If you’ve been told you need an EICR and have absolutely no idea what that means, you’re not alone. The term gets thrown around a lot, particularly by landlords, letting agents and solicitors, but it’s rarely explained in plain English. This guide fixes that. By the end you’ll know exactly what an EICR is, what it covers, what it doesn’t cover, who needs one, and whether you genuinely need to act.
So What Actually Is an EICR?
EICR stands for Electrical Installation Condition Report. It’s a formal document produced by a qualified electrician after carrying out a thorough inspection and test of the fixed electrical installation in a property.
The key word there is fixed. An EICR covers everything that’s permanently wired into the fabric of the building: the consumer unit (commonly called the fuse box), the wiring running through your walls and ceilings, sockets, switches, light fittings, and earthing and bonding arrangements. These are the parts of your electrical system you can’t easily see or access, and they’re the parts that carry the greatest risk if they deteriorate or fail.
What an EICR does not cover is portable appliances. Your kettle, toaster, television, washing machine and laptop are outside its scope entirely. Testing those falls under a separate process called PAT testing, which stands for Portable Appliance Testing. An EICR is purely about the building’s electrical infrastructure.
The EICR replaced an older document called the Periodic Inspection Report, or PIR, and is now the standard assessment used across the UK for domestic, commercial and industrial properties.
What Is the Point of an EICR?
A good way to think about an EICR is as an MOT for your property’s electrical system. Just as a car MOT tells you whether a vehicle is roadworthy and flags anything that needs attention, an EICR tells you whether a building’s electrical installation is safe for continued use and identifies anything that needs fixing.
The problem with electrical installations is that you can’t see them. The wiring in your walls could be decades old, could be deteriorating, could have been interfered with by previous owners or tenants doing their own DIY work, and you’d have no way of knowing without a proper inspection. Over time, insulation breaks down, connections loosen, protective devices wear out, and standards change. What was acceptable wiring practice in the 1970s or 1980s may not provide adequate protection by today’s standards.
According to Electrical Safety First, the UK’s leading electrical safety charity, faulty electrical installations and appliances are one of the leading causes of fires in UK homes, with thousands of house fires attributed to electrical faults every year. An EICR is the primary tool for identifying those risks before they cause harm.
What Does an EICR Actually Involve?
When a qualified electrician carries out an EICR, they work through a systematic process that involves both visual checks and physical testing using specialist equipment. The inspection typically takes between two and four hours for a standard domestic property, though larger or older properties with more circuits will take longer.
You should expect the power to be turned off for a significant portion of the visit. This is a normal and necessary part of the process, not a cause for concern. It’s worth letting other occupants know in advance and making sure anything that needs to stay on, such as a freezer or medical equipment, is discussed with the electrician beforehand.
The inspection covers two broad phases. The first is a thorough visual check of the consumer unit, wiring, sockets, switches, light fittings, and any other fixed electrical components. The electrician is looking for signs of damage, overheating, deterioration, poor workmanship, or anything that doesn’t comply with current regulations.
The second phase is electrical testing of each circuit in the property. This includes checking that the earth paths throughout the installation are intact and working correctly, that ring final circuits are complete and unbroken, that the insulation on cables hasn’t degraded, that wiring is connected with the correct polarity, and that RCDs and other protective devices operate within the correct time limits when tested. These tests require specialist equipment and training, which is why an EICR must be carried out by a qualified, competent electrician, not a general handyman.
Once the inspection and testing are complete, the electrician produces the EICR document itself. This lists every observation made during the inspection, each classified using a standard coding system, and states an overall verdict of either Satisfactory or Unsatisfactory.
What Do the Codes on an EICR Mean?
The codes used on an EICR are standardised across the industry and set out in government guidance on electrical safety standards. There are four of them:
C1 (Danger present) means there is an immediate risk of injury. A C1 observation makes the report Unsatisfactory, and the electrician may take steps to make the hazard safe before leaving the property. Remedial work is required urgently.
C2 (Potentially dangerous) means there is a fault that isn’t causing immediate danger but could become dangerous if left unaddressed. A C2 also makes the report Unsatisfactory and remedial work is required.
C3 (Improvement recommended) means the installation doesn’t fully meet current best practice but isn’t dangerous. A C3 does not make the report Unsatisfactory. You can receive a Satisfactory report that includes C3 observations, though it’s generally sensible to address them over time.
