As Britain braces itself for the long bank holiday weekend ahead, the UK’s leading name in electrics is reminding homeowners in Yorkshire who are preparing to dabble in DIY to leave electrical work to the professionals – or risk the serious safety consequences.

Each year, the May bank holiday weekends are favoured for time-stretched Brits as the ideal time to do some much-needed home improvement work and give their home a new lease of life ahead of the summer spell. In fact, new research1 estimates that as many as 12 million households in the UK will be delving into some DIY this upcoming long weekend.

But with botched DIY jobs shown to cost ‘have-a-go homeowners’ a small fortune in remedy work in recent years, NICEIC has been quick to assert that there is a fine line between a bit of painting and decorating and serious renovation work, such as electrics.

Darren Staniforth, NICEIC's Technical Development Manager, comments: “As the nation’s love affair with home improvement shows no sign of abating, spurred on by an abundance of interior design magazines, home improvement programmes and DIY forums on facebook, the bank holiday DIY trend has grown rapidly.

“While it’s all well and good adding a new lick of paint it’s important that over-zealous homeowners don’t get too carried away and, for example, have a go at seemingly ‘simple’ electrical work themselves at the same time. Unfortunately, this is something that we have started to see a lot of in recent years, with the bank holidays being a prime time for electrical mishaps to happen – the consequences of which, not just in terms of cost are vast.”

Each year around 12,500 house fires, 750 serious injuries and 10 deaths are caused by unsafe electrics in the home. According to Electrical Safety First, the leading charity for electrical safety, almost half of all electric shocks described as severe are the result of a DIY error.

Darren adds: “It’s important that homeowners remember that there is a reason why certain home improvement jobs should only be done by the professionals – and electrical work is most definitely one of them. As we look forward to the bank holiday weekend then, our message is simple – don’t run the risk, instead call in a professional, such as those listed with NICEIC, for any electrical work in order to keep your home and family safe.”

You can search for a registered electrician in your area by visiting www.niceic.com