What Letting Agents Need to Know About EICR Compliance in 2026
Most EICR guidance is written for landlords. That makes sense — the landlord is the duty holder, the person with the legal obligation to ensure the electrical installation is safe and tested. But in practice, the letting agent is the person who has to make it happen.
You hold the keys. You manage the tenancy. You liaise with contractors. You field the tenant complaints. And if the EICR is missing, overdue or unsatisfactory when an enforcement officer comes calling, you are the person standing in the property trying to explain why.
This page is written specifically for letting agents and property managers in Greater Manchester. It covers your legal position, your practical responsibilities, the mistakes that create liability, and how to build a compliance process that does not rely on chasing landlords at the last minute.
Quick answer: Under the Electrical Safety Standards in the Private Rented Sector (England) Regulations 2020, the landlord is the legal duty holder, but agents acting on their behalf share practical responsibility for ensuring a valid EICR is in place. An agent who manages a property without checking EICR status, fails to instruct testing, or does not follow up on unsatisfactory reports is exposed to enforcement action from the local authority and civil liability if a tenant is injured. We work with letting agents across Greater Manchester on rolling EICR programmes. Call 0161 706 1360 to discuss how we can support your portfolio.
The Legal Position: Landlord vs Agent
The Electrical Safety Standards in the Private Rented Sector (England) Regulations 2020 place the duty on the landlord. They must ensure the electrical installation is inspected and tested by a qualified person at intervals of no more than five years, obtain a satisfactory EICR, supply a copy to the tenant within 28 days, and supply a copy to the local authority within 7 days if requested.
But here is where it gets complicated for agents.
If you are managing the property under a management agreement, you are acting on behalf of the landlord. Most management agreements give the agent authority — and responsibility — to arrange maintenance, compliance testing, and safety inspections. Some agreements explicitly state that the agent is responsible for ensuring all legal compliance requirements are met.
If the EICR expires and you have not flagged it, chased it, or arranged it, you have arguably failed in your management duty. If a tenant is injured by an electrical fault in a property you manage that did not have a valid EICR, the landlord's insurer and solicitor will both be looking at what the managing agent did and did not do.
The practical position is that even if the legal duty sits with the landlord, the letting agent carries the operational risk. Local authorities enforcing the regulations will contact the agent first, because the agent's details are on the tenancy agreement. If the agent cannot produce a valid EICR, the enforcement action begins.
What You Need to Check for Every Managed Property
For every property in your managed portfolio, you should hold or have access to the following.
A current EICR with a satisfactory outcome. The report must be dated within the last five years (or within the interval recommended by the previous inspector, if shorter). The overall assessment must be satisfactory. If it is unsatisfactory, remedial work must have been completed and a follow-up report or certificate issued.
The date of the next required test. This is stated on the EICR. Record it in your property management system and set a reminder for three months before expiry. Three months gives you enough time to instruct the test, schedule access with the tenant, get the inspection done, and address any remedial work before the deadline.
Evidence of any remedial work. If the previous EICR was unsatisfactory and work was carried out, you should hold the remedial certificates — Electrical Installation Certificates or Minor Works Certificates — and ideally a follow-up EICR confirming the issues have been resolved.
A copy provided to the tenant. The regulations require the landlord to give the tenant a copy of the EICR within 28 days of the inspection, or before they move in if the test was done between tenancies. As the managing agent, this is your job to arrange. Keep a record of when and how it was provided.
The Five Mistakes That Create Liability for Agents
We work with dozens of letting agents across Greater Manchester. The same mistakes come up repeatedly.
Mistake 1: Not tracking expiry dates. The most common problem. The EICR was done three years ago, nobody put the next test date in the system, and it expires without anyone noticing. The property is technically non-compliant from the day after expiry. If the local authority asks for the report and it is out of date, you are in enforcement territory.
Mistake 2: Accepting an unsatisfactory report and not following up. An EICR comes back unsatisfactory with C2 codes. The agent files it and moves on, intending to sort the remedial work later. Later never comes. The property has a documented electrical safety problem that nobody has fixed. This is worse than not having a report at all, because the hazard has been identified and ignored.
