An EICR in Wiltshire typically costs £120 to £350 for a domestic property, depending on size and the age of the installation, and from around £250 for a small commercial unit. An Electrical Installation Condition Report is the periodic safety inspection of a property’s fixed wiring, carried out against BS 7671. Private rented properties in England must hold a valid Satisfactory report, renewed at least every five years.
Key takeaways
- Domestic EICR: £120 to £350 depending on property size. Commercial: from £250, estimated by inspection.
- A typical 2 to 3 bedroom home takes 2 to 4 hours on site. Most residents can stay in during the test.
- Only C1 and C2 observations produce an Unsatisfactory result. A C3 is “improvement recommended” and still passes.
- Landlords in England face a maximum penalty of £40,000 per offence, raised from £30,000 on 1 November 2025.
- An EICR is not legally required when selling a home, but a Satisfactory report reassures buyers and can prevent price chips.
An Electrical Installation Condition Report, or EICR, is the periodic safety check your electrical installation is meant to have every so often. It is the electrical equivalent of a car MOT, and it exists so that faults that would otherwise be invisible get found before they cause a fire, a shock, or a failed rental inspection.
For most domestic customers in Wiltshire the question is simple: what does an EICR cost, and what do I get for the money?
How much does an EICR cost in Wiltshire?
Prices vary by property size, consumer unit type, and how accessible the installation is. As a rough guide:
- 1 bedroom flat: from around £120 to £180
- 2 to 3 bedroom house: from around £180 to £250
- 4 to 5 bedroom house: from around £250 to £350
- Larger properties, barn conversions, HMOs: estimate by inspection
- Small commercial units: from around £250, again estimate by inspection
The lower end of each band assumes an accessible modern consumer unit, one distribution board, and roughly a dozen circuits. The higher end covers older properties with rewired sections, secondary consumer units in outbuildings, or fittings that need dismantling to test properly.
| Property type | Typical price | Time on site |
|---|---|---|
| 1 bedroom flat | £120 to £180 | 1 to 2 hours |
| 2 to 3 bedroom house | £180 to £250 | 2 to 4 hours |
| 4 to 5 bedroom house | £250 to £350 | 4 to 6 hours |
| Barn conversion or HMO | By inspection | Half to full day |
| Small commercial unit | From £250 | By inspection |
Prices correct as of July 2026. VAT excluded unless stated. Figures are guide ranges; every property is estimated individually.
How long does an EICR take, and can I stay in the house?
A typical 2 to 3 bedroom home takes 2 to 4 hours on site. Larger homes are usually half a day. Commercial premises are estimated individually.
Power is isolated one circuit at a time, not to the whole property, so most residents can stay put during the inspection. You will lose lighting or sockets on the circuit being tested for a short period, then power comes back on and the electrician moves to the next one. Anything sensitive to power interruption (a home office desktop, a freezer that has recently been restocked, a working from home meeting) is worth planning around.
You do not need to turn off every appliance in advance, but clear access to the consumer unit, sockets, and light fittings speeds the job up considerably. If a socket is behind a wardrobe or a sofa, either move it or expect the electrician to skip that outlet and note the limited access on the report.
What happens during an EICR inspection?
An EICR is a mix of visual inspection and physical testing. The electrician isolates each circuit in turn, tests earth continuity, insulation resistance, polarity, earth fault loop impedance, and RCD performance, and inspects accessories at every reasonable point of access. Every observation gets a code:
- C1: Danger present, risk of injury. The installation is unsatisfactory and needs immediate attention.
- C2: Potentially dangerous. Not immediate, but the installation still fails until the C2 is fixed.
- C3: Improvement recommended. Not a fail on its own. The installation still passes.
- FI: Further investigation advised. Under the current version of the standard an FI is advisory and does not on its own make a report unsatisfactory. Government guidance for rented property has not yet caught up with that change, so if you are a landlord it is worth asking your contractor how they are treating any FI observation.
