Builders best is kind of not good enough, now what?

[Buckinghambae]

3 weeks ago we moved into our "dream" home. Brand new and visually it's beautiful, very well specified and the finish is immaculate. It was built by a fantastic builder who I have come to really adore, they'll do anything for us ( they fitted our blinds, shaved the doors when the carpets went down, etc). However there's a major issue with our electrics that they can't pin down and every day at least once it trips. That's on a good day, bad ones are 20+.
It's a nightmare, we've dumped our freezer contents once already and given up trying to have frozen food, it's exhausting as I work 50 miles from home on a horric route so my one day working from home is sacred. The two days I've tried have been a write off and both DH and I have Head of roles so bleating down a phone that the electrics have gone again and we apologise for the lack of screen share is waning thin with colleagues, suppliers and partners.

In our builders defence, it seems to be totally random and they've been here pretty much every day to try and find it.

I've tried to be patient and the first two weeks put it down to a quirk in the house and just made a lot of coffee and left them biscuits whilst I drove into work but I'm now starting to lose it..

At our own personal expense we had someone come in and independently PAT test our appliances so I'm confident it's nothing I've put in the house.

Has anyone experienced anything similar? What the heck happens if we can't find the cause???

Has anyone thought to check the connection from the mains to the house and whether it's a fault with the supply cable? Are you sure you have the correct amount of power serving the property?

wowfudge not a clue but can ask!

Or the grounding point

We had a similar issue after a full refurb and rewire - so frustrating! Is it a Victorian house? With us it turned out the supply to the house had not been updated since it was first connected in the 1920s. The electricity supply company sorted it in the end after weeks of trying different electricians who hadn't a clue. A decade ago now so I can't remember the details but worth looking at.

Oops just seen it's a new build so not applicable, sorry!

Can anyone advise on estate agents commission prices and fees Glasgow south side?

It will cost extra, but you could change the MCBs to RCBOs. It might cost in the region of £50 per circuit.

The effect is that you have an RCD for each circuit, so if the fault is on, say, the outdoor lighting, no other circuit will cut out and your freezer for example, will still work. It will narrow down where the fault lies, and will minimise inconvenience. This is a superior installation, but due to extra cost is not widely done. If done at time of installation is does not cost as much as there is no extra labour.

A photo of the consumer unit, with the lid open, showing the layout and the labels, will give a better idea.

You say it is a new house, so the cause is probably not water getting into an outdoor lamp, more likely to be a nail in a wall or floor puncturing a cable.

BTW I hope your house does not have a single RCD protecting the whole house. This is not considered good practice.

It's on 2 circuits - will grab a picture for you. There's serious home automation in here which worried me to start with but its not on that circuit.

On two circuits? Is that even legal?

I'm clueless as you can tell - the two rcd circuit things

OK, so you have (almost) all your circuits divided between two RCDs.

Most likely, when you have a fault to earth, only one RCD will trip, and half your circuits go off. If they both trip, there is probably a mistake in the wiring, typically on the upstairs/downstairs hall/landing lighting, or around the main switch connections.

On the far left, I think I can see the garage circuit is on an RCBO, which has the functions of an MCB and an RCD in one small device. You will notice it has its own test button. My suggestion is that you have all the other MCBs changed to RCBOs. They can be bought for about £20 each

Sadly you have about fourteen of them, so it would cost a fair bit.

Maybe start with the ones that lose power when you have your frequent trips.

Hugely helpful PigletJohn, thank you.

I won't be paying for anything, it's a brand new house, my developer is responsible for fixing it and even if he wasn't, £140 to help find this would be worth it right now!

There's a "crisis" meeting occurring today to work out how to move forward. Crossing fingers there's a plan by the end of the day