Are you a private Landlord in London?

Did you know that it is your responsibility as a private landlord to maintain electrical safety within your rental properties? Did you also know that you can be fined to failing to ensure the electrical safety of tenants within your properties? If you know about these fines, you are in amongst only 1 fifth of landlords who are aware of them. Fines to maintain appropriate electrical safety can reach up to £20,000 as well as invalidating insurance on your property. Research into UK private landlords carried out recently by the Guardian revealed that 300,000 (21%) were unaware of such fines.

This is not all, just last week, a select committee of MPs made a recommendation that Electrical Safety Checks on privately rented properties are made compulsory and are to be carried out every 5 years. This is great news within the electrical industry. Organisations such as the Electrical Safety Council have long campaigned for Electrical Safety Checks to be brought in line with gas safety checks by making them compulsory. It makes perfect sense as electrical accidents kill 1 person every week and contribute to over half of all house fires in the UK. People who rent their homes are more likely to experience a house fire caused by electrical safety failings than people who own their home.

What Needs to be done to protect your tenants and your property

Currently 40% of landlords admit to not knowing what needs to be done when it comes to ensuring their properties are electrically safe with 17% of the UK's estimated 1.7 million private tenants complaining that their landlords have acted too slowly or not at all when problems with the property electrics has been reported to them.

The most effective way of ensuring your property is electrically safe is by having an Electrical Installation Condition Report (EICR) carried out by an approved qualified electrician. Many landlords have an EICR carried out as this is the easiest way to prove that you have kept in proper working order the electrical installation within the property to ensure the safety of your tenants. Here at Fulcher Edwards we inspect the electrical installations in London properties on behalf of private landlords on a regular basis. Our NICEIC electrician in London will carry out 100% testing on your properties where possible.  What we mean by this, is that we will carry out testing in areas we can access.  For example, if there is a big unit in front of a socket, we would not move the unit if it was too heavy, however you can move any furniture beforehand to improve access.  Many electricians only test small areas, but here at Fulcher Edwards we pride ourselves on being thorough and like to give out customers the opportunity of obtaining 100% testing of their electrical installation.  We carry out all testing  when it is convenient to you and your tenants. Once the testing is complete you will be issued with a certificate which is your proof of the condition of your electrical installation within the property. Should any element of the testing fail, we will issue a recommendation sheet along with a no obligation quote which you can compare to other London electrical services.

What else you can do as a landlord

Encourage your tenants to take an active role in their own electrical safety. If they use their own electrical appliances, tell them about the importance of inspecting cords and keeping the appliance in good working order. Also educate tenants on the dangers of overloading extension leads and ensuring the use of correct fuses.

You may also want to consider electrical testing in your London properties by having PAT testing carried out on appliances that you supply. Although not a legal requirement, it is another effective and easy way to ensure your tenants well being. Supplying the original instruction manuals with every electrical appliance and ensuring your tenants knows about them is also a great move.

Encouraging your tenants to report any kind of electrical problem no matter how minor promptly can also save a lot of hassle further down the line.

Conducting visual checks of the property regularly to check for broken or cracked sockets or exposed wires is recommended and can be done by anyone – they don't need to be a qualified electrician. A good way to ensure the visual check happens is to combine it with quarterly home inspections.

If you still need advice

If you are still not sure there are places you can go to which provide up to the minute information. The worst thing you can do as a landlord is ignore your tenants problem. Your local authority will be happy to give you advice on electrical matters and the Electrical Safety Council also has lots of useful advice which you can check out straight away on their dedicated website.