Electrical And Fire Safety Work Across Wandsworth
We work from 820 Garratt Lane in Tooting, on the road that runs north into Wandsworth High Street. It is about two miles up one road, which is why so much of our week is spent in SW18.
The borough takes in the whole of SW11 and the core of SW18, plus parts of SW4, SW8, SW12, SW15, SW16, SW17 and SW19. That runs from the two storey Victorian terraces beside Wandsworth Town station to the residential towers at Nine Elms, and almost nothing about the wiring is the same at the two ends.
Wandsworth Council is both the housing authority and the planning authority, so property licences, HMO standards and conservation area consent all come from the Town Hall on the High Street. London Fire Brigade is the fire and rescue service, which makes the London Fire Commissioner the enforcing authority under the Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005 for commercial premises and for the common parts of blocks of flats.
Established in 1957, Lektrix Installations Ltd has served South London for more than 65 years and is today run by the third generation of the family. Company number 00595683, NICEIC registered since April 1962, and certified by NICEIC under its Approved Contractor Scheme and its Domestic Installer Scheme.
Landlord Electrical Safety Certificates
Every private tenancy in England needs its fixed electrical installation inspected and tested at least every five years, or sooner if the last report says so. The tenant gets a copy within 28 days, a new tenant before they move in, and the council within seven days of asking. Most of the reports we write in Wandsworth are on period houses that have been split into flats or let room by room.
Anything coded C1, C2 or FI must be put right within 28 days, or sooner where the report specifies a shorter period, and you then need written confirmation from the electrician that the installation is safe or that further work is required. The maximum civil penalty rose to £40,000 on 1 November 2025.
Rewires, Consumer Units And Load Upgrades
Most period houses in Wandsworth have been rewired at least once, and that second generation of work is now decades old itself. The faults repeat: borrowed neutrals on lighting circuits, no RCD protection, undersized meter tails, a consumer unit buried under the stairs.
Loft conversions, side returns, induction hobs and charge points all land on one single phase supply, so the load calculation and a new sub main often matter more than the rewire.
Fire Risk Assessments
Article 9 of the Fire Safety Order places the duty on the responsible person to make a suitable and sufficient assessment. Since 1 October 2023 it must be recorded in full, the old exemption for premises with fewer than five employees has gone, and the record must name whoever carried it out.
We assess common parts in converted and purpose built blocks, houses in multiple occupation, shops, offices, and mixed use buildings with flats over a shop, which is the standard arrangement along Wandsworth High Street and Garratt Lane. The full scope is set out on our fire risk assessments page.
Fire Alarm Installation And Detection Systems In Wandsworth
Lektrix Installations Ltd is a BAFE Registered Organisation, ID 303447, holding BAFE SP203-1 Fire Detection and Alarm Systems for design, installation, commissioning and maintenance, third party certificated by NICEIC. That registration covers alarm systems only, and we say so plainly further down this page.
We design to BS 5839-1 in commercial buildings and BS 5839-6 in dwellings and shared houses, and we maintain what we install. Both are codes of practice rather than law, and grades and service intervals are explained on our fire alarm installation page.
Commercial Premises, Escape Lighting And Testing
Shops, restaurants, licensed premises, offices, light industrial units, schools and managed residential blocks all need periodic inspection of the fixed installation, maintained escape lighting and a fire alarm with a test record behind it. We work for owners, managing agents and occupying tenants across Wandsworth, and can attend outside trading hours where a shutdown is the real cost. Our commercial electrical services page sets out the range.
Escape lighting is function tested monthly and discharged for its full rated duration once a year, and the results belong in a log an enforcing officer can ask to see. Three hours is the normal design duration where there is sleeping accommodation or where people may come straight back in; one hour applies only in the limited case of a building that empties at once and stays empty until the batteries recharge. BS 5266-1:2025 is the current code of practice. We also carry out portable appliance testing on landlord supplied and workplace equipment.
The Housing Stock Behind These Postcodes
When a building went up decides most of the job, and Wandsworth covers about as wide a range of build dates as any London borough. Earlsfield filled in with terraces after its station opened on Garratt Lane in April 1884. Southfields is different again: the Grid was approved by the London County Council in December 1891 and finished by mid 1906, some 1,766 houses, maisonettes and shops on Replingham Road, Brookwood Road, Astonville Street, Revelstoke Road and their parallels. Those houses share cable routes and meter positions street by street, so the same fault turns up three doors along.
There are large Victorian villas on East Hill and in the streets around Wandsworth Common, where full rewires and sub mains to loft conversions are routine. Roehampton has the Dover House Estate and the Alton Estate, where Alton East dates from 1958, Alton West from 1959, and the five slab blocks on Highcliffe Drive are Grade II* listed. Totterdown Fields in Tooting is the London County Council's first cottage estate, 1,244 houses over 38 acres, built between 1901 and 1911, and a conservation area since 1978.
Places we are in most weeks:
- Wandsworth Town and Old York Road, SW18
- Earlsfield and the Summerstown end of Garratt Lane
- Southfields and the Grid, SW18 and SW19
- Balham and Hyde Farm, SW12
- Battersea, Nine Elms and Clapham Junction, SW11
- Putney, Putney Heath and Roehampton, SW15
- Tooting and Furzedown, SW17
- Streatham Park and the SW16 fringe
Around 46 conservation areas cover the borough, from Wandsworth Common and Old York Road to the Shaftesbury Park Estate, the Latchmere Estate and Battersea Square. That changes practical decisions, a surface run cable, an external meter box, a charge point on a front elevation or a sounder on a listed frontage all need settling before work starts, and some of it needs consent.
