When it comes to working with electricity, it is best never to shortcut a job. Risking a fire in your home is not worth a quick fix D.I.Y. job, it is best to avoid electrical fires and rather call in a skilled electrician to troubleshoot and diagnose an electric problem in your home and have them repair the fault.

What is an electrical fault?

An electrical fault is when there is a disruption to the normal flow of the electrical circuit. It can involve any part of the house (or the entire home) from the main entry point of electricity into the house, to the wiring flowing through the circuits in the house, to the power sockets and electrical equipment.

Electrical faults can have harmful outcomes;

• The overload on the circuit could result in a fire or explosion.
• The short circuit could burn out an electrical appliance.
• The overload on a wiring circuit could melt a plug socket.
• The instability of the electrical circuit could leave your home with no power.

Types of electrical faults in a UK home

Power surges, which are often caused by external factors such as stormy weather or lightning damaging power lines, cause the power to trip and then when the person at home starts flicking the power on and off, causes an electrical power surge.

Light fittings, possibly a bad or corroded connection at the light fitting or light switch. If multiple light fittings are not working, then a fault in the electrical wiring circuit.

Light bulbs that keep needing to be replaced, if the wattage of the bulb in the fitting is correct, this could indicate poor contact between the bulb and lamp holder.

An appliance or plug socket giving off electric shocks, is due to faulty wiring or incorrect earth connection.

Circuit breaker that constantly trips, indicating there is too much current being drawn off the tripping circuit, possibly due to too many appliances connected to the circuit. Worst offenders are multi plug extension lead adaptors connecting many appliances to one socket.

An outdated DB board might not protect the home with a circuit breaker and leave a socket to burn out.

Badly ventilated or damp rooms can allow moisture to build up in plug points which can cause the wiring circuit to trip.

Old wiring, might not be able to handle the large consumption of output from all your home appliances (e.g. dishwasher, various TVs, washing machines…). Best is to have an electrician upgrade your entire wiring system including adding more plug sockets.

How to diagnose and troubleshoot an electric fault in a circuit?

An electrical fault can make itself known by tripping a section of electricity or worse, burning out an appliance or socket. When you have noticed that an appliance is no longer behaving as it should (perhaps a light is flickering) or if there is no electricity flowing to a section of the house, call an electrician immediately, describing the issue and have the electrician come through to investigate and find the cause of the issue, ready to repair the electrical fault.

If you are unsure what keeps tripping your mains switch, go to your distribution board (DB board) and switch off / flick down all the switches. Then slowly one at a time, push each one up, pausing before doing the next to give it a chance to trip, to work out whether the fault is limited to a circuit going to smoke alarms, sockets, showers, electric hob… or whether it is the entire circuit that needs a repair.

If your RCD is tripping, this indicates an electrical circuit fault and is usually due to a damaged electrical appliance that might need to be replaced or repaired.

Why do I have no power?

If you find yourself sitting in the dark, the first step is to look out the window and check to see if this issue is limited to only your house or if the street is without power. If it is the street, then there will be nothing for you to do but sit and wait for the power to be restored.

If the electricity fault is limited to your house only, it will be necessary to do some troubleshooting to investigate the cause of the electrical issue. Most often, the problem is either from an overloaded circuit, a short circuit or loose wiring.

An overloaded circuit will be made obvious if someone else in the house was drawing on electricity at the same time you were, perhaps using a hairdryer, while the washing machine was running, or using multi plug socket for the toaster and kettle at the same time as the dishwasher.

A short circuit occurs when a hot wire touches a neutral or ground wire. The extra current flowing through the circuit causes the breaker to trip or a fuse to blow. A damaged or frayed cord running to an appliance could cause this. You might see evidence of a short circuit with black burnt-out markings around a plug socket.

To find the cause of your power outage, try these easy three steps;

1. Unplug every appliance on the dead circuit and switch off every light switch. Once everything that normally draws power is switched off, flip up the tripped breaker switch.
2. If your power cuts immediately, the problem could be a short circuit. An electrician will need to investigate the wiring for bare wires or problem wiring.
3. If your power did not immediately trip, then switch on each appliance and light switch, one at a time, slowly. The minute the circuit trips again, you will have identified the faulty fuse or section of wiring for an electrician to repair.

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