We're doing some renovations which involve adding new electrical outlets and switches, so we know we need a permit from the Electrical Safety Association in Ontario. Because we're doing the work ourselves, we'll have to get the permit ourselves, too. Have any of you ever gone through this process? The website is very confusing -- it talks about having to fax a request for a plan review to Cambridge, but also has an application for a residential inspection on another part of the site. Not sure which we have to do first -- or if we even have to have the plan review.
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Thanks, Dianne and Cherylallismom! It's good to hear that it's not too onerous a process. We are going to the town offices to apply for the building permits this Friday and not looking forward to that process. We especially want to go through the electrical inspection process for peace of mind in knowing that someone who has a good knowledge of this stuff has certified that we did it right. It's one thing to mess up on your drywall seams and quite another to do something wrong with your wiring!
Ours was 8 years ago now, so I don't remember the details around how we got the permit, etc. I do remember that the process was ever so much easier and more pleasant than the building permit / inspection process with the city. The electrical inspector was pleasant and professional to deal with. He noted several deficiencies on his first inspection and explained each one in detail - told us what we did wrong, and what we needed to do to fix it. He also pointed out things that we had done that were "right" but excessive, just for our general knowledge and education. (By contrast the city building inspectors would just say something was wrong. They said they were not allowed to tell us why it was wrong or what had to be done to make it right. Quite delightful, I must say!). Anyway, assuming you have a good electrical inspector I think you will come out of the process with a safe electrical installation and an expanded knowledge of how to do things well for next time!
We've done this.... After the inspection of your plan etc. then you must get a permit for the electrical if they are new installations. If you fail to get a permit they will disconnect your electricity. When you are finished the electrical work you must get an inspection before you close up any walls etc. If there are problems then the inspector must come back before you can close up any walls etc. Then you get a final inspection after the walls etc are closed up. While it's fine to do all of this yourself (we did) we also had a licensed electrician go through everything before it was inspected. This was an off-the-record look at by the electrican (who was a friend) but it did save us time. He found a few errors. We did not use the electrician's name at all with the safety association.. The permit was in our name totally. The inspector was very "picky" & VERY thorough whenever he came to inspect. He missed nothing!!! But that's a good thing when it comes to saftey! The codes seem to change often so you need to make sure that you have the newest version. They were also always over-booked so it did take some time to complete the first few steps.
Yes, it seems to be more onerous than just one inspection -- it looks like you have to get approval of your plans (which you also have to have approved by the town's building department) and then a rough-in and a final inspection. Same on the construction side. We want to do things the right way, but two separate plan approvals and four inspection by two different sets of inspectors seems like an awful ordeal to put people through when they're just doing a minor reno -- no structural changes or anything.
I will definitely call, but was hoping that someone here might have been through the process to give me an idea of how it went -- the authorities don't always tell you everything you need to know up front. Sometimes you find out by trial and error, which we were hoping to avoid.
Yeah, call and ask. I bet you have to have the inspection after you finish the work and get an approval sticker or something. That is what happens here but it's all part of the permit process vs being two separate things. I wonder if they have a separate inspection request for people who have insurance companies that want that sticker on new policies or something.