Much ado has been made in the electrical press of late about the role of we electrical installers when it comes to basic ventilation in domestic dwellings. Generally, if I’m involved in a bathroom or kitchen fit-out, then I’ll install an extractor to remove the moisture and nasty niffs, however red-tape might make that more difficult going forward, and perhaps not wrongly, so this article tells you where I stand while you shower & shit.
Although it’s recently blown up like a fart in a pair of Speedos thanks to an eFixx video (see later), this issue is nothing new. Ventilation comes under two parts of the statutory building regulations: Part F - Ventilation Requirements to Maintain Indoor Air Quality, and perhaps to a lesser extent, Part C - Resistance to Contaminants and Moisture. Anything installed that shifts air around should meet the requirements set out by these documents, and the efficacy and function of any given installation will be skewed by factors such as room size, number/opening of windows, location of combustion appliances, use of room (wet room, bathroom, kitchen, utility), type of extraction system, filtration options, ducting, yada yada yada. You can download and read Parts F and C for yourselves as they’re publicly available from the government's Planning Portal.
Efficient ventilation through compliance with the building regulations is arguably more the responsibility of the architect, builder, bathroom/kitchen fitter, or whomever, as they should be designing their... uh... designs... around such. These cats perhaps don’t have to worry too much about Part-P (Electrical Safety), because the sparky they hire ought to be familiar enough with the requirements of that particular document. Where things are potentially getting unstuck however are us electricians being asked to install the likes of cooker hoods and bathroom fans which are traditionally seen as off-the-shelf DIY-store electrical appliances any ignorant asshole can buy, so it perhaps comes as a surprise that a bona fide spark may be held to account afterwards by Local Authority Building Control (LABC) when asked to prove and certify the efficacy of this equipment under Building Regulations Part-F.
That situation comes about because most sparks, myself included, aren’t terribly familiar with the building regs outside of Part-P, have never been explicitly trained in such areas, have no calibrated specialist equipment for measuring effectiveness of airflow or the like, and we hold no relevant accreditation.
To obtain all that, a dickhead such as myself would have to pay to attend a two-day course, fork out an extra 400-ish quid a year to the likes of NICEIC, and lose another day to a site assessment every so often - all quite outside of the usual hoops we already have to jump through for keeping our electrical work accredited. And just to install a basic trump-sucker onto your new bathroom wall!
I say ‘new bathroom wall’ because this is more about new builds – i.e., a new extension with a bathroom/en-suite, wet room, kitchen or utility. If you’re having a kitchen or bathroom remodelled in an existing dwelling, Part-F states the following:
“Where building work is carried out in a kitchen or bathroom, any existing fans (including cooker hoods, where they extract to the outside) should be retained or replaced. Appropriate checks should be made to determine whether any retained ventilation devices are working correctly.
If there is no ventilation system in the original room, it is not necessary to provide one in the refurbished room. However, additional ventilation may be necessary if refurbishment work is likely to make the building less compliant with the ventilation requirements of the Building Regulations than it was before the work was carried out.
If an extractor fan or cooker hood is replaced and it uses the existing cabling, this does not need to be notified to a building control body…”
The above assumes there are no combustion appliances, which would come under Part-J of the building regulations, and that is itself different kettle of friggin’ fish.
So, changing out your existing kitchen extractor or bathroom fan ought to remain a non-controversial exercise as far as LABC are concerned, however if your building work consists of a wholly new space for anything that might introduce dampness or degraded air quality, then the ventilation requirements will themselves require certifying and signing off for more than just their electrical connection alone… which is interesting as that’s been the case for a long time, since 2010 at least, but LABC and NICEIC generally haven’t been asking for specific certification for this sort of thing. They normally just wanted to see some active ventilation present so they could tick the box and move on to the next item from my experience.
Many a wholly new kitchen, bathroom, wet-room, en-suite and utility have I been involved with over the years with my builder partners, and in all those installs I’ve fitted what I believe to be a suitable extraction solution, be that one provided by the homeowner or builder, or one I have chosen myself. Ventilation however is a complicated beast to get right, and I'm really in no position to know or prove that I haven't cocked it up.
I always select what I believe are decent products from known makes and marques – none of this own-brand Toolstation type tosh that can’t suck a fart from outta your underpants at five paces. For anything with a bit of duct, I plump for an inline mixed-flow option. Is that enough? I always thought so, but fuck knows really because I’m not actually qualified and accredited to be making such judgements.
So, here’s the rub: I’m keeping calm and carrying on as normal without any additional courses, accreditation fees, assessments or equipment costs. If you, as the Duty Holder, be that homeowner, facilities manager, builder, fitter, architect or any other person appointing me for the electrical work, ask me to either source and/or install any airflow equipment for the purposes of extraction to minimise moisture or odours, then I will strive, as always, to fit suitable hardware in a suitable manner, whose electrical aspects will be certified, where required, under Part-P of the Building Regulations through my registration with NICEIC.
