Broadstone, Corfe Mullen and Creekmoor
EICR Broadstone: wiring checks for homes built across a hundred years
Broadstone EICRs from £160
Broadstone has a bit of everything. Big older houses near the Broadway, roads of 1960s and 1970s family homes, bungalows, and newer closes on the old edges. Each age has its own weak spots, and the report names them in plain words.
Jump to: Cost · The village · Four ages of house · Extensions and chargers · Letting · Buying and selling · Corfe Mullen and Creekmoor · On the day · What is checked · Your result · Questions
How much a Broadstone EICR costs
Our price follows your circuit count and nothing else. The size of the garden, the number of bedrooms and the road you live on make no difference. Two homes with the same board pay the same.
| Circuits on the board | Often found in | Fixed price |
|---|---|---|
| 6 or fewer | Flat above the Broadway or a retirement apartment | £160 |
| 7 to 10 | Bungalow or three bedroom estate house | £210 |
| 11 to 15 | Extended family home with a garden room | £265 |
| 16 and up | Large villa, annexe or a home split into flats | £345 for the first 16, and £20 per circuit beyond |
Count every breaker or fuse that powers part of the house. Leave out the big main switch and any surge protector. If you have a second board in a garage or annexe, add its circuits on. Send us a photo first if you would rather we counted.
Got a fuse box with wire fuses? £675 replaces it, with the EICR included
A new consumer unit with surge protection, fitted, tested and reported on in one job. Read more about it on the fuseboard changes page. You never have to change a board to get an inspection.
A railway village that kept its own centre
Broadstone grew up around a railway junction in the late Victorian years, well before Poole spread out to meet it. The line closed in the 1960s and part of the old route is now the Castleman Trailway, the path walkers and cyclists use between Broadstone and Merley.
What it kept is a proper centre. The Broadway still has its own shops, cafes and flats overhead, and the houses fan out from there to the golf course and the heath on one side and toward Creekmoor and Fleets Corner on the other.
For us that matters because the housing changes from one road to the next, and so does what turns up on a test. Broadstone is one of the shortest trips we make from Pete's base in Poole.
Four ages of Broadstone house, and what each one hides
The older villas. The larger houses near the Broadway and the old station area date from the village's first growth. Most have been rewired at some point, but the work was often done room by room. Look out for two styles of cable meeting in one ceiling, and lighting with no earth wire where the earliest rewire stopped.
Post-war estates. The roads of semis and detached homes built from the 1950s to the 1970s make up much of Broadstone. Their original wiring used plastic cable that still tests well in many homes. Their weak point is usually the board: an old unit with rewirable fuses and no RCD, or a split board where some circuits are protected and others are not.
Bungalows. Broadstone has its share, many lived in by the same owners for a long time. Most of the cables run through the loft, so that is where we look hardest, especially under deep insulation.
Later closes. Homes from the 1980s onward tend to have better boards and earthing from the start. What we find there is usually newer: extra circuits for an extension, a car charger or solar panels added by different installers years apart.
Extensions, garden rooms and car chargers
Broadstone gardens are generous, and owners use them. Over the years that brings a long list of additions to the wiring:
- Kitchen and rear extensions. A new kitchen often brings an induction hob, an oven and sometimes heated floors, all heavy loads. We trace which circuit feeds each one and test that the cable size matches its breaker.
- Garden offices and summer houses. A cable run under the lawn to a garden room should be the right type, buried properly and protected at the board. Some are not, and the report says which.
- Electric car chargers. A charger draws a heavy load for hours at a time. We confirm it has its own circuit and suitable protection, and that the earthing arrangement suits it.
- Solar panels and batteries. These feed power back into the house. We note how they connect and make sure the board is labelled so nobody gets a surprise when they isolate it.
Letting a home in Broadstone
Rented homes in Broadstone are mostly family houses, bungalows and flats around the Broadway, let as whole homes. Under the 2020 private rented sector regulations each one needs a satisfactory EICR at least every five years. Hand a copy to your tenant within 28 days, and send one to the council within seven days if it asks.
Shared houses with rooms let separately are far less common here than in parts of Bournemouth. Where there is one, it goes on the 16 and up row, with every board counted. Landlords and agents with homes across Poole can see how we handle keys, tenants and repeat dates on the landlords and letting agents page.
Buying or selling in Broadstone
Family homes here change hands often, and buyers increasingly ask what state the wiring is in. A recent report answers that with a list of findings and prices, which is more use to both sides than a line in a survey.
If you are selling, testing before you list means there is nothing to discover later. If you are buying, see if the seller will let us in before you exchange contracts. Either way, our buying and selling page explains the timing, and owner occupiers can read more on the home owners page.
