Glastonbury has more flats over shops than most towns its size, alongside Victorian terraces, old cottages in the centre and a good number of holiday lets. A rented flat above a shop raises its own electrical questions: shared supplies, long stairs, a kitchen on the escape route. We inspect, put right what is needed and give you the documents the law expects you to hold.
A flat above a High Street shop often has the oldest wiring in the building. The shop below has been refitted several times; the flat upstairs has been tidied up but rarely rewired. When we inspect one, these are the questions we settle first:
How often? The Electrical Safety Standards in the Private Rented Sector and Social Rented Sector (England) Regulations 2020 require the installation to be inspected and tested by a qualified person at least every five years, or sooner if the previous report asks for it.
Who gets the report? Every current tenant, within 28 days of the inspection. Any new tenant, before they move in. The local housing authority, within 7 days if it asks in writing.
What if work is needed? Remedial or further investigative work must be carried out within 28 days, or sooner if the report says so. You then have 28 days from completion to give the tenant and the local housing authority written confirmation.
What about alarms? Under the Smoke and Carbon Monoxide Alarm (England) Regulations 2015, as amended with effect from 1 October 2022, you need a smoke alarm on every storey with a room used wholly or partly as living accommodation (bathrooms and toilets included), and a carbon monoxide alarm in every room used as living accommodation that contains a fixed combustion appliance other than a gas cooker. They must work on the day a new tenancy begins, and be repaired or replaced when the tenant reports a fault. The regulations do not say mains or battery; we fit mains-powered interlinked alarms with sealed back-up batteries.
Holiday lets? These should have the installation inspected and tested at least every five years, under government fire-safety guidance for paying-guest accommodation.
No two lets are the same, so we don't publish a price list. The inspection is priced on the size of the installation and the number of circuits, and the alarms on what the flat or house needs, from a one-bed flat to a full HMO design. Remedials found during the inspection are quoted at a fixed price before any work starts.
This year we carried out the remedials on a town-centre flat in Glastonbury after its EICR. The list was typical of a flat that has been let for years without much attention:
Everything was then re-tested and the paperwork updated. Low insulation resistance is the item that catches landlords out. Nothing looks wrong, but it can mean a cable is breaking down somewhere, and the only way to find it is to test circuit by circuit and narrow it down. That is why we give a fixed price for remedials after the inspection rather than guessing beforehand.
On a separate property in town we extended an existing fire detection system to five mains-powered, wirelessly interlinked alarms in the hall, landing, living room, kitchen and utility, to meet a fire safety requirement on the property. Wireless interlink means no floors lifted and no walls chased, which suits a flat that is lived in.
Arranging access is often the hardest part. Give your tenant notice in line with the tenancy agreement, and let us know if the stair door is shared with the shop or locked outside trading hours. If the flat's board is in the shop, or the meter sits in a cupboard behind the counter, we need the shopkeeper's co-operation as well. Settling that before the visit saves a wasted trip for everyone.
The inspection covers every circuit with the full set of dead and live tests, and a one-bed flat has fewer circuits to get through than a house. Power to the flat goes off in short spells. If the shop's supply is separate it should not be affected at all; where the two are tangled together, we will tell you before we start. More on the inspection on our Glastonbury EICR page, and alarm layouts on the Glastonbury smoke alarms page.
More jobs in the town from 2026, with no names or addresses.
Leave your details and a line about the job. We will ring you back to talk it through and arrange a survey or a written price.
Your duty under the 2020 regulations covers the installation that serves your let. If the shop has its own supply and board, that is a matter for the shop. Where the two are linked, for example a shared stair light or a flat circuit fed from the shop's board, the report needs to cover what serves the flat. We will tell you at the inspection exactly where the line falls.
A heat alarm. Smoke alarms in kitchens go off with toast and steam, and tenants end up taking them down. A heat alarm responds to a rise in temperature instead, so it stays in place. The rest of the flat gets mains smoke alarms, all interlinked so that one sounding sets the others off, which matters in a flat where the bedroom is a floor away from the kitchen.
Only in short spells while circuits are isolated for testing, so the tenant can stay in. If the remedials include a new consumer unit, the power is off for most of that day, and we would agree the date with the tenant through you.
No. For a flat that is already lived in we use Aico mains alarms with RadioLINK wireless interlink. Each alarm still needs a permanent unswitched supply, but there is no cable between them. That keeps the work tidy in older buildings. If the flat is being rewired anyway, we hardwire the interlink instead.
An Electrical Installation Condition Report with every circuit's test readings recorded on the schedule and an overall result. For a satisfactory installation the certificate is issued the same day. Keep it on file, give a copy to each tenant within 28 days, and note the date of the next inspection, which will be no more than five years away, or sooner if the report says.
Priced by the job, not by the hour. A written, fixed price after a survey, NAPIT certification on every notifiable job.
07889 334849