Electrical Appointment

More than one month ago we had our Electrical appointment. To be more precise, it was on the 19th March. That was a really long day. Having first our Aircon appointment at 9:30, then DiLorenzo (for tiles and carpet) at 11am and finally Clipsal at 2pm.


A little context:

Well before we requested the tender, we started drawing our  first electrical layout. We had a clear idea of what we want for our house. We are not really fussy about electricals, but we wanted to have at least the basics so we can install later the rest. Some decisions we made after give it a lot of thinking were:

1. We are not installing any LED for now. We will request only provision and install LEDs, pendant lights, and others after handover.
2. We are not going to make any special installation for the Home Theatre, we will rather put a big TV instead of a projector.
3. We will put the minimum number of data points, we decided to trust that WI-FI will improve even more in the  in the coming years. However, at the end during the meeting,  the consultant mentioned that we can return the included phone points and use that credit for Data points instead. We were happy to change them. So at the end we ended up with 5 data points.    

At tender stage we made a 3K allowance for electricals. I think, it is not too much, but by no means too little (at least not for me).

When we arrived to Clipsal, we met with our consultant Leah, she is such a nice girl!!

We sat for 1.5 hours with her, I can't imagine going to this appointment under-prepared, specially if you are not a sparky nor want to spend more money once you are in your new place. Even with all of this, we missed one light! luckily it wasn't an important one ( it was a light for a future artwork)

There was a clear difference with all other WH's providers in comparison with Clipsal. Previous to our appointment they called us to confirm the meeting time and give some details on how to arrive to their office. Then a couple of days after that we received (by mail) an envelope containing a booklet with all the products that Clipsal provides for homes, a complete price list and some maps and instructions on how to reach Clipsal and where to find the customer's parking. Additionally there was a copy of our home layout so we can start playing around with the distribution of lights, power points and others. They really do their homework.

I think that with the WH inclusions you will have a lot, but in the modern lazy world you are going to want more!!.

We basically added:

1.  A extra power point to all the rooms.
2.  Provision for LED to all the living areas.
3.  Change 2 power points to Saturn Horizon Silver (In the splashback in the Kitchen)
4.  5 Data point(only included one).
5.  We deleted 2 telephone points and got the credit, so we added more data points.
6.  8 Extra external lights. We have, as we called it, backyard and side yard.
7.  4 Square footer light for our staircase.
8.  2 Extra TV points (included 2)

At the end we exceeded our allowance. The total was $ 3717. This could have been less, at least for $ 210 (price of the 2 Saturn power points). But we are happy with that.

During the meeting we decided to change the orientation of our living room, thanks to Leah who made us realised our mistake. She was really good in pointing out improvements in location of lights and switches, safety and recommendations about the layout in general. However, you have to go prepared with clear ideas in mind about what do you want.

We left Clipsal extremely tired, but happy to finish with all the meetings (before the wrap up meeting). It was a very intense day.

Now, we need to start budgeting the inclusions we are planning to do after moving in. These are mainly LEDs, pendant lights, external lights and any other stuff we will need for replacing the basic bayonets/provisions that we requested in our electrical appointment. Ah.. and the most important a sparky to help us with the installations.

See you next time :)