Why do I need an electrical certificate COC?

 What is an electrical compliance certificate?

My name is Rhulani Sambo, I am a qualified electrician based in Queenswood, Pretoria South Africa. I perform the following electrical services:

• Issuing of the electrical certificate (COC)
• Installation of plugs, geyser timers and lights
• Electrical maintenance of plugs and lights
• Installation of generators up to 10KVA
• Installations of uninterrupted power supply (UPS) using axpert inverter

I am the electrician near you and me, I cover most parts of Pretoria such as Pretoria East, Pretoria Central, Montana, Pretoria Moot and Centurion.

Feel free to contact me at 073 985 8226.

Most of us have never heard of a COC unless you are an electrician, or you want to sell your house.

And for many sellers, an Electrical certificate COC is associated with stress, frustration, and lots of money. And many have discovered that a beautiful well-maintained house is not a guarantee that a COC will be issued.

So, what is the Electrical certification of compliance (COC) and why do you need one?

An Electrical COC is an electrical certificate that shows that all the electrical work and wiring in your home meets the general electrical safety code, national electrical code and compliance standards set by law. In simple language, it means that whenever you switch on any electrical installation in your home such as lights swithch, plugs, stove or geyser you are safe from a mini-explosion or electric shock because all the house wiring has been tested and inspected by a qualified licensed electrician.

Usually, a broken or faulty plug or a light doesn’t bother most people. All of us at some stage in our lives have lived in a house with electrical problems, where light or a plug doesn’t work properly, and we continue to live with it. And then there is the one plug everyone is warned about and we avoid because every time some unsuspecting person uses it, it trips off the power of the whole house. And for some weird reason, we continue to live with the faulty plug and the faulty light fitting or switch.

It’s not really a problem until the property gets sold. Then you need to call a qualified electrician to check all your house electrical wiring. If your home electrical wiring, distribution board (DB) plugs, geyser, stove, lights circuits and light switches are all in order you sigh a huge sigh of relief. Y pay the certified electrician for electrical inspection and testing and the compliance certificate and move on to selling your home.

But if you have neglected your home electrical installations, it will cost you when the electrician comes to carry out inspection and testing of your house. Because before the electrical compliance certificate (COC) can be issued, all electrical faults must be repaired.

But how do you know that you’re not being ripped off? How can you check that the electrician is qualified and have the electrician wireman's license? How would you know that  he/she is a registered licensed electrical contractor with the South African department of labour?

Before you appoint the electrician to carry out the repairing work and issuing of the electrical certificate(COC) you need to know how much will it cost to do so. It's one of the most painful things when you pay a lot of money to an incompetent crook who charged you a fortune and left you with a mess. And that mess has to be fixed by a certified and licenced electrician that you have disregarded because you thought he or she was expensive, and you have to pay. Again.

The first thing you need to do when looking for an electrician to issue an electrical COC is to find out if they are, a qualified electrician. They should have a wireman's license card, and their registration document as an electrical contractor from the Department of Labour(ECB) to issue an electrical certificate of compliance.

There are many electricians but not all of them are qualified or certified to issue an Electrical COC. Only an electrician who has a wireman’s license card can sign off on an Electrical compliance certificate (COC).

There are three types of licensed electricians in South Africa,

• A Single-phase tester - the wireman's license card is blue in colour. This single-phase electrician can only test the electrical installations ( a normal house electrical distribution board(DB) with one phase and issue an electrical certificate of compliance (COC) for it.
• An Installation electrician must have a yellow wireman's license card. He or she can test and issue an electrician certificate (COC) for both the single-phase and a three-phase electrical installation e.g ( Industrial installations and commercial installations DB boards), but not specialised installations such as hospitals or places with hazardous chemicals etc.
• A Master electrician must have a red wireman's license card. The master electrician can test and issue an Electrical compliance certificate for all the above mentioned electrical installations and specialised installations.

It can also happen that an electrician is registered with the Department of Labour as an electrical contractor but his/her registration for that specific year has expired. Then their signature on the COC will be rendered invalid. So, it will be good for clients to demand to see the registration document from the Labour Department and the electrician wireman's license card.

You can call the Department of labour at 012 309 5022 if you are in Gauteng Province or call the office of the Cheif Inspector( National Head Office) at 012 309 4000 with the electrical contractor's GN number and the wireman's license number of the electrician to find out if he or she is registered for that specific year to issue an electrical certificate.

How do you know how much to pay and what questions should you ask when you book an electrician to do an Electrical compliance certificate (COC) for your house?

First, ask what is included in the price.

To issue an Electrician COC, every circuit breaker, plug point, light point and light switch must be tested and inspected with specialised electrical testing equipment. The DB board must be tested, together with the isolators of the geyser and the stove. Every single place in your home where electrical wires are coming from the distribution board (DB) needs to be tested.

Every fault must be identified and rectified before you get that yellow document, called an Electrical COC. Let me say that again, first, everything needs to be tested, then everything needs to be fixed, and only then will you get your COC. If there's even one thing that isn’t working you will not get it. This excludes your appliances like a stove, geyser, aircon, and gate motor because appliances are not part of the house wiring.

