Building regs/Minor works certificate?

And whilst I am on can anyone tell me what would be the typical cost of fitting 3 led downlighters in said bathroom?

It depends on how difficult/time consuming it was to do.

I changed a baton holder to 3 spot lights in a bathroom last weekend. 90 minutes work, £5 worth of parts, £10 for fuel (although I also charged the next customer 3 miles away on the next job the same as someone has to pay for wear and tear of the vehicle and my time to get there). The customer supplied the spotlights.

I charged £50. If it was a job for work it would have cost £70 plus vat.

As for the certificate.

Yes you should have been issued with one if building control are involved. That would of course add another £10 to the invoice if it was a works job as someone has to type it up.

Thanks for the info, We have just been presented with a "surcharge" bill of over £250 (+VAT) by the builder because his electrician installed 3 LED downlights. Surely a basic ceiling light must have been included in the cost of a new bathroom installation (costing several thousand pounds), and upgrading to 3 downlights (which we didn't ask for) cannot cost this much.

Also £100 to provide the wiring and connect up a mirror which we supplied and fitted.

Bear in mind that electrician had full access to the room before the ceiling was put up and walls plasterboarded.

Although we have been presented with the building control approval cert I am struggling to get a minor works cert for the electrics.

My gut feeling is that all of this is a bit unreasonable, but I am trying to get a second opinion from those with more knowledge, before I go in to battle.

OK so our firm would probably have charged £96 plus the cost of the downlights for the job I described. And LED downlights cost less than £10. So unless they had a much harder job to do or you are in an expensive location the only things I can think of is they took a long time to do a basic job[1], they charged travel time and they had to make two trips not just the one I did.

I cannot say if £250 is too much. However I do agree that a basic light and light switch should have been included in the original quote and changing that to 3 spotlights for £250 is a lot of money unless there are things we are not aware of.

Do the lights in the bathroom have RCD protection?

Any idea who the electrician was? If you know then you can find out which scheme, if any, he is registered to.

But visits for first fix and second fix should have been part of the original quotation surely?

I think I have listed all that is relevant. Having challenged the charges I have been told "those are our standard charges".

The whole property was rewired last year (separate contract) to replace old rubber cable, and the electrician who did that job was made aware that a new bathroom was planned for that area of the house. So in answer to the question yes they do.

I know that the main contractor (who employed the electrician) is a member of the FMB.

The FMB is just a trade organisation that people pay to join. It serves no use other than taking sides with the builder, a bit like check-a-trade