Licensed Electricians for Kensington Homes

Two very different building stories share this postcode, and they go wrong in completely different ways.

The older core sits around Doncaster Avenue. Bungalows of the California type and Federation-era cottages went up through the first years of last century, brick and double brick, and a good number still run the layout the original sparky gave them.

Renovate one and the wiring sets your scope for you. Cabling that has gone brittle behind the plaster turns up the moment the walls are open, which is how a kitchen job becomes a rewire.

Then there is the density. At the 2021 census, close to 71% of dwellings here counted as flats or apartments, against roughly 21% standing as separate houses.

That layer stacks up along Anzac Parade: walk-ups, subdivided older buildings, and newer apartments dropped onto an early 1900s street grid.

Plenty of the flats carved out of those old buildings never received an RCD on a single circuit. The standards expect one now, and fitting them is board work rather than a plug-in accessory.

UNSW and NIDA set the tone here, and that shapes the electrical work as much as the brickwork does. Short tenancies, share houses and rented rooms mean a fault gets mentioned late, usually by somebody who does not own the place.

So two habits matter on this run. We test what is physically at the board instead of believing the label on the front of it.

And we put what we find in writing, so the owner, the agent and whoever actually lives there are all working from one version of events.

Beyond the housing story above, two faults account for most of the phone calls. Both go back to the year the place was wired:

The stock here arrived in three distinct pushes, and you can read which one a place belongs to straight off its switchboard.

The pre-1940 wave. Ceramic fuses, cotton-and-rubber era cabling, and a supply specified before most of these appliances existed. This is where rewires and board replacements land.

The 1960s to 1980s wave. The walk-up blocks. Circuit breakers are often present but RCDs frequently are not, and the board has usually been added to rather than planned, one circuit at a time.

The 2000s-onward wave. Newer apartments, including the housing built over the old Wills tobacco factory site by Raleigh Park. Compliant from birth, and the work here is far more often a new circuit for a charger, a data run, or lighting than a rescue job.

Knowing the wave tells us what to quote before we lift the cover. It is also why we do not price a Doncaster Avenue cottage and an Anzac Parade apartment off the same sheet.

1. You call and a real person answers the phone. Not a call centre. Describe the fault and you get an honest read on whether it is urgent or whether it holds until the week after.
2. The quote goes in writing. A fixed written price before we start, itemised line by line. The price is agreed before any work starts.
3. We do the work. Everything is tested before we sign off and the site is left clean. Notifiable electrical work is lodged with NSW Fair Trading.
4. The paperwork follows. A Certificate of Compliance for electrical work, your 12-month product warranty, and a lifetime workmanship guarantee standing behind the labour.