The Electricity (Consumer Safety) Act 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 administers a compulsory pre-sale certification scheme for specific types of electrical appliances, and a voluntary certification scheme for all other electrical products.

Fair Trading maintains records of electrical accidents and analyses them in order to improve the safety of electrical appliances.

Under electrical safety laws, some household type electrical articles are ‘declared articles’. They must:

• be approved by the Office of Fair Trading or equivalent
• be marked to show that approval
• comply with the required safety standard.

Approval scheme for electrical articles
Counterfeit powerpoints
Declared articles
Electrical goods