Question about rewiring

[NoseyNooNoo]

Our new house is going to need rewiring - taking about 3-4 weeks and costing £6-8K that we hadn't budgeted for - gulp!

So, what do I need to know. We will get a few more quotes/opinions but I'm wondering about the practicalities. Will our walls end up with lines cut through them? Will the tiles in the shower room, bathroom need to be removed?

I'm guessing we may as well change the fairly old shower at this point anyway and get new switches since we have about 6 different types. Is there anything else we should do at the same time or other considerations.

Any thoughts anyone has would be great.

TIA

do you need any extra plug sockets/light fittings?
Are they in the right place?
if you are getting everything rewired anyway might as well make sure it is where you want and enough.

Is the main house fuse the correct new recommended level? older houses oftern have older circuit breaker fuses and blow due to the newer modern demands on the electrics.
Do you even have a fuse box? if you are having one installed, think about where it is going. easy to get to if fuse blows and you ned up in darkness but not so easy you are fishing little fingers out of it perminantly.

If your electrician is anything like ours they can work wonders without harming too many walls. I honestly can't work out how ours produced new sockets and wired in cookers without so much as a scratch in the plaster in most cases!

The do have to chase in the odd wire (just two sockets in the whole house in our case), but mostly work under floors, in the loft and down wall cavities.

If your electrician is Part P qualified (should be!) then he will advise on new circuit breakers etc. and can make the installation reasonably future-proof. They are not allowed to just rewire into an existing circuit board if it's not up to scratch, it's very tightly controlled now.

Just get new switches/socket covers/overhead light fittings at the same time, and everything where you want it to be, as it's so much easier/cheaper for these to be done at the same time.

We haven't a got a fuse box - well we have something that is about 35 yrs old and then lots of added on bits. There isn't what I'd call a master switch.

I am thinking of getting matching switches, sockets and thinking of where I'd like lights to be.

Thanks for your ideas.

They probably won't need to cut lines through your walls , but will pull the new lengths of wire through the gaps inside the wall where the current ones run - mostly your wires will be in the gap between the plasterboard (or lath and plaster in an old house) and the actual outside wall, so they can take the socket off and just work through those existing holes. But they are likely to need to get under some of your upstairs floorboards to get access to the wires that run under there for the downstairs ceiling lights, and into the loft to do the same for the upstairs lights.

If you have a 35-year-old circuit board with added bits then you will almost certainly need to budget for an upgrade!

The electrician who rewired our kitchen managed to do lots of the work without causing too much damage. He was able to run most of the cables in the cavities so didn't have to chase them into the walls.

My advice would be to walk around each room and think where you might want to plug something in then put a socket there. You will end up with loads of extra sockets but it's better to put them in now. You'll also avoid trailing extension leads across the floor. Put in even more in the kitchen. Also, put accessible switches in for any sockets that aren't normally accessible, such as the ones the washing machine,fridge and dishwasher are plugged into. We have a switch panel in the corner of the kitchen that switches all of these sockets.

You should also run extra cables for anything that you might want to fit in future, such as an electric shower or electric gates.

Ours didn't make much mess at all, though they did knacker a few of the floorboards by lifting them with unwarranted violence.

Everyone else's tips about sockets are great. The only thing I forgot to think about was hoovering -- we could really have done with another one to help us do the landing, even though we'd never want anything permanently plugged in there. I mention it because it's easy to stand in a room and think about lamps etc, but I forgot about cleaning.

would be intersted to know how many rooms are in your house that would give an indication of the prices quoted. you MUST get a qualified electricain and double check with the registering body NICIE to check they are currently registered as well not just on there letter heads or advertising page. you will require a certificate at the end. A good electricain will not make to much mess as long your not adding new plugs or sockets but they will reqiure access to the loft and floorboards so furniture and carpets etc will have to be moved if the ground floor is concrete there will probably neeed more chasing out as access will have to come down from the floor below. all sockets SHOULD be changed for current and this would be in your quote. make sure your fuse box has more than you currently need incase at a further date you need to use a spare fuse. Also you must insure that you add acouple of extra plug points in each room that you think you will need as you will be supprised! you think you have worked out just what you need but something always comes up later then you start adding extension cable. reommend new shower now whilst they are there also if you are having a rewire it is now neccessary to have smoke detectors wired into the mains as well. a standard three bed house should cost around £6500 inc vat for a good job as a guide.

Thank you everyone for your comments. They have been so useful.

Kittycat - we have a 4 bedroom, 3 reception room house. So it sounds like our 'back of a fag packet' estimate is reasonable. We will obviously get 3 proper quotes but the electricians we saw yesterday asked us to think about what we want them to do before they give an itemised quote. We have used them before for small jobs in our previous house. I think they are pretty honest.

Definitely check qualifications of electrician and get a personal recommendation, this is most important.

We had new fuseboard installed by a fully qualified electrician but he was not someone our builder had previously used as he had been let down by his usual sparks. He did not do the job properly and we had a fire start in the fusebox which could have burnt the whole house down with us in it.

Please get references and personal recommendations. Electricity is a dangerous thing if care is not taken.

And while you are getting the new sockets etc. get mains connected smoke alarms fitted. They saved our lives - that is no exaggeration.

Can I clarify exactly what qualifications are required. The company we're looking at are NICEIC Registered Domestic Installers, NICEIC Approved Contractors and PAT approved as per the NICEIC website.

And then whaty paper work do we need to be left with at the end of the job.

NICEIC Registered Domestic Installers should be fine. Any new wiring, unless it's something really minor) has to be certified - you get a Buildings Regs Part P Compliance Certificate, which you need to keep in case you ever sell the house and it shows the installation has been done properly.

Though we had all the correct paperwork from our electrician and he still screwed it up so badly that our house nearly burnt down.

For this reason it is still really, really important to get references and follow them up.