FAQ's

A portable appliance is a piece of equipment which weighs less than 18kg and is capable of being moved whilst in use or can be easily taken from area to area. Item such as vacuum cleaners, stereos, kettles etc fall into this bracket.

Hand Helf appliances are items such as drills, hair driers, and other such appliances that are held in the hand during use. This sort of appliance can hold the greatest danger as an electrical shock from a faulty appliance would travel down the arm passing close to the heart before earthing to ground. In cases like this it is often difficult to let go of the faulty item thus causing more injury.

This equipment weighs less than 18kg and is portable and not fixed in place. This covers such items as appliances on wheels and oil filled, microwaves, fans, mobile air conditioning etc.

These are appliances that are fixed in place which are not intended to move and exceeds 18kg in weight. Example of which are washing machines, tumble driers, fridges, large printers, air compressors, etc.

This covers any appliance that is fixed securely in place such as wall mounted storage heaters, extraction fans, hand driers etc.

These are appliances like a cooker, fridge, freezer, extraction hood and other such items which are built in to a unit such as in a kitchen. With this type of appliance they very rarely have outer casing meaning the electrical components are more easily accessible thus having more live parts that could cause an accident if not properly maintained..

IT. products such as computers, printers, fax machines, copiers, xbox, Playstation, telephones, chargers, etc

These are widely used and often abused. Leads & adapters are tested individually and must pass inspection.

Regulations state that items operating on less than 50 volts AC are classed as low voltage appliances and therfor testing is not required, appliances such as phone chargers, laptops and other low battery operated items fall into this category.