Glastonbury has plenty of flats over shops, rented cottages and holiday lets, and in homes like these alarm work usually comes up at a predictable moment: after an inspection report, before a new tenancy or when a tenant reports a fault. We fit mains-powered Aico alarms linked by radio, test each one and certify the electrical work. Every job is quoted individually, at a fixed price in writing.
Plenty of the flats along the High Street and the streets off it sit above a shop, a cafe or an office. The flat is somebody's home, and its alarms are domestic ones: a detector on the ceiling of each key area, mains-powered with a sealed back-up battery, linked so that they all sound together. That is a BS 5839-6 Grade D system, and it is what this page is about.
The shop below and any shared entrance or stair are a separate matter. Where a building needs a panel-based fire alarm with zones and call points, that is a different kind of system, covered on our fire alarm page for Glastonbury.
For the flat itself, the layout is usually short and simple:
In an open-plan flat where the kitchen and living room are one space, we look at where the cooking happens and where the escape route is before choosing between heat and smoke detection.
Alarm upgrades and electrical inspections often go hand in hand. A landlord has the five-yearly report done, it lists remedial work, and while we are putting that right the alarms get brought up to date as well.
A town-centre flat this year is a fair example. We traced and cured a low insulation resistance reading, replaced a broken socket and its back box, swapped a mains smoke alarm that needed replacing, and added a heat alarm in the kitchen that had never had one. Everything was then re-tested so the paperwork reflected the finished installation.
Doing the two together saves a second visit and means the tenant only has to give access once. Timing matters too: under the 2020 electrical regulations for rented homes, remedial work the report calls for has to be done within 28 days, or sooner if the report says so.
A studio flat over a shop and a shared house need very different systems, so we don't publish a price list. The price depends on the number of rooms and storeys, which alarms are needed and whether the interlink is RadioLINK wireless or hardwired, which in an occupied flat usually adds labour. Any remedial work from an EICR is quoted separately. We survey first, then give you a fixed written quote.
The medieval and Georgian cottages in the town centre, and the houses climbing up through Bove Town, often have low ceilings, small rooms and one narrow, steep staircase. That staircase is the only way out of the upstairs, so the alarm plan is built around it: smoke detection at the bottom and at the top, heat in the kitchen, and carbon monoxide wherever there is a stove or boiler.
Low ceilings bring their own detail. Alarms need to sit clear of walls and beams so smoke can reach them, and in a cottage with exposed timbers we choose positions carefully rather than putting the alarm wherever the old one was.
Victorian and Edwardian terraces further out are more regular. Two floors, a hall, a landing, a back kitchen, often a boiler in the kitchen or a cupboard off it. Our three-bed package suits most of them.
In these occupied houses we usually suggest RadioLINK, Aico's wireless interlink. Each alarm still takes a mains supply, but there is no cable to pull between floors, which matters in a cottage where the floor above is also the ceiling below.
Not every job is a quick swap. One Glastonbury property this year needed its fire detection extended to meet a fire safety requirement placed on it, and we took it to five mains-powered, wirelessly interlinked alarms covering the hall, the landing, the living room, the kitchen and the utility room.
Wireless interlink is what made that practical in a lived-in house. Each new alarm needed a local supply and a careful position, but none of them needed a cable to the others.
On larger houses, and on any shared house, we design the system room by room rather than working from a package. Houses in multiple occupation get a full design and installation, quoted once we have seen the property.
Recent jobs, with addresses and names left out.
For private landlords in England, the Smoke and Carbon Monoxide Alarm (England) Regulations 2015, amended in 2022, set the minimum. In short:
The regulations do not insist on mains power. We still recommend mains alarms with sealed batteries, because a tenant cannot take the battery out of one.
Holiday lets should have the electrical installation inspected and tested at least every five years. For the wider landlord picture, see our landlord compliance page for Glastonbury.
Mains alarms are part of the fixed wiring, so the work is tested and certified to BS 7671:2018+A4:2026. A new circuit gets an Electrical Installation Certificate; an addition to an existing circuit gets a Minor Electrical Installation Works Certificate. Notifiable work is registered under Part P through NAPIT. We also leave a list of where each alarm is and when it was made, so its 10-year replacement can be planned.
That paperwork covers our electrical work only. It is not a fire safety approval of the flat or the building. More about our work in the town is on our Glastonbury page.
Leave your details and a line about the job. We will ring you back to talk it through and arrange a survey or a written price.
If the flat is let as a private tenancy in England, the smoke and carbon monoxide alarm rules apply to the flat in the same way as any other rented home, along with the five-yearly electrical inspection. The shop below is a separate question. Where the building needs a panel fire alarm, that is a different kind of system from the domestic alarms we fit in the flat.
Treat it as a reported fault, because the regulations require landlords to repair or replace an alarm once a tenant reports a problem. Chirping can mean the alarm has reached the end of its life or has a fault. Send us the manufacture date from the back of the alarm if the tenant can read it, and we will tell you whether it needs replacing on its own or alongside the rest.
Gas cookers are specifically excluded in the landlord alarm rules, so a gas hob alone does not require one. If the flat also has a gas boiler, a gas fire or a wood burner in a room used as living accommodation, that room needs a carbon monoxide alarm. A combined heat and carbon monoxide alarm can cover a kitchen that contains a boiler.
Yes. With RadioLINK wireless interlink there is no cable to run between rooms, so the disruption is limited to fitting each alarm and connecting its supply. We arrange access with you or your letting agent and test every alarm, including the interlink, before we leave.
We test every alarm when we fit it, and check that pressing the test button on one sets off all the others, so you know the interlink works. After that, pressing the test button on any alarm should sound the whole system. Landlords must check the alarms are working on the day each new tenancy starts, and our written list of positions and dates makes that check quick.
Priced by the job, not by the hour. A written, fixed price after a survey, NAPIT certification on every notifiable job.
07889 334849