Electricians in Dorset

Electricians in Dorset: one set of rules, two councils

For electricians, Dorset is one county with two councils. From 1 April 2019 the former East Dorset, North Dorset, Purbeck, West Dorset and Weymouth and Portland areas came under Dorset Council, while Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole came under BCP Council. The building regulations are national, so the rules match on both sides of that line, but which council hears about your electrical work depends on where the house stands.

Plenty of everyday work never reaches either council: BCP's building control guidance lists extra sockets, light points and switches, and alterations to existing circuits, as needing no approval except near a bath or shower. Notifiable work done by an installer in a competent person scheme runs to a legal timetable. Within 30 days of finishing, you get a copy of the compliance certificate and the council gets notice of it, sent by the installer or through the scheme operator, which for our work is NAPIT.

If 30 days pass and nothing arrives, the government's advice is to contact the installer's scheme operator. Keep the certificate with the house papers: without approval, GOV.UK warns, you won't have the certificates you may need to sell. For older work with no paperwork you can apply for regularisation, but only to a council's own building control and only for work done after 11 November 1985. Dorset Council's advice when choosing an electrician is to search the Electrical Competent Person register.

From our Christchurch unit we also work in the towns around it, each with a page of its own: Bournemouth, Ferndown and Wimborne on this side of the county line, and New Milton, Lymington, Ringwood and Fordingbridge across it in Hampshire.

Off the gas grid: electric heating, the consumer unit and the supply

Not every Dorset home is on the gas grid. The government's estimate for 2024 puts 42,506 of the 185,720 homes in Dorset Council's area, 22.9%, without a gas meter, against 14.3% across BCP and 15.6% in England as a whole. That year 19,238 of the area's domestic electricity meters were Economy 7, and they averaged 5,885 kWh each, against 3,276 kWh for its standard meters and 4,620 kWh for Economy 7 meters across England.

Storage heaters usually pair with a cheaper overnight tariff, most commonly Economy 7, and the Energy Saving Trust calls them the most common type of electric heating. Each is hard-wired to its circuit. The Trust describes how heating and hot water once ran through a second meter, apart from lighting and cooking, before the two were combined into one meter with two readings; now a smart meter gives dual-rate tariffs through a single meter and fuse box.

The supply into the house matters as much as the consumer unit. Dorset Council's January 2024 grid review found most of the county's local network run by SSEN, with a small area of West Dorset in the hands of National Grid Electricity Distribution. SSEN offers a free load check before a new heating type goes in, and says a domestic supply increase is usually free up to 80 amps.

Older houses, older wiring and lighting for dark skies

Dorset Council's area has a bigger share of Victorian and older homes than England as a whole. Valuation Office Agency figures for 31 March 2026 put 33,370 of its 188,900 homes in the pre-1900 build period: 17.7%, more than one in six, against 14.9% across England and 10.7% in the BCP area.

Some signs date an installation quickly. Electrical Safety First notes that cables coated in black rubber were phased out in the 1960s, that lead- or fabric-covered cables are older still and may well need replacing, and that a fuse box with a wooden back or cast-iron switches will need replacing. It recommends inspection and testing every 10 years in an owner-occupied home, and says electrics more than 50 years old should be checked and updated.

Outside lights get particular attention in Cranborne Chase, whose 983 square kilometres stretch across Dorset and three neighbouring counties. It became an International Dark Sky Reserve in October 2019, the only National Landscape designated in its entirety, and its lighting guidance treats control of upward light as essential for private lighting, domestic fittings included, not just street lights.

The Chase's lighting note for new builds and refurbishments asks for full shielding on any outside fitting over 500 lumens, so no direct light goes above the horizontal, a colour temperature of 2700K or warmer, with 2200K recommended, and PIR switching with daylight sensing.