UK Landlord Forum / Life

Hi Folks,

I've been told about some amended electrical inspection regulations.  From what I've read, it looks like some documents get called different things and there's a scale of how bad / dangerous any defects found are. So no big deal there.

Main change is it is now "recommended" that the wiring is checked out every change of tenant, which could make the inspections now happen more frequently than yearly, should you chose to follow the "recomendation".

More Info: http://www.esc.org.uk/fileadmin/user_upload/documents/industry/best_practice/BestPracticeGuide4-Locked.pdf

Hi Jeremy,

Excellent article, very comprehensive. One comment would be that, whilst it is important to protect tenants well being (and your property) it seems like more and more legislation is coming into play, practically all aimed at the landlord, it seems tenants are better protected which is a little bit unfair.

A more concise breakdown of the electrical regulations can be found here - http://lovemypad.com/landlord-obligations-electricity-2/

Finally, it would be interesting to know how many letting agents are aware of these changes. My previous agent did not even understand Section 21 notices, and I was paying them well for the privilege - grrr!

Thanks for that.  Will have a read through when I get a bit more time later. 

I do agree that there now seems to be an endless stream of legislation coming through against landlords.  Some has been reasonable, and some just a pain.  There is no balance there as yet. 

Cheers for the link! Since it is a "recommendation", i'm sceptical about how serious landlords will take it. It may just seem like another additional cost of being a landlord.

ciaraboo, shocking that your agent wasn't aware of a section 21! That's pretty basic landlord law!

Hi Cairaboo,

I've used one agent for one of my properties now entering into it's third year.  I've not had one news type e-mail off them.  In some ways that's good: No marketing up-sell dross to read through in case it's important.

But I just don't trust the fact I've had not one "law x is changing" type communication from them.  I rely for my news from being on the marketing list from my deposit holder (this kind of info goes hand in hand with them gently pushing to use one of their electrical inspection firms) and being on the marketing list of the electrical and gas firm I actually use.

I think agents miss a trick here.  In every industry I've ever worked in, we always sent out client flyers with this kind of news.  It was part of an overall comms strategy: This part was showing to our clients we're on top of the changes within the industry we're operating in, i.e. maintaining credability.

And I agree with you guys Topseyt and Propertyfag about this being more creeping legislation.  All industries have to pass their costs onto their customers in the long term order to survive.  And if more inspections are done, what small fraction will actually discover an important problem compared to how much extra cost is created for tenants from each non-value adding inspection?