fitting a light?

LADY_A_5

me again lol

i have brought a lovely light for the frontroom ceiling, but it needs to be fitted professionally.

what sort of money am i looking at to fit it?

thanks

Ebe_Scrooge

It depends ! If you're simply replacing an existing fitting with a new one, then it's no more than 30 minutes work for an electrician. At the risk of being shot down in flames, this is actually something you can do yourself if you know a bit about electrics, or get a reasonably competent friend to do for the price of a couple of beers. However, if you're not sure then it really is worth paying a professional to do it for you.

If you're putting up a new light fitting ( i.e. there's nothing there at the moment ) then it'll involve more work. Generally it'll mean lifting some floorboards upstairs to run a wire from a suitable existing junction to the point where you want the light, then feeding the new wire down into the ceiling below. If this is the situation, then you can save money by lifting the floorboards yourself so that the electrician just has to run the wire and make the connections - if you want him to do it all, then of course he's got to charge for his time taken to do the donkey work as well as the skilled part of it :-)

LADY_A_5

hiya thanks for the reply
i live in a flat, there is a light there already, but the new light i have brought is massive and heavy, also bigger fitting wise then whats there already iyswim

maybe they will have to widen the existing light fitting hole to accomadate the new one and also its heavy with lots of wires.

i am clueless with these things my oh attempted but said he has never seen a fitting like it so has no idea other then to let a professional do it.

im really thinking about costs, maybe i should ring around for quotes.

Ebe_Scrooge

Definitely, if you're not sure it's wise to get a professional in to do it for you. Ring around for a few quotes ( I'm not sure what the going rate is for electricians these days ), but I can't see it being too expensive. The wiring itself will actually be pretty straightforward for someone who knows what they're doing, despite it looking like a nest of vipers ! In terms of the weight of the fitting, this won't be a huge problem, it's just a case of locating the joists and screwing it into them, rather than trying to screw into plasterboard ( this is what should be done anyway, but I've come across plenty of instances where the fitting has not been screwed into a solid surface ). Good luck :-)