Skip to main content Skip to footer Most pages about fuse boards start with what is wrong with yours. This one starts with two questions nobody local asks: what board have you actually got, and is your incoming supply the real limit rather than the board? In a lot of Peterhead properties the board is the visible problem and the supply is the actual one, and finding that out first is what stops you paying twice.
Four things cover almost every Peterhead property. Find yours and the rest of this page tells you what it means.
A row of removable holders, often black or white ceramic, with fuse wire inside. No switches to flick. If a fuse goes you rewire the carrier.
No RCD protection of any kind. This is the one case where replacement is not really a discussion.
Small switches rather than fuses, but nothing with a test button and no visible T marking. Common in boards fitted from the late seventies through the eighties.
Overload protection but no protection against an earth fault through a person. Replacement is normally the right call.
Breakers in two banks, each behind a larger device with a test button. Circuits share protection, so one fault takes out everything on that side.
Still compliant. Not a fault. The case for changing it is consequence, not legality, and we say so below.
Every circuit on its own device, each with its own test button. Usually a wider board, often with a surge protection module at one end.
This is current best practice. If you have it, you need an inspection, not a new board.
One thing worth saying plainly, because a lot of quotes lean on it. A plastic enclosure is not automatically a fault. The regulation requiring non combustible enclosures applies to new installations. It does not retrospectively condemn the board you already own. If somebody quotes you on that basis alone, ask them which regulation and which date.
This is the part that is missing from every other consumer unit page covering Peterhead, and it is the part that most often changes the job.
Where the supply enters the property there is a service cut out with a fuse in it, and that fuse sets the ceiling on everything downstream. Common single phase ratings are 60A, 80A and 100A.
That cut out is not yours and not your electrician's. It belongs to the distribution network operator, which in the north of Scotland is SSEN. No electrician may lawfully break the seal or change it. What we can do is establish what you have, work out what you actually need, and support the application.
A new board does not increase what the network will give the property. If you are adding a car charger, an electric shower, an induction hob or a heat pump, the question is not how many ways the board has. It is whether the supply can carry the simultaneous demand. Fitting a beautiful new board and then discovering the answer is no is an expensive sequence, and we see it.
Going from a 60A supply to 100A is a Load Increase application to the network operator, not an electrician's job. It has its own timescale and its own process, and it is worth starting before rather than after the board is on order.
This catches people out constantly, so here is the sequencing in plain terms.
Where a job needs more than one of those, the order matters and the lead times do not run in parallel. Establishing that at survey is free. Discovering it on the morning of the install is not.
Three legitimate reasons to change a board, and one that gets used a lot but should not be.
Ceramic carriers, or breakers with no RCD anywhere. There is no shock protection on the circuits. This is the strongest reason and it stands on its own.
On a shared RCD, one failing appliance takes out every circuit behind it. Individual RCBOs mean one fault takes out one circuit and leaves the freezer, the heating and the lights alone. This is a real and honest argument, and it is about consequence rather than compliance.
A charger circuit, a shower, a garage supply. If the board is full, has no spare ways and no capacity for the protection the new circuit needs, replacing it is the sensible route rather than bolting on an enclosure beside it.
Age alone is not a defect and a plastic enclosure is not retrospectively a fault. Neither is a finding on its own. If that is the whole justification on a quote, ask what the actual test results were. A firm that has tested can answer immediately.
The cheapest way to settle it properly is an EICR. From £150 + VAT, it turns opinion into coded findings. C1 means danger present, C2 potentially dangerous, FI further investigation needed, and any of the three makes a report unsatisfactory. See our Peterhead EICR page.
Dated deliberately, because most pages covering this area quote a version of BS 7671 that is two amendments behind.
Amendment 4 was published on 15 April 2026. There is a six month transition during which the previous version remains valid, and from 15 October 2026 Amendment 4 becomes mandatory for new work and BS 7671:2018+A2:2022+A3:2024 is withdrawn. There is no 19th Edition and none has been announced, so this is still the 18th Edition.
And the honest part: Amendment 4's headline changes are about battery storage, functional earthing for ICT systems, Power over Ethernet and medical locations. None of them forces a domestic consumer unit upgrade. Anyone using Amendment 4 as a reason you need a new board in an ordinary Peterhead house is stretching it.
Not mandated. A dual RCD split load board remains compliant. Individual RCBOs are best practice because of what happens when a fault occurs, not because a regulation forces them.
The old calculation route was removed in Amendment 2. The assessment is now based on the consequence of a surge, and an SPD is fitted unless you decline it, with that decision recorded. £40 to £80 + VAT per device.
Required on socket circuits up to 32 A in HMOs, high rise residential, purpose built student accommodation and care homes. Only recommended in an ordinary dwelling. If you let an HMO in Peterhead this is a genuine difference between your property and the identical house next door.
Non combustible enclosures are required for domestic boards, but this applies to what gets installed now. It does not make your existing plastic board a defect.