No change there then.
However, if the officious pricks at Local Authority Building Control rock up after the fact and demand additional certification under Parts F and/or C, or any other part of the Building Regulations, as current or under future amendments, for ventilation equipment, then let me state right now it will be the Duty Holder’s responsibility to ensure an accredited and competent third-party is appointed, at the Duty Holder’s own expense, to certify the airflow and equipment as being up to snuff… or sniff… if you will.
Should such an expert outfit deem my solution to be deficient, I would be prepared to work with the Duty Holder to address any shortfall of my own making, but only for any ventilation equipment I myself selected, supplied and installed. This does not extend to reparations for decorative damage, loss of business or any other direct or indirect consequence where changes are required. Equipment I was asked to bung in by any other party, whether I objected to its quality or efficacy at the time or not, is not my responsibility to rectify or replace in any way.
Ducting, venting, final positioning, airflow design, decorative covers, exterior vents/cowls and similar mechanical aspects of the installation dictated by the likes of an architect, builder, fitter, homeowner, manufacturer or any other third-party where I had no direct involvement in that design, or where my advice was overruled, is also not my responsibility.
Okay, I know this all sounds like I’m trying to pass the buck, but the simple point is this: why should it be the electrician’s problem? We get the kicking simply because the appliance has a bunch of wires and we’re the asshat's who hook it up, but there may be multiple parties involved from the fan manufacturer to the equipment supplier, architect, builder, interior designer, fitter and duty holder who each have a role to play. It’s not just the electrician’s problem simply because it happens to be an electrical appliance, and I’ll be damned if I’m making it wholly my headache merely for being the handsome chap who plugged it in.
From my personal experience, LABC have never asked me for certification outside of Part-P, but if they do so for something like this then I cannot provide it; and neither can most of my electrical compadres. If, as a Duty Holder, you’re not comfortable with this situation, then simply ask your chosen spark to provide nothing more than a supply of power, where needed, then go appoint a company that is accredited for ventilation, such as a HVAC specialist, to undertake installation and certification of the correct hardware for the job.
Sure, that’ll cost a fucking bomb, but it’s your predicament, not mine. This isn’t a situation of my making, nor is it my place to dictate how you go about hauling yourself out of a Building Control hole. I’m just informing you of the shit sandwich we all find ourselves taking a bite out of.
Ventilation is traditionally something we sparks haven’t devoted much time or thought to, domestically speaking at least. An extractor, be it kitchen, bathroom, gimp’s room or any other space in between is just that isn’t it? A fartbox fan on the wall or ceiling? Just grab one from ToolFix or ScrewStation and bollocks three-metres of flexi-duct onto the end of the bastard, yes??
Well, no, and rightly not. Ventilation is important for both health and hygiene; something that perhaps wasn’t accounted for so much just a few years ago. With tragic deaths appearing in the press more recently from people whose walls are sprouting spores and whose carpets have toadstools growing out of the shagpile, the topic is more to the fore than ever before.
Even then though, I object to anyone pointing illness or loss of life squarely on the sparky. I could install a completely compliant ventilation system as specified by a property landlord in accordance with all the regulations in the world, but it’s for nought if the tenant chooses to switch it off or defeat/disable its effectiveness. I’ve been to houses where there’s heavy use of cooking/washing facilities, yet the extract isolator is off. It’s the same with smoke alarms where such has been covered over or removed so as not to interfere with vapes, ciggies or, for all I know, an indoor barbecue. If someone is going to block trickle vents, keep windows closed, disable extractors, stuff draught excluders under doors and yet run a pressure cooker, washing machine and a clothes dryer for hours on end in the middle of a wet November, then I can’t design or install against all their stupid.
Extraction has to be done right and I don’t begrudge there being courses specifically designed to teach that. What I can’t stomach is paying NICEIC more money and being put through further indignity… sorry, I mean, “assessments”, to ensure I’m trying to do the job diligently when what really both salts and, indeed, peppers the skidmarks within my undercrackers is that these rules and regs only take effect where LABC know something is happening.
Most kitchen and bathroom fitters operate wholly under the radar of Parts F, C *and* P of the Building Regulations, and what LABC don’t know about, they won’t chase up. We legitimate sparks face this problem exactly because we are legitimate and we’re trying to do a decent job under the spotlight of the likes of NICEIC and LABC. The unaccredited go unnoticed and face no scrutiny or repercussions.
So, yeah. Part-F…
That “F” is for “Fuck you” if you want certification from me that will satisfy LABC for the effectiveness of any kind of extraction system. So, do bear that in mind if asking me to install such on your new kitchen, bathroom, en-suite, utility room, sex dungeon or whatever.
To educate yourself further, I recommend this video from eFixx where Envirovent were the guests. You can skip the non-technical sections, this is a very good presentation...
..unlike this presentation which is me and the Electrician's Podcast lads loudly moaning about the issue (and a few others). Warning: this one contains several C-bombs:
AFF1