The finished report is a legal document. It lists every circuit, every observation, every reading, and gives an overall verdict of Satisfactory or Unsatisfactory. Testing is carried out against BS 7671:2018, currently incorporating Amendment 4:2026. The superseded version is withdrawn on 15 October 2026.
Why do EICR prices vary so much?
Two properties with the same number of bedrooms can produce very different EICR estimates. Factors that push the price up:
- Older wiring. Rubber, lead sheathed, or mixed vintage installations take longer to isolate and test safely.
- Second consumer units. Outbuildings, garages, EV chargers, and annexes all add circuits.
- Poor accessibility. Fitted furniture over sockets, sealed loft hatches, and inaccessible junction boxes all slow the inspection down.
- Extra tenants or bedrooms in HMOs. More sockets, more lighting circuits, more work.
What does not change the price is the honesty of the report. A cheap EICR that skips half the circuits is worth less than the paper it’s printed on. Every EICR we issue is signed off under our NICEIC and ECA approvals, so the paperwork is defensible to a council inspector, a housing tribunal, a buyer’s solicitor or an insurer.
What happens if an EICR comes back unsatisfactory?
An Unsatisfactory result is not a disaster. It means at least one C1 or C2 was found, and remedial work is required. In practice the remedial work is often much smaller than owners fear: a faulty RCD, a set of missing bonding conductors, an unlabelled circuit. Most remedials sit in the low hundreds of pounds. We itemise them line by line with fixed price options so there are no surprises. Once the remedial work is complete and certified, the installation is re-tested and a new Satisfactory report is issued.
Nulectrics carries the remedial work out on any EICR we complete ourselves, and we can act on an EICR issued by another contractor as well.
What is the penalty for a landlord without a valid EICR?
The Electrical Safety Standards in the Private Rented Sector (England) Regulations 2020 require every rented property to have an in-date Satisfactory EICR, renewed at least every five years, or sooner if the report specifies. A valid copy must be given to any new tenant before they move in.
The maximum civil penalty is £40,000 per offence, raised from £30,000 on 1 November 2025 by the Electrical Safety Standards (Extension to the Social Rented Sector) Regulations 2025. On top of that, councils can issue banning orders, and tenants can claim Rent Repayment Orders. On the insurance side, be wary of the common claim that a missing EICR voids your policy. Home and landlord wordings generally do not make an EICR a condition of cover, and a fire caused by an electrical fault is still a fire claim. What policies do require is that you keep the property in good repair and condition, so a current EICR is useful as evidence that you met that duty rather than as a policy requirement in itself.
Licensed HMOs already required five-yearly EICRs before 2020, and some local authorities ask for additional annual visual checks. Worth confirming with the licensing team if you let student HMOs in Bath, Bristol, or a Wiltshire market town.
Do you need an EICR when buying or selling a home?
An EICR is not required by law when you sell a home. A Satisfactory report is still useful evidence for buyers, solicitors, and mortgage valuers, and it can prevent last-minute price chips over unknown electrical condition. If you have made significant electrical changes since the last EICR, or you have simply never had one, booking an inspection before you list is a low-cost way to keep the sale clean.
How do EICR rules differ across the UK?
The ESSPRS 2020 rules cover England only. Scotland has run private rented sector EICRs since the Housing (Scotland) Act 2014. Wales operates under the Renting Homes (Wales) Act 2016. Northern Ireland has no equivalent statutory scheme yet. Landlords with properties across the UK should ask their contractor to confirm which regime applies to each address.
Booking an EICR in Wiltshire
We cover Chippenham, Corsham, Calne, Melksham, Devizes, Trowbridge, Warminster, Marlborough, Bath, and the wider Wiltshire area for EICR testing, both domestic and commercial. See our EICR testing page for the full scope, or contact us for an estimate on your property.
Related guides: signs your house needs a rewire, what BS 7671 Amendment 4 means for your home, and our domestic electrician service across Chippenham and Wiltshire.
Service areas: Nulectrics is based in Chippenham, Wiltshire. We cover domestic work across Chippenham, Corsham, Calne, Melksham, Devizes, Trowbridge, Bath and the surrounding area, and commercial work UK-Nationwide.