Around £525 on average in the UK, with most jobs landing between £350 and £750 for the board and the labour together. Board size moves it more than anything else, London adds roughly a fifth, and the job is notifiable work under Part P in England and Wales, so it ends with a certificate rather than just an invoice.
The headline figure is an average of £525, with a normal band of £350 to £750 including the unit and the electrician. Price by size:
Source: MyJobQuote, Consumer Unit Replacement Cost Guide (UK prices 2026), checked 4 August 2026.
A second guide prices the same job by the number of ways on the board, with VAT included, and gives the time each size takes. Outside London:
The same board sizes in London:
Source: Housekeep, fuse box replacement cost guide, checked 1 May 2026.
These are market estimates from cost guides, not tariffs, and the two guides do not agree to the pound. Treat the overlap as the sane range and let local quotes settle the rest. If quotes for your job sit far apart, the reasons quotes differ covers what usually explains it.
How many circuits the board carries
Every circuit needs its own protective device, its own termination and its own test. That is why the same job runs £350 to £500 at 6 circuits and £610 to £850 at 12.
Source: MyJobQuote, listed in full at the bottom of this page.
Which type of unit you fit
Supply-only prices for a 10 circuit board: £35 to £80 for a basic or part-populated unit, £80 to £150 for a dual RCD split load board, and £150 to £300 or more for a high integrity or full RCBO board. The board itself is the smaller half of the bill.
Source: MyJobQuote, listed in full at the bottom of this page.
Labour time and the hourly rate
Electricians quote £45 to £75 per hour or £220 to £350 per day, and a straight replacement takes 4 to 8 hours.
Source: MyJobQuote, listed in full at the bottom of this page.
Where you live
London sits about 23% above the UK middle, while the North West and North East sit about 9% below it. A second guide puts the same gap at roughly 20%: £300 to £850 in London against £250 to £650 outside it, both including VAT.
Sources: MyJobQuote and Housekeep, listed in full at the bottom of this page.
Who buys the board
An electrician who supplies the unit himself typically adds 20 to 25% on top of the trade price. Removing and disposing of the old board is a separate £70 to £150, and relocating the unit to a new position starts at £300 to £600 and climbs from there.
Source: Housekeep, listed in full at the bottom of this page.
Whether it is an emergency
A call-out after a failure costs around £160 for a minimum of two hours, then £50 to £80 per hour. Planning the work instead of waiting for it is the cheapest saving on this page.
Source: MyJobQuote, listed in full at the bottom of this page.
What the pre-checks turn up
An EICR inspection beforehand runs £120 to £300 in 2026. It is money spent to find out whether the installation can take a new board, because anything it fails on has to be put right before or during the swap.
Source: MyJobQuote, listed in full at the bottom of this page.
A 2025 guide puts the usual all-in price at £500 to £600, labour at £40 to £80 per hour or £150 to £250 per day over 3 to 6 hours, and removal of the old board at £150 to £200. The direction of travel between that guide and the 2026 figures above is upward, which is worth knowing before you treat any single range as settled.
Source: PriceYourJob, consumer unit replacement cost, guide dated 12 September 2025.
Day rates and hourly rates are the part most people cannot sanity check: what an electrician charges per day puts the labour in context. If you want to see how the labour sits inside a whole project instead of a single day, the cost calculator puts a range on the work as a whole, and rewiring costs covers the bigger job this one is often bundled with.
This is what separates a consumer unit swap from a job you can simply book and forget. In the NICEIC wording: "The replacement of a consumer unit in a dwelling in England and Wales is notifiable work and must be certificated for compliance with Part P of the Building Regulations."
Source: NICEIC technical guidance, Replacing a consumer unit in a dwelling (via Professional Electrician), published 19 February 2021.
Electrical Safety First puts it the same way: "Replacing a consumer unit in domestic premises in England or Wales is notifiable work under the Building Regulations."
Source: Electrical Safety First, Best Practice Guide 1 (reproduced on Voltimum UK), checked 13 August 2026.
The job ends with an Electrical Installation Certificate (an EIC, or a DEIC for the replacement of a distribution board), carrying the test results and the inspection and test schedules.
