circuit left disconnected. Now the boss is saying if they don't want it done just put these in the comments on existing installation section of the certificate because we can't leave things turned off, and "you can't put a gun to someone's head and have the work done" but again I'm of the understanding this doesn't absolve you from any comeback if something untoward was to happen.

Just wondering what people do in these situations as I'm not getting much help from anyone at my firm.

Thanks in advance.

 

[Octopus]

Your boss is correct that you can't leave circuits switched off and highlighting them on the EIC is the thing to do .............. obviously if its effectively a C1 you should deal with it on the spot

Can you give examples?

 

[Pete999]

First post so bare with me, and apologies if this isn't in the right place!

Im a quite "wet behind the ears" electrician, qualified about a year ago and recently changed firms. New firm is getting me to do board changes, often without a prior EICR which my previous firm always did first.

My understanding is when finding conditions during the testing following CU change that would warrant a C2, the client should be made aware and to either have the conditions rectified or the affected circuit left disconnected. Now the boss is saying if they don't want it done just put these in the comments on existing installation section of the certificate because we can't leave things turned off, and "you can't put a gun to someone's head and have the work done" but again I'm of the understanding this doesn't absolve you from any comeback if something untoward was to happen.

Just wondering what people do in these situations as I'm not getting much help from anyone at my firm.

Thanks in advance.

Does this firm you work for allow you to do any testing prior to changing the Cu? or is it a case of change the CU, and hope there aren't faults that can or will cause any nuisance tripping of the RCD or RCBOs, because anyone, be it an individual or company, changing a CU without any prior testing, is asking for trouble in my opinion.

 

[Andy78]

Depends what the issue is. There's not many C2 faults I would be happy to energise with and just leave a note on the cert. You are leaving record that you have not followed the regs and left a potentially unsafe situation.
Customers should be made aware of the requirements of the regs and the limitations of your work.

 

[oracle]

With a CU change surely it should be given an EIC as the whole installation is affected and circuits that complied with older fuses or breakers may no longer comply.

This is why a CCU change is not considered Minor Works

 

[Pete999]

First post so bare with me, and apologies if this isn't in the right place!

Im a quite "wet behind the ears" electrician, qualified about a year ago and recently changed firms. New firm is getting me to do board changes, often without a prior EICR which my previous firm always did first.

My understanding is when finding conditions during the testing following CU change that would warrant a C2, the client should be made aware and to either have the conditions rectified or the affected circuit left disconnected. Now the boss is saying if they don't want it done just put these in the comments on existing installation section of the certificate because we can't leave things turned off, and "you can't put a gun to someone's head and have the work done" but again I'm of the understanding this doesn't absolve you from any comeback if something untoward was to happen.

Just wondering what people do in these situations as I'm not getting much help from anyone at my firm.

Thanks in advance.

Sorry Mate, was going to mention something, but in reality it doesn't answer your questions. It's an observation really, your firm will have given the client a quotation, for the CU change and nothing else, any fault or anomalies that crop up during and after the change can be seen by some clients as a scam to get more work, seen this lots of times, like I said doesn't answer your questions.

 

[Andy5678]

Do all your tests and inspections before you rip out the old Consumer unit. If there is anything major that needs repaired that you can’t fix there and then, put it back together and inform your boss.

 

[Deleted account]

I normally give the customer the option of an EICR prior to CU change at an aditional cost of £150-£200ish

But....

If I don't do the EICR I do as Andy 5678 recommends. I would do a visual inspection throughout and a few basic insulation and fault loop testing before starting to dismantle old board.

In the quote I state this is what I would do and if any issues where discovered they would need to be rectified before continuing. If they didn't want to,proceed at this point I would stop without any charge to the customer.

I have always done this and only ever had 2 customers say they didn't want to continue and one of them came back a week later and instructed me to make the issues right and change the board.

Under normal circumstances I cannot see the point of charging the customer an extra £150-£200 for an EICR prior to a board change.

 

[Whitbreadz]

Thanks for the replies all!

It's pretty much change the board and hope! Obviously a full EIC is completed along with associated tests.

An example of a recent one that is somewhat trivial and up to personal opinion, would be the decorator moving all the downstairs lights and you can see connectors pushed up in to the ceiling, too short to bring down to test or rectify, with no enclosure. In my opinion that contravenes 526.1 (I believe?) Basic insulation outside of an enclosure. I'd classify that as C2. Now according to the customer that was done about 15 years ago, there's no sign of heating of what I could see of the connectors, so in theory should be ok for a while to come? The customer was informed and wasn't interested in having it done as it had been fine for ages apparently.

Now I put a note on the EIC in comments on existing section, but I was reading the best practice guide number 1 on CU changes last night and it states that a "disclaimer does not absolve the installer from responsibility" you're meant to carry out a risk assessment, but if it's still classified as a C2 you still have to leave it disconnected. Now my boss isn't the sort to do a risk assessment, as he thinks it's trivial and has "been in the game too long to worry About things like that" So back to my original point, where does responsibility stand in situations like the above?

Also Paignton Pete, I like the idea of doing the tests before doing the board change! What sort of depth and sampling are you doing on the pre change tests?

 

[Ian1981]

You can’t leave potentially dangerous defects and issue an EIC.
Examples are where no protective bonding conductors are present, the client should be informed that the CU change can not go ahead until protective bonding is carried out.
If the client refuses then the proposed works do not happen.

 

[Risteard]

Depends what the issue is. There's not many C2 faults I would be happy to energise with and just leave a note on the cert. You are leaving record that you have not followed the regs and left a potentially unsafe situation.
Customers should be made aware of the requirements of the regs and the limitations of your work.

You have followed the Regs. The distribution board replacement is what you have done. You aren't responsible for the entire installation.

 

[telectrix]

You have followed the Regs. The distribution board replacement is what you have done. You aren't responsible for the entire installation.[/QUOTE]
he is responsible if he has energised any circuit with a C1 or a C2 applicable.

 

[telectrix]

he is responsible if he has energised any circuit with a C1 or a C2 applicable.

 

[Markyd]

dont suppose you can name the company.....just so other people dont make the mistake of getting them to do any work on their property without doing it properly....Your Boss has a dangerous attitude

 

[oracle]

A CCU change requires a EIC not an EICR. As others have already shown, before the CCU is changed the installation condition must be inspected and tested.