Appliance Testing

PAT Testing

Portable appliance testing for offices, landlords, HMOs, schools and workshops across Manchester, Tameside and Stockport. Every item inspected, tested and recorded, with a full asset register you can hand straight to a licensing officer or an insurer.

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The honest position on whether you need it

A lot of what gets said about PAT testing is wrong, and most of it is wrong in the direction of selling you more testing than you need. There is no law that names PAT testing, no legal duty to test every twelve months, and no requirement to label anything. The actual duty sits in the Electricity at Work Regulations 1989, which say electrical equipment must be maintained so that it does not cause danger. That is it.

What that means in practice is that the right interval depends on the equipment and the environment it lives in. A monitor that sits on a desk and never moves is not the same risk as an extension lead dragged round a workshop, and treating them the same is how people end up paying for testing that achieves nothing.

Where a fixed frequency does apply, it almost always comes from somewhere other than the law: an insurance policy, or a council licence condition.

Where it becomes a real obligation: council licences

This is the part that catches landlords out, because it varies by council rather than being national. If your property needs a licence, appliance testing may well be written into the licence conditions — and a condition has a date attached in a way that the general legal duty does not.

Across the areas we cover, the requirements genuinely differ. Manchester’s selective licence conditions require an original PAT certificate to be produced on demand where you supply appliances. Stockport asks for a PAT certificate alongside the EICR with an HMO licence application, and charges for an incomplete application. Trafford’s HMO standards specify annual testing. Tameside and Stockport run no selective licensing at all, so for most private landlords there the general duty is all that applies.

Council positions checked August 2026. Licensing designations change and conditions get updated, so confirm your own address and licence type with the council rather than relying on this page.

What we actually do on the day

Every item gets a visual inspection first, which is where most genuine faults are found — damaged leads, cracked plugs, the wrong fuse, strain relief pulled out. Then the electrical tests appropriate to that class of equipment, and the result recorded against the item.

You get an asset register listing everything tested and its result. That is the document that matters, and it is what people are usually missing when they arrive having previously paid someone who put stickers on things and left. If an item fails, we tell you what failed and why, and whether it is worth repairing or replacing.

Who asks us for it

Landlords and HMOs

Often a licence condition

Where a council licence requires appliance testing, it applies to what you supply — the cooker, the fridge, the washing machine — not to the tenant’s own things.

Offices and workplaces

Duty of care

The employer duty under the Electricity at Work Regulations applies to equipment provided for use at work, including the kettle and everything under the desks.

Schools and community buildings

Insurer-driven

Usually asked for by the insurer rather than by law, and typically covering a large, mixed inventory that nobody has a current list of.

Workshops and trade units

Higher risk, shorter intervals

Tools, leads and transformers in a working environment take more punishment, so they justify testing far more often than an office does.

Frequently Asked Questions

Not by that name, no. There is no law that says you must PAT test, no legal duty to test annually, and no requirement to put a label on anything. What does exist is a duty under the Electricity at Work Regulations 1989 to keep electrical equipment maintained so that it does not cause danger, and PAT is simply the usual way of showing you have done that. The duty is risk-based, so the sensible interval depends on the equipment and the environment.

Usually because of something other than the law itself. Insurers often ask for it as a policy condition, and several local councils make it a condition of an HMO or selective licence, which turns a risk-based practice into a fixed obligation with a date on it. Employers also use it to evidence their duty of care. All of those are real reasons; none of them is a statute that names PAT testing.

It scales with the number of items rather than a flat call-out. An office with a thousand items works out at a much lower rate per item than a rental property with ten, because most of the cost is in getting there and setting up rather than in the test itself. Tell us roughly how many items and what sort of site it is and we will quote it properly.

There is no legally fixed interval. A laptop in an office is a very different risk to a extension lead on a building site, and the guidance is to set intervals based on the equipment and how it is used. Where a licence or an insurance policy specifies a frequency, that is what you follow. We will tell you honestly if we think you are testing more often than you need to.

An asset register listing every item tested with its result, not just a sticker on the plug. That is the document a licensing officer or an insurer will ask to see, and it is the part people are most often missing when they come to us after using someone cheaper.

Yes, and for landlords and HMOs it usually makes sense to. The fixed installation and the appliances are two separate pieces of work with two separate documents, but doing them on one visit saves a second trip and a second disruption to your tenants or staff.

Related Services

EICR CertificatesLandlord Safety CertificatesCommercial Electrical InstallationsEmergency Lighting MaintenanceView All Services

Areas We Cover

We provide pat testing across Denton, Tameside, Stockport and the wider Greater Manchester area — find your local team below.

DentonAudenshawDane BankHaughton GreenHydeOldhamAshton-under-LyneStockportSalfordGortonOpenshawReddishBredburyRomileyMarpleWoodleyDroylsdenDukinfieldStalybridgeSaleBramhallTamesideGlossop
View all areas we cover

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