Landlords: your EICR failed... the honest 28-day to-do list (no scare tactics)

You've had the five-yearly check done, and the report has come back stamped UNSATISFACTORY. If your stomach dropped at the word, you're in good company... a fair few of the landlords who ring me about this have already convinced themselves a five-figure fine is in the post. It almost never is. An unsatisfactory EICR is a to-do list, not a court summons, and if you work through it calmly you'll be fine.

(I won't re-explain what an EICR is or go through every code from scratch... I've covered the basics elsewhere. This is the "it failed, now what" version.)

What "unsatisfactory" actually means

An EICR comes back either satisfactory or unsatisfactory, and it's the codes against individual observations that decide which. Three of them make a report unsatisfactory:

• C1... danger present. Something on the installation is a risk right now... exposed live parts, that sort of thing. Rare, but it means action today, not in 28 days.

• C2... potentially dangerous. The bulk of real remedials. Not live-and-lethal this second, but it could become dangerous, so it has to be put right.

• FI... further investigation required. The inspector found something that needs digging into before it can be signed off either way.

Any of those three and the report is unsatisfactory... and that's what starts the legal clock. Which brings me to the bit people get wrong.

The 28-day clock... and the step most landlords miss

Under the Electrical Safety Standards in the Private Rented Sector (England) Regulations 2020, once a report is unsatisfactory you must have the remedial work (or further investigation) carried out within 28 days... or sooner, if the report specifies a shorter period. A C1 in particular shouldn't be sitting around for four weeks.

Here's the part that catches people out. Doing the work isn't the end of it. You then have to get written confirmation that the work has been completed, from the electrician who did it, and supply that confirmation, along with the report, to both your tenant and your local council, within 28 days of the work finishing.

That last handover is the step I see missed constantly. Landlords fix everything properly, breathe out, and never send the paperwork to the council. On paper, that's still a breach. So: fix it, get the written confirmation, send copies to tenant and council. All three.

(While we're on paperwork... you also owe the report itself to existing tenants within 28 days of the inspection, and to any new tenant before they move in.)

What genuinely has to be fixed... and what doesn't

This is where trust gets won or lost, so I'll be blunt. C1, C2 and FI are what you're legally required to act on. There's a fourth code (C3, "improvement recommended") and it is not a failure and does not have to be done. A report can be full of C3s and still be perfectly satisfactory.

C3s are genuine suggestions... often "this met the standard when it was installed, but here's how we'd do it now." Worth knowing about, sometimes worth doing when you've got the walls open anyway. But nobody can force you to do them, and a report should never be marked unsatisfactory because of C3s. If yours is, ask why.

About that headline fine... let's deflate it honestly

Yes, the penalties are real, and yes, they went up. Since May 2026, under the Renters' Rights Act, the maximum civil penalty for breaching these electrical rules is up to £40,000 per breach... raised from the old £30,000 cap, which is the figure you'll still see quoted all over the place. And they can stack: failing to get the EICR done, failing to give your tenant a copy, and failing to carry out the remedial work are each a separate breach, each capable of its own penalty. So the real exposure for a landlord who ignores the whole thing is worse than a single headline number suggests.

But read how enforcement actually works before you lose sleep. The council doesn't open your report, see "unsatisfactory," and post you a £40,000 bill. What happens is a remedial notice... a formal letter telling you to sort the work within 28 days. You get 21 days to make written representations if you disagree. Penalties come into play when a landlord ignores the notice, drags it out, or is a repeat offender. The eye-watering number is a ceiling for the worst cases, not the going rate for a genuine landlord who's a bit behind.

So the honest summary: don't be complacent, but don't panic-spend either. A landlord who quietly gets the C1s and C2s fixed and files the paperwork has nothing to fear from that headline.

The quieter reason to get it right: insurance

Fines aside, the one that actually catches landlords out is insurance. If there's ever a fire or an electrical injury and your insurer asks for a valid EICR you can't produce, or you can show the report came back unsatisfactory and you never acted on it, that's the kind of thing that gets a claim questioned. Keeping your certification current and your remedials done isn't just box-ticking; it's what keeps your cover meaning something.

My promise: I code to the standard, not to the invoice

Here's the suspicion I know some of you have, because I read the same landlord forums you do: that the electrician who fails your EICR is really just writing himself a shopping list. That a C2 is only a C2 because it pays better than a C3.

I understand why the worry exists, and I won't pretend it never happens. So here's how I work. I code to BS 7671, the actual standard, not to what I'd like the repair bill to be. If something's genuinely a C3, it goes down as a C3, and I'll tell you plainly you don't have to touch it. And if you ever want a second opinion on a report... mine or anyone else's... I'd encourage it, not sulk about it. A fair EICR survives a second pair of eyes. That's rather the point of it.

Most of my remedial work is the honest, boring stuff: a tired consumer unit with no RCD protection that codes as a C2, dodgy bathroom zones, no earth bonding to the gas and water. The natural home for all of it is a proper inspection and testing job, done straight.

A word for Slough landlords

If you let in Slough, you're in the busiest rental and HMO patch on my whole round... a lot of Victorian terraces in Chalvey and the town centre, 1930s semis, ex-council stock, plenty of it still on original boards that fail exactly the way you'd expect. A typical unsatisfactory report round here is an old rewireable fuse box, no RCD, and bonding that went missing when someone swapped the plumbing over to plastic years back. All fixable, none of it dramatic.

One moving target worth checking: borough-wide landlord and HMO licensing in Slough has been chopping and changing... the last schemes lapsed and the council has been consulting on bringing them back. Where that's landed by the time you read this I can't promise, so check the council's current position before you assume you do or don't need a licence. Whatever the licensing says, the EICR duty applies regardless.

If your report came back unsatisfactory

Send it over. I'll tell you honestly which items are C1, C2 or FI and genuinely need doing, which are C3s you can leave, and what the work involves... no scare tactics, no padding. You'll get the written confirmation for your council, done properly. Start with a free, no-obligation quote at https://bphelectrics.co.uk/ or give me a ring on +44 7722 132736. I'm a NAPIT-registered, family-run electrician covering Slough, Windsor, Maidenhead and the Thames Valley, and landlord remedials are bread and butter.