EICR Procedure: Full Breakdown – What is an EICR?
An EICR is an Electrical Installation Condition Report, which means a visual inspection of and test via measurement of your fixed wiring systems, including accessories such as switches, sockets, lights and isolators.
Why is an EICR important?
A well-installed electrical system should last for at least forty years, but as you can imagine it would be subject to various stresses and external influences. How can we ensure that the system reaches its design lifetime? With a regular regime of ongoing maintenance; Electrical Installation Condition Reports. The designer of your installation shall provide you with a date of the next inspection, based upon the use of the premises, the quality of the accessories, and the skills and responsibilities of the site maintenance staff or residents. At this point, EICR’s become due. With regular inspections, we can visually check the state of things. By measurement of resistance and impedance, we can compare results from the current inspection and compare to when installed, or the last EICR, to verify any cable degradation.
What does an EICR include?
An EICR will include:
- Inspection of a sample of electrical accessories such as switches, sockets, light fittings, electrical vehicle chargepoints, etc.
- Inspection of any accessible cable runs, such as that within trunking, conduit or minted on cable tray or clipped directly to the fabric of the building.
- Isolations of sections of the installation to facilitate ‘dead tests’. On a smaller install such as a flat, it will be everything, but in a more complex or larger system, it could be portioned out.
- Dead testing with where we measure the continuity of protective conductors such as earth bonds to gas and water, cable resistance for the length of each circuit, the resistance of the cable insulation and polarity. We can also test the function of switch gear and circuit protective devices this way.
- Live testing, which involves taking impedance readings and fault current measurements. We could be working around 230v or 400v so expect safe systems of work for this bit!
- We will also make observations about the installation if it has gone through any change of use. For instance, homes wired in the 70s might only have a single socket in each room, which could encourage the use of multi-socket adapters and extension leads.
- We might also make comments on things less directly related to BS7671 The Wiring Regulations, if we think it might affect the building as a whole. Think smoke detectors, gas or water pipework, structural issues, that kind of thing.
How long does an EICR take?
That depends! Your electrical installation is a piece of string, just how long is it? A small 2 bedroom flat might only take a few hours to test, and may only require an inspection every five years. Somewhere with more stringent fire safety issues such as a cinema or theatre would require much more frequent inspections to ensure safety standards are high as the buildings can be trickier to evacuate. Larger commercial or industrial buildings will be looking at partial inspections yearly ad infinitum; they will never get a ‘finished’ certificate, but the standard of maintenance shall be higher based upon the frequency of the checks.
Step-by-Step EICR Procedure, and how to prepare for your EICR Inspection
- Ensure that all parties are prepared for the inspection
- Such as ensuring work-from-homers have charged laptops and can hotspot their phone.
- Being conscious of business continuity in terms of ePOS, ensuring the UPS for the servers is in good health ahead of time or that shutdown has been planned with IT.
- Ensuring other affected services are aligned, ie testing of the lift supply when the lift engineers are present.
- Make a cup of tea before the power goes off.
- Isolate the allotted circuits one by one to prove what those circuits are serving.
- Isolate the entire system, to facilitate the removal and proving of earthing conductors and to measure the resistance of earth from the system back to the substation.
- Write up the report referencing the current version of the standard and those that were applied at the time of initial design, and make recommendations for improvements and repairs.
To find out more contact Pretty Wired on 020 4542 1890, email us at info@prettywired.co.uk or send us a message here.
