I am planning a new layout for our utility room and would appreciate some advice. We have three appliances (washer, dryer and freezer) that will sit under a worktop directly below the window. My intention is to feed this equipment via a row of three 13A fused spur switchplates located inside a tall larder unit to the right of the appliances.

Would there be any problem in terminating each of these switched fused spurs with an unswitched 13A socket instead of cutting off the moulded plugs currently fitted to the appliance power cords and hard wiring each cable to a flex outlet box?

Another issue is the risk of trapping the mains cord when one of these big and heavy machines is pulled out from under the worktop for servicing and then pushed back. There will only be a 23mm gap between each machine, so it will be impossible to see what is happening behind the appliances. The only solution I can think of is to pull the loose mains cord up and across the top of the machine before it is pushed back under the worktop. The loose cable would then be pushed back out of sight once the machine is in place.

Are there any better ways to minimise the risk of trapping the cable?
 
I'm well aware that the IEE Regs use the term ring final circuit, but ring main has been common terminology since Adam was a boy - and it has the advantage of being shorter and easier to say. Old habits die hard! :)

Very few phrases in the English language are totally unambiguous and 'above counter top isolation' certainly fails that test. Taken literally, it means directly above, rather than simply at a higher level, but words are not always meant to be interpreted in such a literal manner. Just out of interest, does the layout I described in my previous post meet the Scottish regs?
 
Would worry about it passing Scottish regs; their stuff is different, something to do with the weather and those large midges.:)

I hail from north of the border and have plenty of experience of Highland midges, but large they are not. The pesky blighters are tiny creatures. The irritation they cause is out of all proportion to their size.
 

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