How Many Circuits Does The Average House Have?

[Dan]

I was thinking something along the same lines - I'm kind of assuming he wired it himself judging by things like the freezer on it's own circuit (a good idea) the emergency light (another good idea, although I'd probably have had it on a lighting circuit) and because there are so many circuits.

It would be nice to think that buying a house from an electrician would be a great thing because you know the electrics are the best they can be, not that it would be a bad thing because you need to pay his mate a fortune for an EICR.

Yeah but the plumbing could be shocking so swings and roundabouts lol

 

[Adam W]

Yeah but the plumbing could be shocking so swings and roundabouts lol

You'd hope he would have taken his own advice and got a professional in to do it.

 

[Dan]

You'd hope he would have taken his own advice and got a professional in to do it.

I would hope lol

Have you @kingeri ?

 

[Adam W]

To answer the original question I might expect:
Upstairs Lighting
Downstairs Lighting
Outside Lighting
Upstairs Sockets
Downstairs Sockets
Kitchen Sockets
Freezer
Shower*
Immersion Heater*
Hob*

So that's 10, being generous, and assuming you don't have mains gas, otherwise you could omit the asterisked circuits.

There may have been a good reason why there need to be so many circuits, perhaps due to the way the property has been constructed or converted; this is one of the pitfalls of living in a home which has character.

 

[Adam W]

I've got 7
Total of 16 in the house /Garage in a 2 bed 2 story house.

Washer
Drier
Cooker (Electric oven + hob ignitor)
Dishwasher
Freezer
Fridge/Microwave
Other Kitchen sockets ring
Bedrooms / Lounge ring
Lights Up + Smoke + Em
Lights down + Smoke + Em
Immersion heater
Radial for computer / Router sockets.
Garage /External Lights
Garage ring
2nd ring in Garage
Radial to small workshop sockets.

Again, that seems an awful lot for a 2 bedroomed house - could you not have had all the kitchen appliances except freezer on one ring? And 2 rings for a garage is a lot especially if you have a workshop as well.

 

[kingeri]

I have dabbled with a bit of plumbing but only alongside my dad, who was a plumber/gas man. The three circuits for kitchen sockets is OTT I'll admit, but in my defence I only installed one of them, two doubles for general use. Was easier than tapping into existing circuits as the consumer unit is in the basement directly below. As wired in 4mm, and using Wylex RCBOs, and I had the capacity in the CU, I just put it on its own circuit.

 

[Zags]

Thank you for the discussion you have allayed my fears and I don't think I have been 'had' at all but I am upset by the amount of money. Looking at the report there are 19 circuits and yes it is a storage heater house as there is no mains gas. It is a house I am buying so over £400 when I was expecting £200-£250 is a lot of money at a time when I don't have much. The report came back as unsatisfactory with a number of C2 and C3 recommendations. The quote to put it all right is again about £450. Thanks everyone for your input

No another note are modern storage heaters any good or is it worth the investment to get oil on site and go for central heating? No pressure to answer just thought I would ask while I am here.

 

[Zags]

here are the circuits!

 

[Dan]

There we go then I guess that explains it I guess.

I read somewhere that oil central heating was the least economical kind of heating but not sure where. The lads should be able to answer that though.

Also check on www.ukplumbersforums.co.uk

 

[Andy78]

Thank you for the discussion you have allayed my fears and I don't think I have been 'had' at all but I am upset by the amount of money. Looking at the report there are 19 circuits and yes it is a storage heater house as there is no mains gas. It is a house I am buying so over £400 when I was expecting £200-£250 is a lot of money at a time when I don't have much. The report came back as unsatisfactory with a number of C2 and C3 recommendations. The quote to put it all right is again about £450. Thanks everyone for your input

No another note are modern storage heaters any good or is it worth the investment to get oil on site and go for central heating? No pressure to answer just thought I would ask while I am here.

If you agreed to the per circuit cost before the work commenced then I'm afraid that is what you should pay. If you were led to believe that the lower cost you mentioned was going to be the final bill then have a word with the electrician.

You can of course get several quotes for the remedial work from other contractors if you wish. Make sure certificates are forthcoming for any remedial work.

 

[Zags]

Thanks Andy, I totally agree I did accept the price at the start - the price was £150 the for the first 8 circuits and I stated I thought that would cover the house as it's so small. The electrician has come back and stated that there are ' a very large amount of circuits' for the size of the house, therefore they must have thought the bill would be larger than I expected - at no point was this relayed to me until I got the bill.

 

[Dan]

I think you're perhaps going to have to take this one on the chin and pay it. Then if you want to, get a few quotes in for the remedial work and make sure you're getting a good price for that.

 

[telectrix]

negotiation is the way forward here. ask the spark who did the EICR if he'll give you some discount if you give him the remedials. if it were me in that situation, i'd probably knock off £70 - £90.

 

[Zags]

that's a good idea! Thank you!

 

[rfears]

I read somewhere that oil central heating was the least economical kind of heating but not sure where. The lads should be able to answer that though.

Like everything that depends. I'm on oil, which until recently was dirt cheap. Its also the only alternative without large upfront costs for new boilers etc. Gas isn't available, electric for space heating is not viable. Biomass would be feasible but £20K sort of puts me off - luckily I have storage space for the fuel but many people wouldn't

 

[richy3333]

I'm not sure why people are getting worked up about to cost, it's an open market. I too charge by the circuit and I'd have been a little more in this instance. There might also be travel costs depending upon location. To be fair I do always tell the customer before work commences but the costs are also clearly listed in my T&Cs. It's not rocket science to count the OCPDs and multiply that by the circuit rate to achieve a figure.

 

[Gnasher]

I understand that this is a few weeks old however.

Would be interesting to know the age of this installation and a photograph of the DBs as it looks like an older installation with multiple radials. Very difficult to comment without a reasonable amount of detail.

Problem is that the coustomer is looking for support for their surprise in the final cost, possibly to support a complaint.

It may well be that the installation is old and rambling, and that the sparky done a good job and should have charged more.

That's why it is worth asking how many DBs, fuses, breakers they have prior to quoting. I understand that everyone may not be able to answer this so a quick visit may be required.

When replying to members of public with these sort of questions I think that some caution should be exercised in the replies as it could potentially damage the electricians reputation.

 

[Gnasher]

I understand that this is a few weeks old however.

Would be interesting to know the age of this installation and a photograph of the DBs as it looks like an older installation with multiple radials. Very difficult to comment without a reasonable amount of detail.

Problem is that the customer is looking for support for their surprise in the final cost, possibly to support a complaint.

It may well be that the installation is old and rambling, and that the sparky done a good job and should have charged more.

That's why it is worth asking how many DBs, fuses, breakers they have prior to quoting. I understand that everyone may not be able to answer this so a quick visit may be required.

When replying to members of public with these sort of questions I think that some caution should be exercised in the replies as it could potentially damage the electricians reputation.

No dig intended to anyone who posted a reply, just my thoughts.