FI (Further investigation required) means the electrician has identified something that needs closer examination before a definitive verdict can be given. An FI observation makes the report Unsatisfactory until the further investigation has been completed.
If your report comes back as Unsatisfactory, it doesn’t mean your property is dangerous to the point of being uninhabitable. It means specific issues have been identified that need to be resolved. Once remedial work is completed, you receive written confirmation, and the installation can be considered compliant.
Who Needs an EICR?
This is where people get confused, so let’s be straightforward about it.
Landlords in England have been legally required to hold a valid EICR for every residential rental property since 2021, under the Electrical Safety Standards in the Private Rented Sector (England) Regulations 2020. The inspection must be carried out at least every five years by a qualified and competent electrician. Since the Renters’ Rights Act 2025 came into force in May 2026, the penalty for non-compliance has increased to up to £40,000 per breach. This is not optional and it is not something that can be worked around.
Homeowners are not legally required to have a periodic EICR, but it is strongly recommended. The IET (Institution of Engineering and Technology), the body that publishes BS 7671, recommends an inspection every ten years for owner-occupied properties, and sooner if there are any signs of problems or significant electrical work has been carried out. Some mortgage lenders and home insurers are increasingly asking for evidence of a valid EICR, particularly for older properties.
Businesses are not required by a specific EICR law, but they are required under the Electricity at Work Regulations 1989 and the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974 to maintain their electrical installations in a safe condition. Carrying out regular EICRs is the recognised way to demonstrate that duty of care is being met. The recommended frequency varies by premises type, from every five years for standard offices up to annually for higher-risk environments.
Do I Really Need One?
If you’re a landlord, the honest answer is yes, absolutely, with no room for debate. The law requires it, the penalties for non-compliance are severe, and your tenants’ safety depends on it.
If you’re a homeowner, the honest answer is that you probably should, even if it’s not compulsory. Think about how long it has been since anyone checked the wiring in your property. If the answer is “I have no idea” or “not since we moved in ten years ago”, that’s the case for booking one. The cost of an EICR is modest compared to the cost of an electrical fire, or compared to the bill for emergency remedial work when a problem that could have been caught early has been allowed to develop.
There are also specific moments when an EICR makes particular sense regardless of where you are in the routine cycle. If you’re buying a property, a standard surveyor’s report won’t include a full electrical inspection, and older properties in particular can hide significant issues behind freshly painted walls. If you’ve recently had major building work done, wiring can be disturbed in ways that aren’t obvious until something goes wrong. And if you’re adding high-demand technology like an EV charger, solar panels or a heat pump, it’s well worth checking the condition of the existing installation before putting additional load on it.
Who Can Carry Out an EICR?
An EICR must be carried out by a qualified and competent electrician. In practice, the recommended way to verify this is to use an electrician registered with a government-approved scheme. NAPIT is one of the main government-approved competent person schemes for electrical work in the UK, and membership confirms that an electrician has the appropriate qualifications, insurance, and ongoing assessment to carry out inspection and testing work to the required standard.
Using an unregistered electrician doesn’t automatically mean the work is invalid, but it does place the burden of proof on you to demonstrate that the person was competent. For landlords especially, that’s a risk that simply isn’t worth taking. If a local authority questions the validity of your EICR and you can’t demonstrate the inspector’s competence, you could be treated as non-compliant even if the inspection itself was thorough.
What Happens After an EICR?
If your report comes back Satisfactory, you keep a copy, provide copies to any relevant tenants or parties, and note the recommended next inspection date on the report. That date is the one that governs when your next inspection is due.
If your report comes back Unsatisfactory, you need to arrange for the remedial work to be completed, typically within 28 days or within any shorter period specified in the report. Once the work is done, you receive written confirmation from the electrician, which you keep alongside the original EICR as evidence of compliance.
At Flodman Electrical we carry out both the inspection and any follow-up remedial work, so you don’t have to coordinate between different contractors. We’ll walk you through the report clearly, explain exactly what any observations mean in plain English, and give you a straightforward quote for any work required.
Book Your EICR With Flodman Electrical
Flodman Electrical are NAPIT-approved electricians based in Farnborough, covering Hampshire, Surrey and Berkshire. Whether you’re a landlord needing to meet your legal obligations, a homeowner wanting peace of mind, or a business looking to stay compliant, we’re here to help.
Get in touch with Flodman Electrical today to book your EICR
Flodman Electrical Ltd, NAPIT Approved Contractor. Serving Farnborough, Hampshire, Surrey and Berkshire.
