Landlord electrical safety rules explained
The electrical safety rules for private landlords in England in plain English: the five-year EICR, who gets a copy and when, the 28-day repair deadline and the fines.
Private landlords in England must have the electrics in each rented home inspected and tested at least every five years by a qualified person. A copy of the EICR must go to tenants within 28 days and to the council on request, and any C1, C2 or FI faults must be fixed within 28 days. Fines reach £30,000.
- EICR at least every five years
- Copy to tenants within 28 days
- Faults fixed within 28 days of the report
- Fines of up to £30,000 per breach
The rules in one minute
If you let a house or flat in England, the landlord electrical safety regulations come down to this. You need an Electrical Installation Condition Report, an EICR, for every rented property at least every five years. The report must be done by a qualified and competent person. You give a copy to your tenants, to the council if they ask, and to anyone thinking of renting the place. If the report finds anything unsafe, you fix it within 28 days and tell the tenant in writing. If you do not, the council can fine you up to £30,000.
The law behind this is the Electrical Safety Standards in the Private Rented Sector (England) Regulations 2020. They applied to new tenancies from 1 June 2020 and to every existing tenancy from 1 April 2021, so there is no longer any property that is still waiting for its first report.
We manage the reports for a lot of landlords between Fleetwood and Lytham, from a single flat above a shop in Cleveleys to blocks of forty, and the rules are not complicated once you have seen them written down plainly. That is what this guide is for.
Which tenancies are covered
The regulations cover almost every private tenancy: assured shorthold tenancies, licences to occupy, and houses in multiple occupation, which the council calls HMOs. If you let rooms to people who are not part of your household, you are covered.
There are a few exemptions. Social housing let by councils and housing associations is outside these regulations, although the government has said it intends to bring it in, so check the current position if that applies to you. Lodgers who share your own home are exempt. So are long leases of seven years or more, student halls of residence, hostels and refuges, care homes, hospitals and hospices. Holiday lets where the guest has no right to stay beyond the booking are not tenancies in this sense, although your insurer and the fire safety rules will still want an EICR.
If you are not sure which side of the line you fall, assume you are covered. The cost of a report is a lot less than the cost of finding out you were wrong.
The 5-year EICR and the deadlines
The report must say the installation is satisfactory, or you must have the remedial work done and get written confirmation that it now is. The interval is five years from the date of the last report, or shorter if the electrician has written a shorter one on the report because of the condition of the wiring.
The deadlines are the bit landlords get caught by, so here they are in order.
Within 28 days of the inspection, give a copy of the report to the existing tenants.
Before a new tenant moves in, give them a copy.
Within 28 days of a request from a prospective tenant, give them a copy.
Within 7 days of a request from the local authority, give them a copy.
If the report says remedial work or further investigation is needed, complete it within 28 days of the inspection, or sooner if the report sets a shorter time. Then, within 28 days of finishing the work, give the tenant and the council written confirmation that it is done. That confirmation is normally the certificate for the repair plus a short note from the electrician.
Keep every report until the next one is done. You will be asked for the previous one at the next inspection, and the council can ask at any time.
What counts as unsatisfactory
An EICR gives every fault a code. C1 means danger is present. C2 means potentially dangerous. FI means further investigation is needed before the electrician can say whether something is safe. Any of those three makes the report unsatisfactory and starts the 28-day clock.
C3 means improvement recommended. A C3 does not make the report unsatisfactory, and you are not legally required to act on it, although some C3s are worth doing while the electrician is there. The most common C3s we write on rented flats in Blackpool are older plastic consumer units, the fuse box, and lighting circuits without RCD protection. An RCD is a residual current device, the switch that cuts the power when electricity leaks where it should not.
Where a report says “further investigation”, that is not the electrician being awkward. It means something could not be proved safe in the time available, usually because a circuit was inaccessible or a reading was borderline.
Fines and enforcement
Enforcement is by the local council, so in our area that is Blackpool, Wyre or Fylde. The council can serve a remedial notice giving you 28 days to put things right. If you do not, it can arrange the work itself and recover the cost from you, and it can impose a financial penalty of up to £30,000 for each breach. You have the right to make representations and to appeal.
In practice the first contact is nearly always a tenant complaint or a licensing inspection. Blackpool Council runs selective licensing in parts of the town, and the licence conditions include keeping a current EICR, so a missing report can also put your licence at risk. HMO licences carry the same condition everywhere.
A tenant can also report an unsafe installation to the council directly, and under the fitness for human habitation rules can take action over electrical hazards whether or not an EICR exists. A report dated within the last five years is the simplest answer to all of it.
Wales and Scotland are different
Wales has its own version. Under the Renting Homes (Wales) Act 2016 a landlord must have an EICR at least every five years, give the tenant a copy within 14 days of the occupation date, and must keep the home fit for human habitation. Scotland has required a five-year EICR since 2015, and Scottish landlords must also have the appliances they supply checked, which is the PAT testing that England does not require. If you have a property over either border, check the gov.wales or mygov.scot guidance rather than this page.
A simple landlord checklist
Here is the version our office manager gives to new landlord customers. It fits on a phone screen.
Find the date of your last EICR. If it is more than five years ago, or you cannot find one, book an inspection now.
Read the overall verdict. Satisfactory means file it. Unsatisfactory means book the remedial work this week.
Give every tenant a copy within 28 days, and keep proof you did.
Give every new tenant a copy before they move in. Put it in the welcome pack with the gas safety certificate and the How to Rent guide.
If remedial work was needed, get the certificate and a written confirmation from the electrician, and send both to the tenant within 28 days of the work.
Check your smoke and heat alarms at the same time. The alarm regulations are separate, but a landlord bundle covers both in one visit.
Set a reminder for four years and nine months from the inspection date, so the next one is done before the old one runs out.
If a tenant reports a problem, respond in writing and get an electrician out. A fault report sitting in an inbox is the thing councils like least.
Need a hand?
We do EICRs for landlords from £120 including VAT, with the report back within 48 hours, and a landlord bundle with the smoke and heat alarm check from £165. The detail is on our EICR and landlord certificates page. If you have a portfolio and want all the renewal dates in one place, get in touch and we will set it up for you.