Many electricians will come and do the assessment and will only charge you once all electrical faults have been fixed and then you get issued with the Electrical certificate (COC).

You will be charged for the time the electrician spends at your property to inspect and test the electrical wiring and you will be charged for the material used and the time the electrician spend at the property repairing the faults.

So, what are the labour rates or cost for an electrician in South Africa e.g Pretoria, Centurion, Pretoria East, Midrand and Johannesburg? 

The electrician price for labour per hour ranges between R500 per hour to R750 per hour.[ As for the Electrical certificate of compliance (COC) price cost in Pretoria, Pretoria East and Centurion are from R980 for residential properties including flats and townhouses].

I strongly urge all clients to be very careful of the fly by night cut-throat electricians who claim to charge less than R800 for an Electrical compliance certificate COC. You will soon realise when they arrive that R500 or R650 quickly escalates to R2000 or even R3000. A lot of these electricians don't even do a proper job and leave you with more problems. 

Choose qualified and licensed electricians who guarantee their workmanship. Because some call themselves electricians but in reality, they are handymen. Big difference. Mostly you find them in local online directories. So, do your due diligence.

Be careful when your see prices like Electrical COC for R550 or R750. Check their credentials before you agree to anything, check their wireman's license and their electrical contractor's document from the department of labour to see if is valid for that specific year. You can even call the department. Unfortunately, there is a lot of untrustworthy, fly by night bakkie brigade in this electrical services industry. Some of these characters use stolen credentials and some their friend's credentials to issue the electrical certificates (COC).

In most cases that means that you will pay this R550 - R750 for the COC document then be billed again for the inspection and testing your house, thereafter you will be billed for every hour the electrician spends in your home, fixing the so-called "faults" and the material used. You will end up paying far more than the R550 or R750 which they lured you with. I can assure you that 9 out of 10 you won't pay the amount that they advertise. Instead, you will end up with a FAT BILL.

If everything is working and you only need a COC you will still pay for the time the electrician spends in your home. That is the ideal situation the homeowner is striving for. And some are seriously praying for because it can be quite costly to fix your wiring if you’ve never done so before.

How long is a COC valid?

A COC is only valid for two years, or when alterations have been done after the issuing of the electrical certificate of compliance. Other than that, every two years you must test the electrical installations (wiring) of your property. According to regulations every single building in South Africa needs to be issued with an electrical certificate every two years, as required by law. If this was really happening, all electricians with a wireman’s license would be dancing in the streets and think Christmas has come early.

The reality is that most people only look for a COC when they sell their property.  If you are a property owner or leasing (renting) a property, whether a residential property, shop or warehouse, you need a COC. If you have insurance on the building structure itself or the content inside the property and a fire breaks out in the building, one of the first things the insurance will ask is for the COC. If you don't have a valid COC you will run into serious problems and it will be a struggle to have your claim paid out. These are some of the most unpleasant surprises you only discover once you have to deal with an insurance company.

Here is what the law says about who is responsible for the electrical installation (Property)'''''Responsibility for Electrical Installations

(1) Subject to sub-regulation (3), the user or lessor of an electrical installation, as the case may be, shall be responsible for the safety, safe use and maintenance of the electrical installation he or she uses or leases.

(2) The user or lessor of an electrical installation, as the case may be, shall be responsible for the safety of the conductors on his or her premises connecting the electrical installation to the point of supply in the case where the point of supply is not the point of control.

(3) Where there is a written undertaking between a user or lessor and a lessee whereby the responsibility for an electrical installation has been transferred to the lessee, the lessee shall be responsible for that installation as if he or she were the user or lessor.

This is not the answer that homeowners generally expect to hear – even though there is no ambiguity about what the law state

• Subject to the provisions of sub-regulation (3) every user or lessor of an electrical installation, as the case may be, shall have a valid certificate of compliance for that installation in the form of Annexure 1, which shall be accompanied by a test report in the format approved by the chief inspector, in respect of every such electrical installation.

For most sellers, the uncertainty of not knowing what they’ll pay when the inspection and testing have been done is very stressful. And they get filled with extreme animosity towards the electrician, suspecting that they might get ripped off, without really knowing what they’re paying for.

I know that sinking feeling as someone is doing a job and you have to wait for them to finish before you know the cost. It is not a good feeling at all. And you know things have a habit of needing to be paid when you are at your most broke.

We like for you to know the cost beforehand. And we want you to know what you are paying for.

Our price is R1 350 to inspect, test, repair and issue a COC for Flats and Townhouses only. This includes labour, which is the time that we spend in your home. And if one of your plugs or your lights is not working, we fix it at no charge to you. And just because we like doing business with you, we will send you the COC free of charge. You don’t even have to pay the courier to get the COC to you.

But because we like to keep things simple we only do COC’s for townhouses and flats.

When you pay that R1 350, you don’t pay anything after that. That’s it.

But, the fee doesn’t cover isolators and circuit breakers.

But before you call anyone for anything, do your homework. Compare prices. Look at your options and then make a decision. And let be an informed decision.