Mistake 3: Using unqualified contractors. The regulations require the inspection to be carried out by a qualified and competent person. In practice, this means a person registered with NICEIC, NAPIT, ELECSA or a similar competent person scheme. An EICR carried out by an unregistered electrician may not be accepted by the local authority, and it will not satisfy the regulations. Check your contractor's credentials before instructing them.
Mistake 4: Not providing the report to the tenant. The 28-day clock starts from the date of the inspection. If the agent does not send the report — or does not keep evidence of sending it — the landlord is in breach. It does not matter that the electrical installation is safe. The obligation is to provide the report, and failure to do so is a standalone breach.
Mistake 5: Relying on the landlord to arrange it. Some agents take the position that the EICR is the landlord's responsibility and leave it to them. This works right up until it does not. If the landlord forgets, goes abroad, becomes uncontactable, or simply does not prioritise it, the property falls out of compliance while you are still collecting management fees and holding the keys. The local authority will contact you, not the landlord, because you are the party managing the tenancy.
Building a Compliance Process That Works
The agents we work with who stay consistently compliant all do the same things.
Centralised tracking. Every managed property has its EICR date, expiry date, and status recorded in one system — whether that is a property management platform, a spreadsheet, or a dedicated compliance tracker. The data is reviewed monthly.
Automatic reminders at three months. When an EICR is three months from expiry, a reminder fires. This gives enough time to notify the landlord, arrange the inspection, get any remedial work done, and still meet the deadline.
A retained electrical contractor. Rather than shopping around for each EICR, the agent has a standing arrangement with a contractor who knows the portfolio, holds the access details, and can book inspections in batches. This is faster, cheaper, and produces more consistent reporting.
A clear management agreement clause. The management agreement states that the agent has authority to instruct EICR testing and reasonable remedial work on behalf of the landlord, with the cost recharged. This removes the delay of seeking landlord approval for routine compliance work.
Immediate action on unsatisfactory reports. When an EICR comes back unsatisfactory, the agent instructs remedial work within the week — not the month, not the quarter. C1 items (danger present) are addressed the same day or next day. C2 items (potentially dangerous) are scheduled within 28 days. The agent does not wait for the landlord to decide whether to fix an electrical hazard in a tenanted property.
What Happens if You Get It Wrong
Local authorities in Greater Manchester are actively enforcing the electrical safety regulations. Enforcement starts with a remedial notice requiring the landlord (or agent) to produce a satisfactory EICR within 28 days. If the notice is not complied with, the local authority can arrange the inspection itself and recover the costs, plus impose a financial penalty of up to £30,000.
Beyond the regulations, there is civil liability. If a tenant is injured by an electrical fault in a property without a valid EICR, the landlord's insurance may not pay out, and the agent's professional indemnity insurer will want to know what compliance processes were in place.
For agents who are members of a redress scheme — which all agents in England must be — complaint outcomes relating to compliance failures are taken seriously. A pattern of failures can affect your membership.
How We Work with Letting Agents
Manchester Compliance works with letting agents across Greater Manchester on rolling EICR programmes. Here is what we offer.
Portfolio pricing. Fixed per-property pricing for EICR testing, with discounts for volume. No call-out fees, no day rates, no surprises.
Tenant access coordination. We contact the tenant directly to arrange access, using your preferred communication channel. We work around tenant schedules and provide clear appointment windows.
Digital reporting. Every EICR is delivered digitally within 48 hours of the inspection. You receive a PDF by email, and we can provide reports in bulk formats if your property management system supports upload.
Remedial work under one roof. If a property fails, we quote and carry out the remedial work. One contractor, one relationship, one invoice trail. The agent does not need to find a second electrician.
Expiry tracking. We track the expiry dates for every property we test and notify you when the next test is due. You still own the compliance process, but you have a backup reminder from the contractor who will do the work.
Get Your Portfolio Compliant
If you manage residential lettings in Greater Manchester and you are not confident that every property in your portfolio has a current, satisfactory EICR, call 0161 706 1360. We will audit your portfolio, identify the gaps, and put a programme in place to bring everything up to date — and keep it there.
Email: hello@manchestercompliance.co.uk Phone: 0161 706 1360 Address: 25 Holden Clough Drive, Ashton-under-Lyne, OL7 9TH