Backup-Ready · Mid Somerset & Bath
A separate essentials board, a fail-safe changeover switch and an outdoor inlet, so your fridge, heating, broadband and medical equipment run from your generator, power station or home battery during a power cut. Designed, installed, notified and certified.
Part P
BS 7671
Why now
Since 13 August 2026 the Grid Code has included a written protocol, the Demand Control Rotation Protocol, for rota disconnection of demand as a last resort if supply ever runs short. Storms, flooding and faults already cause local power cuts. The real question is what you keep running when the lights go off. A generator through a window and a trailing lead is not the answer. A properly wired alternative supply is.
What we offer
Every job starts with a survey and a written plan. You buy the generator, power station, battery or UPS; we design and install the fixed wiring that lets it run your essentials safely. One clear price before any work starts; design and network operator applications on bigger jobs are shown as their own line.
We walk the property with you, agree what has to keep running, measure the load and check the supply, earthing and board. You get a one-page plan: what to keep alive, what to buy and the fixed price for the install. The survey fee comes off the job.
The core product. A separate consumer unit for the keep-alive circuits, a fail-safe changeover switch and an outdoor inlet for your generator or portable power station. Typically a single day on site.
Bought a battery that is designed to run the house on its own in a cut? We wire it to its transfer device and an essentials board, add the earth electrode and protection it needs, make the network operator application and certify it.
For broadband, a medical device or an alarm panel: a dedicated, labelled circuit fed from your UPS with surge protection at the board. The quickest way to stay connected, and it can grow into an essentials board later.
Generator changeover for shops, pubs, care homes, surgeries, village halls and farms: milk cooling, freezers, pumps, tills and chillers. Designed first, four-pole switching on three-phase, witnessed commissioning where the network operator asks.
The backup source itself, fuel and servicing. We tell you the output and connector it needs and test with your unit on the day. We do not install roof solar, and we do not touch the cut-out or the meter.
How it works
Done properly
An alternative supply changes how the earthing and protection behave. We test the essentials circuits on the mains and again on your backup source, record both, and leave a laminated card by the changeover so anyone in the house can do it at 2am.
Consumer unit upgrades →FAQ
Your home or premises keeps the things that matter running during a power cut, safely and without extension leads or fuse-pulling. We move the essentials onto their own board, fed through a fail-safe changeover switch. In a cut you plug your generator or power station into an outdoor inlet, turn the switch to BACKUP and the essentials come back on. The rest of the property stays off until the mains returns.
No. You buy the backup source. We design and install the fixed wiring, tell you the output it needs to have, and test the whole arrangement with your unit on the day. That keeps the price clear and lets you choose the unit that suits you.
No. Back-feeding a house through a socket is dangerous to you, to anyone working on the network and to the generator itself. A changeover switch that breaks the mains before it makes the backup, switching line and neutral, is the only safe way to connect an alternative supply. That is what we install.
Yes. An alternative supply that can never run in parallel with the grid is notified to the network operator, and they are offered the chance to witness the commissioning. A home battery that can run the house on its own needs an application before it is connected. We handle the paperwork and tell you which route applies before you commit.
Many grid-connected home batteries shut down when the grid goes off, because they are designed to work alongside it. Keeping circuits alive needs a unit that can run on its own, the right transfer device, an earth electrode and the correct protection on the backed-up circuits. We check what you have and tell you honestly whether it can be made to carry essentials or not.
Typically the fridge and freezer, the boiler or heat-pump controls and pump, the broadband router, one lighting circuit, the alarm panel and a labelled socket for anything medical. We measure the load of your essentials list so you buy a backup source that can start and run them.
Fuel generators stay outside, away from doors, windows and vents. Home batteries have location rules in dwellings: not in bedrooms, escape routes or lofts, with ventilation and clearance from fuel. We check the position at the survey before anything is bought.
Most domestic essentials-board installations are completed in a single day, with the paperwork, certificate and a demonstration of the changeover included. Commercial and farm changeovers are designed first and scheduled from the design.
No. We do not install roof solar and we do not supply batteries. Backup-Ready is the electrical side: the board, the changeover, the inlet, the earthing, the protection, the notification and the certificate.
More from DS Electrical Installations (SW) Ltd
Areas we cover
Get a quote
Tell us what has to keep running and what you have, or plan to buy, to run it. We'll book the survey and give you one clear price for the install and the certificate. Where a job needs a network operator application or a written design, that is priced as its own line so you can see it.
DS Electrical Installations (SW) Ltd will call you back to talk through the job.
