Part P

[john]

Reading through the 'Electrical safety - dwellings approved document which came into effect on 6th April 2006. The building control body may choose to carry out the inspection and testing itself,or to contract out some or all of the work to a specialist body which will carry out work on its behalf. Building control bodies will carry out the necessary inspection and testing at their expense, not at the householders expense.

Has anyone gone down this route ? Mainly the 'not at the householders expense' bit ?

[Peter Crosland]

I told a friend who is building an annexe and has had it wired by a retired, experienced, but not actually currently qualified, electrician. When he showed the relevant paragraph to the BCO there was considerable panic. After several phone calls to his office the BCO agreed that they were responsible and nobody on the council was qualified. The BCO's boss tried to wriggle out of it but in the end said the council will have to employ someone to do it. I understand that the BCO subsequently said his boss had asked him not to tell anyone.

Peter Crosland

[Tim S]

Hmm - so are you saying that notifying works to the LBA that are notifiable under Part P must by law incur no cost to the homeowner? No notification fee or testing/inspection fee?

Cheers

Tim

[Andrew Gabriel]

That's what your building notice fee is for -- to pay for the inspections required. Councils then started insisting on full electrical tests, and that the householder pay for these. That was never the original intention, but typical of gold plating of regs which happens. The government clamped down, making it clear LA's are not permitted to charge extra for electrical testing, or to ask the householder to get it done themselves. The original intention was that BCO's would give the installation a quick visual check, like they do everything else they check, not that they employ electricians to do first fix check, and a full final test -- that was gold plating by the electrical trade, which the councils seemed to fall for.

[Fash]

I'm in the middle of it at the moment. Had to threaten the council with the local government ombudsman for failure to uphold the building regulations before they would play ball. They are planning to use the councils direct labour electricians for the testing. I had a BCO out just before christmas to look at some of the first fix I wanted to cover up. He was happy enough although it was clear he knew virtually nothing. I had to run through the finer points of safe zones with him with the benefit of my copy of the "On-Site Guide".

Anyway they are understandably unhappy at Prescott dropping this on them without any funding or thought for the hassle, but they can be pushed.

To be fair it took me 12 months to get them to agree to test. In the meantime while I was having remedial structural work done the BCO conveniently ignored all the temporary surface wiring which I've put in to make it safe for the moment.

Good luck.

Fash

[Tim S]

Ah yes , that is as I thought. For some reason, I read the earlier statements as implying there was no cost *at all* to the home owner.

Of course, more and more LBA's are just setting a special building notice fee for Part P work - it's around 118 in my bit of Kent, but some other's in this group have mentioned their LBA's are charging as much as 300-odd, which will pretty much ensure even the most "upright" citizen will think twice about notifying, unless it's a whole house rewire, and even then it's adding 10-20% or more to the cost of a DIY rewire, depending of how fancy your design and parts are.

On a side note - has anyone had any experience of doing major Part P work under a building notice - particularly the concept of 1st/2nd fix, that doesn't generally apply if doing the job in sections (room by room for example)? Anyone had any interesting arguments with the BCO or his agents about multiple 1st fix inspection visits?

Cheers

Tim

[JellyBelly]

Last year, my mam's house was completely rewired by a non-Part Pee person so we went to the local council Building Control. We paid £56.75 (or thereabouts), they came out to inspect at the first-fix stage, gave us the OK to carry on and then came to do the final full test and inspection (which took about 5 hours) when we were ready.

It was only later on that I found out that the council were sub-contracting to a local firm of electricians to do the work. I paid £56.75 but then the sub-contractors charged the council £200. Needless to say, that situation didn't last long and now the council uses their own employees to do the work - and I believe that the fee is now £70. That's with Preston City Council, Lancashire.

JellyBelly

[Peter Andrews]

Apparently my LA subcontracts to a company from the other side of London! Their visits and sign off of a loft conversion - first fix 5 minutes - final inspection 15 minutes! I didn't see it but really don't believe that any meaningful testing could have been done - but doubtless a nice little earner!

Peter

[Hugo Nebula]

On Fri, 12 Jan 2007 20:04:10 +0000, a particular chimpanzee named Tim S randomly hit the keyboard and produced:

The DoE/ODPM/DCLG Building Regulations division has always said to Local Authorities, when asked to clarify badly worded Regulations, Requirements or Approved Documents, that it's down to the Local Authority to interpret them in their areas. Which is a cop-out.

When some LAs interpreted the original Part P as requiring certification from a third party (contractor or some other tester) and not the Council, the DCLG moved quickly and said that LAs have to test if no certificate is forthcoming, and they can't charge extra for it. Some LAs have chosen to interpret this guidance as, "Bollocks! We can't afford that; we're still asking for third-party certification and will carry on doing so even if dragged before the Ombudsman".

[stevelup]

Hi

I notified months ago and sent off the 'postcard' informing the LA that the works were commencing. I'm well past first fix stage and they never contacted me with regard to inspecting the work.

Do all LA's inspect the first fix - is mine an anomaly or is it typical?

Everything is now well and truly plastered / tiled over so there is no sane possibility of a visual inspection any more...

Steve

[thankyousam]

I'm through this very process now. To be fair to Cardiff BCO they have been really supportive throughout. I've paid them about =A3190 for the building notice, based on a =A33k professional quote for the rewire. Things have got quite interesting because the BCO will only pay for one test/inspection by their contractor, however I am quite within my rights to do this job circuit at a time which technically requires an inspection/test per circuit - which the BCO won't pay for.

The BCO guy came around when I had the first-fix ready on the kitchen circuit and after a 20 minute chat told me that he was happy for me to do all the circuits and power them up individually if need be because we obviously need power to live in the house. Once I have completed the final circuit, probably the garage/outdoor circuit, he will arrange for their inspector/tester to come out and test all the circuits and [hopefully] issue the certificate.

It's all complicated by the fact that the BCO can't ask me to pay any more for the extra inspections. I think it helped that I had a copy of the OSG and wiring regs to hand to correct the BCO guy when he came around the first time.