Property Licensing And What It Means For Your Wiring
Wandsworth runs three licensing regimes side by side. Mandatory HMO licensing applies borough wide to any house in multiple occupation with five or more occupiers in two or more households. Additional HMO licensing has covered all 22 wards since 1 July 2025 and runs to 30 June 2030, catching smaller shared houses, HMOs let to a maximum of four people sharing a kitchen or bathroom, and flats in purpose built blocks of three or more units. Section 257 HMOs, converted blocks of flats where the conversion did not meet the 1991 Building Regulations, sit outside that designation.
Selective licensing covers ordinary single household lets in seven wards: Furzedown, South Balham, Tooting Bec and Tooting Broadway from 1 July 2025, and East Putney, Northcote and West Putney from 1 April 2026. Our own front door sits in Tooting Broadway ward, one of the four wards in that first designation.
A licence application in Wandsworth means a satisfactory Electrical Installation Condition Report, a declaration that any electrical appliances the landlord supplies are safe, and smoke alarms installed and kept in working order. Licence conditions can ask for more than national guidance does. Grade A detection is a common example, and it is the conditions that bind you, so we read them before quoting.
Who Is Allowed To Carry Out A Fire Risk Assessment?
It is one of the questions we are asked most often on Wandsworth jobs, and the answer is not the one most people expect. In England there is no licence, no protected title and no compulsory register for fire risk assessors. Article 18(5) of the Fire Safety Order sets an outcome test instead: a person is competent where they have sufficient training and experience, or knowledge and other qualities, to do the work properly. That is the whole statutory test, and it names no course and no certificate.
You will see it claimed that the law now requires a certified assessor. It does not. The provision people have in mind, article 9A, was passed in section 156(4) of the Building Safety Act 2022 but was left out of the commencement and is still not in force. What did change on 1 October 2023 is the recording duty, the assessment must be written up in full, and the record must include who carried it out.
So we put our position in writing. Fire risk assessment sits under a separate voluntary certification scheme that we do not hold. Our BAFE registration covers the design, installation, commissioning and maintenance of fire detection and alarm systems, and nothing beyond that. Before you book, we will tell you who will carry out your assessment and what their training and experience is, so you can satisfy yourself that they are competent and record the name with confidence. If your building needs an assessor with third party certification or specialist higher risk experience, we will say so and help you find one.
Frequently Asked Questions
Does A House Converted Into Flats Need A Fire Risk Assessment?
Yes, for the shared parts. The Fire Safety Order covers the common stairs, hallway, structure, external walls and flat entrance doors, not the inside of a private flat. Wandsworth has a great deal of this stock: a house converted into flats before the 1991 Building Regulations is a Section 257 HMO, and the escape route and its detection are usually where the action plan lands.
Do I Need A Property Licence For My Rental?
Very likely. Wandsworth runs mandatory, additional and selective licensing. Additional HMO licensing has covered all 22 wards since 1 July 2025, and selective licensing covers single household lets in Furzedown, South Balham, Tooting Bec, Tooting Broadway, East Putney, Northcote and West Putney. Check the council's licence checker for your address.
How Often Must A Fire Risk Assessment Be Reviewed?
There is no statutory interval. Article 9(3) requires review regularly, and whenever there is reason to think the assessment is no longer valid or there has been a significant change, an extension, a change of use, or altered escape routes. Annual review is common practice in Wandsworth blocks, not a legal rule.
What Grade Of Fire Alarm Does A Shared House Need?
It depends on the building, not on one rule. The 2008 LACORS guidance sets Grade D LD3 with added detection as the benchmark for a normal risk shared house of up to four storeys, and Grade A LD2 at five or six storeys. That guidance is recognised good practice rather than law, and licence conditions often ask for more.
Who Enforces Fire Safety In A Block Of Flats?
London Fire Brigade, through the London Fire Commissioner, is the enforcing authority under the Fire Safety Order for common parts and commercial premises. Wandsworth Council enforces housing standards separately under the Housing Act 2004 and through licence conditions. Both can act on the same building.
Can I Have An EV Charge Point On A Terraced Street?
Often not with a standard wall mounted unit, because the terraced grids in Earlsfield, Southfields and Tooting have little off street parking. Where there is a front garden, a driveway or a communal car park it is straightforward. Wandsworth's 46 or so conservation areas also affect where a unit can sit on a front elevation.
Are You Certified To Carry Out Fire Risk Assessments?
There is no certification requirement in England. Article 18(5) of the Fire Safety Order sets a competence test, sufficient training and experience, or knowledge and other qualities. The separate voluntary scheme that certificates fire risk assessment is one we do not hold, and we tell you that before you book. Our BAFE registration covers fire detection and alarm systems.
What Happens After The Report
An action plan nobody can act on is just paperwork. Ours is written to the BS 5839-6 and BS 5266-1 categories rather than to a product, and you are free to take it to any installer. Where you do ask us to quote for detection, escape lighting or remedial electrical work, that is a separate job on a separate invoice.
Booking A Visit
Ring 020 8672 6945 or 07727 683993, or email info@lektrix.co.uk. A fire risk assessment is quoted after a short conversation about the building rather than off a price list, and we can usually be anywhere in Wandsworth the same week.