Source: NICEIC technical guidance, Replacing a consumer unit in a dwelling (via Professional Electrician), published 19 February 2021.
Part P sits in Approved Document P, 2013 edition, the building regulation in England covering electrical safety in dwellings. It sets out which work has to be notified.
Source: GOV.UK, Electrical safety: Approved Document P, edition 2013.
Practical version: before anyone starts, ask how the work will be notified and which certificate you will receive, and keep that certificate with your paperwork. Building regulations sit alongside planning rules rather than inside them, which is the same split explained in planning permission versus building regulations.
A new consumer unit only makes sense on an installation that can carry it, so a competent electrician inspects and tests first. That is also where surprise costs come from: anything that fails here has to be put right.
Sources: Electrical Safety First, Best Practice Guide 1 (reproduced on Voltimum UK), checked 13 August 2026; NICEIC technical guidance, Replacing a consumer unit in a dwelling (via Professional Electrician), published 19 February 2021.
Replacement is called for when the unit is damaged, when it has been made unusable by overheating, or when it is in a dangerous condition with exposed live parts.
The counterweight most quotes leave out, in the Electrical Safety First wording: "a consumer unit need not be replaced simply because it has rewireable fuses, cartridge fuses or older-type circuit-breakers, as these devices can provide satisfactory overcurrent protection".
The absence of RCD protection, or a plastic enclosure, does not force a replacement on its own either.
Source: Electrical Safety First, Best Practice Guide 1 (reproduced on Voltimum UK), checked 13 August 2026.
Cost guides list the signals that tend to put people in front of an electrician. Read them as a reason to have the installation looked at, not as a verdict on your board:
Source: MyJobQuote, Consumer Unit Replacement Cost Guide (UK prices 2026), checked 4 August 2026.
Since January 2016, consumer units in dwellings have been manufactured from non-combustible material. The aim is to contain a fire that starts inside the enclosure and to avoid the toxic gases a plastic case gives off, which is why a new board is usually a metal one.
RCDs are, in the IET wording, "thousands of times more sensitive than circuit-breakers or fuses". An RCBO combines earth fault and overcurrent protection in a single device, so protection sits per circuit rather than shared across several.
Owner-occupied homes: an inspection of the installation at most every 10 years. Rented homes: every 5 years, or at a change of tenancy. The RCD itself gets tested with its own test button every 6 months.
Source: IET consumer guidance, Consumer Units, checked 13 August 2026.
I sell no leads and take no commission from electricians, so the ranges here follow the sources rather than a booking. Prices from commercial cost guides are estimates of the market, and the regulatory points come from NICEIC, Electrical Safety First, the IET and GOV.UK. This is guidance to take into a conversation with a qualified electrician, not a substitute for one.
About £350 to £750 for most homes, averaging around £525, with the board and the labour both in that figure. Size drives it: 6 circuits £350 to £500, 10 circuits £480 to £640, 12 circuits £610 to £850. London runs roughly a fifth higher than the rest of the UK.
In England and Wales, yes. NICEIC guidance states that replacing a consumer unit in a dwelling is notifiable work and must be certificated for compliance with Part P of the Building Regulations, and Electrical Safety First says the same. Ask your electrician, before the work starts, how the job will be notified and who issues the certificate.
Not on its own. Electrical Safety First guidance is explicit that a consumer unit need not be replaced simply because it has rewireable fuses, cartridge fuses or older-type circuit breakers, since those devices can give satisfactory overcurrent protection. Damage, overheating or exposed live parts are the reasons that do call for replacement.
An Electrical Installation Certificate, an EIC, or a DEIC where a distribution board is replaced, with the test results and the inspection and test schedules attached. Keep it: it is what you hand over when you sell, remortgage or let the property.
Roughly 4 to 8 hours for a straight replacement, and per board size around 3 to 4 hours for a 6 way, up to 6 to 7 hours for a 16 way. Testing the existing circuits before the new board goes on is part of that time, not an extra the electrician invented.
Different board types, different assumptions about what the pre-tests will find, and different pricing of the old board removal. Ask each electrician to price the board, the labour, the removal and any remedial work as separate lines, then compare like with like.