From £550 + VAT, with a guide up to £950 + VAT depending on circuit count and complexity. All prices exclude VAT.
| Work | Price |
|---|---|
| Consumer unit upgrade, typical 100A domestic | from £550, guide to £950 + VAT |
| Consumer unit with EV charger bundle | £750 to £1,000 + VAT |
| Surge protection device, per device | £40 to £80 + VAT |
| RCBO, per device plus install | £25 to £30 + VAT |
| EICR to decide first | from £150 + VAT |
| Earthing or bonding upgrade | quoted after survey |
Cable runs beyond fifteen metres, consumer unit upgrades on top of other work, and earthing upgrades are chargeable extras quoted after the survey. We state that plainly so the from price stays honest.
A straightforward board change is a single day. Power is off for most of it, and we will tell you the window in advance. Where you need a fridge or freezer kept alive we arrange a temporary supply rather than leaving you to improvise.
Before anything is disconnected we test the existing installation, because a board change means taking responsibility for what it is protecting. Then the new board goes in, every circuit is reconnected and identified, the earthing and main bonding are checked and corrected, and every circuit is tested through: continuity, insulation resistance, polarity, earth fault loop impedance and RCD trip times.
You receive an Electrical Installation Certificate with a full schedule of test results and a properly labelled board. That certificate is what a solicitor, an insurer or a letting agent asks for.
One correction worth making, because it appears on a lot of Scottish pages including some of ours previously. Scotland does not have a competent person scheme, and it does not have Building Control notification. Those are the England and Wales mechanisms, along with Part P, which does not apply here at all. In Scotland the framework is the Building (Scotland) Regulations and Building Standards, administered for Peterhead by Aberdeenshire Council. A building warrant is not required to replace a consumer unit in an existing house. What is always required is that the work complies with BS 7671 and is tested and certified, which is what the certificate above evidences.
The first is the familiar one: a satisfactory EICR at least every five years by a competent person, with a copy to your tenants.
The second is newer and widely misdescribed. Since 1 March 2024 the Repairing Standard has required one or more RCDs rated at no more than 30 mA in the main consumer unit, normally covering the socket outlet circuit as a minimum, with the exact protection depending on the installation. Worth being precise about what that does and does not mean, because a lot of pages overstate it:
Peterhead itself, the harbour and Blackhouse industrial areas, and out through the Buchan towns and villages.
Testing on our Peterhead EICR page, general work on our Peterhead electrician page, car charging on our Peterhead EV charger page. Wider reading: EICR explained and when a rewire is the answer instead.
Don't see yours? Call 07304 027013 or get in touch. We come back the same business day.
Look for what the circuits sit behind. Ceramic holders with fuse wire, breakers with nothing that has a test button, two banks each behind a device with a test button, or every circuit on its own device with its own test button. Those four cover almost everything in Peterhead, and step one above tells you what each means.
No. The requirement for non combustible enclosures applies to what is installed now, not retrospectively to a board already on your wall. A plastic enclosure on its own is not a defect. If that is the only reason given on a quote, ask what the test results showed.
No. A dual RCD split load board remains compliant. Individual RCBOs are better because one fault then takes out one circuit rather than half the house, but that is an argument about consequence, not a legal requirement, and anybody telling you otherwise is overselling.
No. Amendment 4 was published on 15 April 2026 and becomes mandatory on 15 October 2026, but its main changes cover battery storage, functional earthing for ICT systems, Power over Ethernet and medical locations. None of those forces a domestic board upgrade.
No electrician can. The service cut out belongs to the network operator, which in the north of Scotland is SSEN, and only they may change it. Going up is a load increase application with its own process and timescale. We establish what you have, work out what you need and support the application.
It depends on why they trip. If several circuits share one RCD and the small leakages add up, then yes, individual RCBOs will fix it. If a circuit has genuinely degraded insulation, a new board will detect that fault more decisively, not less, and you will still need the circuit repaired. Testing first tells you which you have.
Yes, and this is a real difference rather than an upsell. Arc fault detection devices are required on socket circuits up to 32 A in HMOs, high rise residential, purpose built student accommodation and care homes, and only recommended in an ordinary dwelling. So a licensed HMO has a requirement the identical house next door does not.
No warrant is required to replace a consumer unit in an existing house. And to correct a common error: Scotland has no competent person scheme and no Building Control notification, because those are England and Wales mechanisms, as is Part P. Here it is the Building (Scotland) Regulations, with Aberdeenshire Council as the authority for Peterhead. The work must comply with BS 7671 and be certified.
A straightforward change is a single day, with the power off for most of it. You get the window in advance, and where a fridge or freezer needs to stay running we arrange a temporary supply.
You get told, with the reading that shows it, and it is quoted separately. A board change means taking responsibility for what the board protects, so we will not quietly energise a circuit that failed its test.
Call Steven directly on 07304 027013, message us on WhatsApp, or use the form. Tell us which of the four boards in step one looks like yours, and whether you are adding anything, a charger, a shower, a hob. Those two answers usually determine whether this is a board job, a supply job or neither. NICEIC approved, SELECT member, City and Guilds 2365-03 installation, 2391-52 inspection and testing, 2382-22 wiring regulations, £2M public liability insured.
Faithful Spark Electricians Ltd · Consumer unit upgrades across Peterhead & Buchan · NICEIC Approved Contractor · SELECT Member · City and Guilds 2391-52, 2382-22, 2365-03, 2921-34 · BS 7671 18th Edition · £2M public liability insured
