Commercial COC

[ians]

Your customer rents a property in a building with 10 other shops ... your customer (the tenant or lessee) contacts you and requests that all the light in the shop are replaced with LED.

So before we go into the COC ... if you modify the existing lights and fit LED replacement tubes ... the challenge already starts ... firstly you have to dispose of the gas filled tubes ... then you need to ask your yourself if you are allowed to modify the fitting ... lets leave this right here.

You head out to site and notice a few non compliant issues .. .and you havent even opened the DB or the ceiling boards ... and you can feel the heat on the outside of the Sub DB.

First question to your customer ... do you have a "valid" electrical certificate of compliance for the shop ... NO.

Sorry I cannot work in the shop until a "valid" COC is provided ... the customer says screw it I will find another electrician ... you leave.

Or maybe not ... maybe the customer has had enough of all the electrical issues in the shop and they have only been in the shop a couple weeks.

The customer contacts the landlord and requests a "valid" COC ... the landlord sends the property broker around and advises your customer the tenant that no COC is required because there is a COC for the entire building.

NO problem ... show us the part of the COC that is relevant to the shop.

Thats were the fight starts............................................ ..........

[ians]

So lets clear up a few things before we continue ...

The user ... who is the user ? ... there seems to be a bit of confusion with regards the definition of the word user ... who by the way as we all know is the responsible for the safety of electrical installation.

So is the lessee the user or does the lessee only become the user if they use the property to generate an income ... workshop or if you sell products or maybe make and sell products ?

Do tenants renting commercial properties automatically become the "user"

Can someone please clear up the definition "user".

[ians]

If you share a building with other tenants and there is only one meter and the power supply and bill is split between the tenants ... then maybe 1 COC for the entire building is ok ?

However as soon as you are allocated a meter and a DB specific for your shop/workshop ... do you become the user (responsible) and a COC must be provided for the shop/workshop ?

[Dave A]

One question to ask in trying to split responsibility across different parties is where is the point of control for the points of consumption within the particular tenant's unit?

My difficulty with the "user or lessor" bit is it doesn't prioritise one over the other. Perhaps the intent is that the tenant says "I am not going to use that electrical installation until the lessor provides me with evidence that it is compliant and safe."

[ians]

The way I see it ... if the tenant shares a power supply with the land lord ... the landlord has a COC and is responsible for the electrical installation.

As soon as a pre paid or any form of metering is installed at a main or sub DB .... from the metered point ... the tenant lessee becomes the user.