Corfe Mullen, Creekmoor, Merley and the heath
We cover every road around Broadstone, not just the BH18 postcode. Corfe Mullen, to the west, is a large village of mostly post-war housing and bungalows, with some older cottages on its edges. Creekmoor, to the south, is mostly newer estate housing with plenty of families and some rented homes. Merley, to the north on the way to Wimborne, is mostly estate housing with a few older roads. Canford Heath and Upton are a few minutes on, and we cover them too.
Homes in Poole itself are on the Poole EICR page, and the streets nearer the harbour are on the Parkstone page.
What happens on the day
We arrive at the agreed time, look at the board, and confirm the circuit count and price before any testing starts. Then we work room by room, and we tell you before each short power break so you can save work on a computer.
Smaller homes usually take a morning. A large house with a garden office and a car charger can take most of the day. Before we leave, we talk you through what we found.
What we check, and what falls outside the report
The report tests the permanent wiring and judges it against BS 7671, the wiring rules used across the UK. In a Broadstone home that covers:
- The board: its age, its enclosure, and the protection on each circuit.
- Insulation tests that pick up worn or damaged cable before it causes a fault.
- Loop readings to prove a fault would be cleared quickly.
- RCD trip times, measured with an instrument, not just a press of the button.
- Main bonding on the incoming gas and water pipes.
- Accessories, with a sample of sockets, switches and joints opened up.
Left out: anything with a plug, which is a separate test known as PAT, and gas, boilers and plumbing. Hidden cable is tested, but we never lift floors or open walls to see it.
Each test is explained in full on what an EICR is.
Understanding your result
Page one states the result: satisfactory or unsatisfactory. Every observation inside has one of these codes:
- C1 Danger present. A real risk of harm right now. We make it safe on the spot, and the result is unsatisfactory.
- C2 Potentially dangerous. Fine today, but one further fault would turn it into a risk. Unsatisfactory until put right.
- C3 Improvement recommended. Safe, but behind today's standard. C3 items alone never make a report unsatisfactory.
- FI Further investigation. Something we could not get to the bottom of during the visit. Unsatisfactory until traced, and priced on its own.
Post-war homes in Broadstone often pick up a C3 or two for an older board. Treat those as advice, not a failure. Each C1, C2 or FI comes with a written price, and you choose who fixes it. Let us do the repairs and we retest and update the report at no extra charge. The inspection fee does not change with the result, so nothing is ever coded to create work.
Broadstone EICR questions
What people in Broadstone and the villages beside it want to know before they book.
Do you cover Corfe Mullen and Creekmoor too?
Yes. Broadstone, Corfe Mullen, Creekmoor, Merley, Canford Heath and Upton are all within easy reach of Pete's base in Poole. Every one of them is priced from the same circuit table.
My house was built in the 1960s. Does it need rewiring?
Not necessarily. Many homes from that time still have wiring that tests well. The board is more often the weak point, especially if it has rewirable fuses or no RCD. The report tells you which parts are fine and which need attention, so you only pay for what is really needed.
We have a garden office with its own cable. Is that included?
Yes. If it is supplied from the house, it is part of the installation. We test the cable, the protection at the board and the sockets and lights inside the garden office, and its circuits are counted in the price.
Do you check electric car chargers?
We check the circuit that feeds the charger: its protection, its cable and the earthing arrangement it relies on. The charger's own software and the vehicle are outside the report.
I rent out a bungalow in Broadstone. When is the next report due?
Look at the date on the last report, as it states when the next inspection is needed. For a let home that is never more than five years. If you cannot find the old report, book a fresh one and you start the clock again.
Should I get a report before selling my Broadstone home?
It often helps. A recent report lets you deal with anything serious before buyers find it, and gives your agent a clear answer when the wiring comes up. If you would rather not do any work, the report still lets you price it honestly.
How long is the report valid for?
For a rented home, five years at most, or sooner if the inspector recommends it. Owner occupiers usually work on a ten year gap, plus a new report whenever the house is sold. The report itself gives the date the next one is due.
What if there is a second board in the garage or annexe?
We add its circuits to the main board's and price the total from the same table. Past sixteen, every further circuit has its own fixed price in the table, and we agree the figure before testing begins.
Our RCD keeps tripping. Is an EICR the right booking?
Probably not first. A tripping RCD is a fault, and a fault finding visit is built to find the reason quickly, leave the house safe, and give you a repair price in writing before we go.
Our fault finding visit is a fixed £149.
Book a Broadstone EICR
Choose the number of circuits and the quote page shows your fixed price. Send it over and we come back with dates, fitting around the school run, a tenant or a sale deadline.