Electrical articles

The Electricity (Consumer Safety) Act 2004 requires that electrical appliances must be designed and manufactured so that they will not, in normal use, result in electric shock, injury or death to the user, or fire damage to the user’s property.

The Office of Fair Trading, through the Energy and Utilities Unit of the Home Building Service, administers a compulsory pre-sale approval process for specific types of electrical articles known as ‘declared articles’ and a voluntary approval process for all other electrical articles referred to as ‘non-declared articles’.

The Energy and Utilities Unit also investigates complaints and accidents relating to the failure of equipment or installations and conducts audits and proactive marketplace checks to detect the appearance of unsafe or unapproved electrical appliances or products, including items sold online.

The following pages provide more information on these topics.

Approval of electrical articles
Operating an approval scheme for electrical articles
Counterfeit powerpoints
Safe electrical goods
Unapproved electrical goods