A report, not a certificate
An EICR is an Electrical Installation Condition Report. An
engineer inspects and tests the fixed electrical installation of a building that
already exists — the consumer unit or the distribution boards, the circuits
running out of them, the earthing and bonding, and the accessories on the ends
— and writes up its condition. The whole report then comes back as
satisfactory or unsatisfactory.
The word people reach for is "certificate", and we know exactly what they mean,
so nobody gets corrected on the phone. The distinction is still worth having. A
certificate is issued for work that has just been done: an Electrical Installation
Certificate for a new installation or an alteration, a Minor Works Certificate for
something smaller. This is a report on something already in place,
and it describes a condition on the day it was done rather than promising anything
about the day after. If a letting agent, an insurer or a local authority has asked
you for a landlord safety certificate, an EICR is almost always
the document they want.
What it is measured against
BS 7671 — the IET Wiring Regulations, the British Standard every electrical
installation in the UK is judged by. One thing that is rarely explained and causes
a great deal of unnecessary worry: an existing installation is not required
to be rebuilt every time the standard is updated. Where an older
installation differs from the current edition, that is recorded as a departure and
usually coded as an improvement, not as a danger — unless it genuinely
presents a risk, in which case it is coded as one. An old installation is not the
same thing as an unsafe one, and we will say so in writing if that is what we find.
What the engineer actually does
It starts as a visual inspection: the board and its protective
devices, the state of the enclosure, labelling, signs of overheating, damage,
corrosion or work somebody has added since. Then the testing, and this is the part
that needs the power off for a while. With the installation isolated we measure the
continuity of the protective conductors and the ring final
circuits, the insulation resistance of the cables, and
polarity — that live, neutral and earth are where they are
supposed to be. With the supply back on we measure
earth fault loop impedance, which tells us whether a fault would
actually operate the protective device quickly enough, and we test the
RCDs and RCBOs for trip time rather than just pressing the button
on the front.
Accessories are inspected with the covers off on a sample of the
installation rather than every single one, which is what the standard expects on a
periodic inspection. How large that sample is, and anything we could not get to,
is agreed with you before we start and written on the front of the report as the
extent and limitations. Nobody should be reading that page for the
first time after the job.
How long it takes
It is governed by the number of circuits and distribution boards,
not by floor area, which is why a cluttered two-bedroom flat can take longer than a
tidy warehouse. A small flat on one board with a handful of circuits is the
quickest thing we do. A three or four bedroom house with an older board, an
extension and a garage supply takes appreciably longer. An office or a shop depends
on how many boards there are and what hangs off them, and a factory, school or
block with several boards is normally phased across more than one visit so that the
place keeps running. The honest answer for your property comes with the quote,
because we will have asked you the questions that decide it.
The other thing that decides the day is isolation. Parts of the
test can only be done with the power off, and on an occupied building the
negotiation about when that happens usually shapes the visit more than the testing
does.
An EICR is
An inspection and test of the fixed wiring already installed, written up with a
coded observation against anything wrong, an overall satisfactory or
unsatisfactory outcome, and a recommended date for the next one.
An EICR is not
A certificate for new work, a test of your appliances, a guarantee that nothing
will fail afterwards, or a pass that lasts forever. It reports a condition on
the day, and it does not cover anything plugged in.