Get well first my friend , I know what it means to try and fight when you're already down & being kicked hard . David

I have a different electrical problem shown elsewhere in the forums and came across this thread whilst trying to get some understanding of things related to my problem . Perhaps my experiences of some 20 years ago may help . Before the days of the split from generating boards to someone who resells the electricity , I had mega problems with mains borne spikes tripping my supply trip & master switch to the main consumer unit. One day after having over 100 trips out I managed to get hold of the generators electrical faults folk and explained that being an industrial electronic test & service engineer I had checked all my plug in equipments and also traced all the wiring & had found no faults. They sent a team of two to test the installation with a simple plug in rotating drum voltage & current , this was left for two days and didn't it register any problem . Yet in the presence of the head honcho who came that afternoon the trip kept actuating . Next morning they sent in a team of two to check all my wiring from the fuse board , disconnected the wires inside the consumer unit ., took off every wall plate, disconnected all light fittings & switches etc . so that there were only cables in place . They then did a thing called a Wee Megga test , which is a high insulation test to show whether there was " leakance " occurring ( basically electricity leaking out of cables , through old cables with breaking down insulation when they are damp ....as we lived in a 164 yr old railway signal mans gate crossing house ) . The wee megga test proved all my cables were OK ( the place had been rewired for about four years previously ) . They reconnected things and the trip still kept tripping , even though nothing was plugged in or anything switched on . They were scratching their heads and other body parts when I said , " Look , I know you can't see any problem on the mains with the drum recorder . Do you have an oscilloscope with a dual beam so that you can check & freeze pictures of the incoming power ? " That was a light bulb moment for the area fault electrical engineering manager .. two days later they set up a dual beam oscilloscope and started to watch the samples of the incoming mains . Hey presto I was getting zillions of very high short lived low power mains borne spikes uperimposed on the normal supply voltage of 240 volts @ 50 cycles per second . The manager made several urgent phone calls & stayed with me till a new engineering team put new cable to the property from the pole , replaced the incoming tails to the meter and they also fitted a special type of mains spike filtering master & residual current circuit breaker & earth leakage switch. They did anotheer scoped sampling exercise fort a good 1/2 hr & found they had resolved the problem After that I had no problems. It seems that because I was on the end of a long branch line from the local transformer I was getting hit with a spike @ 50 cycles a second every time an engineering company 1/2 a mile away started to draw heavy current ... they were working from 07.00 till 20.00 hrs most days inc week ends . I respectfully suggest that until you get every circuit that runs off your consumer unit individually disconnected , stripped & wee megga tested & traced out to the bitter end of all connection points , you will have little cause to complain legally . Getting the DNO to do an oscilloscope view of the incoming mains may well show you have some sort of timing pulse on the incoming power that should not be there. I say this because you have a three phase supply cable to the property and to me that says the old night storage cheap electricity rates which sometimes had a white meter that was set to run via a mains borne pulse signal injected into your electricity supply . However once that is done & because of the meter reading problem , you can ask the Distribution Network Organisation (DNO )if they will try & help you resolve it by removing the three phase cable entirely form your property and replace it with with a normal domestic supply cable system . Do the barns / out buildings have any electrical supply in them? If so see if you can work out where the supply comes from . Does the barn /out building supply die if you turn off your master switch ? One other thing , do you have a radar station or microwave transmitter station within say 3/4 a mile of your home or the barn/ out buildings

A quick up date, My home was fully rewired with a new consumer unit & all wiring it was commissioned on 29 March 2009 . Eon sent me an email saying they had closed my complaint and I would get a complaint form with in 10 day .. no such beast arrived ( if sent at all ) So I use a different route of attack and went into their moving supply arena and put a pasted word document in the details box as trying to type for more than a few seconds kept seeing the link drop out . Surprise surprise I get their complainers folk on saying that they have reopened the original contact file and they offerme a telephone number so that I may contact the distribution network organisation ( DNO ) ,. Eon don't want to try help past this , so it they say they will send a written letter within 10 days showing how they have resolved the matter . ( Magic roundabout again ?) I now eagerly await their letter & should have it by 11 Dec 2014 , it should also contain information about escalating things to an independent organisation. I have also collated the same sort of new info( mainly shown below ) & sent it via email ( you need that email paper trail ) & sent it to the DNO as well .... I'm still waiting to see if the antsnest has been disturbed on this one but i will be bitching big time if they don't come back to me by 11 Dec 2014 . It seems that the fault after looking at it forensically with several high grade electrical engineers & electricians etc was caused due to an over voltage across two phases when the underground cable failed and the neutral was " lost ". It is a common thing apparently and can affect just one person depending where the nearest neutral for the three phases is located . I have tried to pursue this event as, " The electricity that was supplied by EON , purchased by me was not of merchantable quality and that it has caused damage in my home . Note I'm not saying that some one is at fault I'm seeking redress under the supply of goods & services . My home had two 1KW resistive& one transformer ( the UPS ) loads running at the time and the 480 volts +- 8% burnt out my equipment. Interestingly or not the insurers said as it was not storm or tempest nor accidental damage or loss of good I have no claim prospects on the domestic policy . I wonder can this form of damage ever be insured for by a private househi=older and actially be claimed for at the end of the day ?

I'm new to the CAG it's taken me a few days to discover it as a result of me experiencing a problem with multiple impacts both financially to me and likely to be threatening my health. Due to the age of the thread it is highly likely that there will have been some more consumer friendly changes /improvements to things. I'm hoping to get the specification for power supply to my premises from the generating and / or cable carrier companies as well as the reseller company . I think I'm correct that as I purchase my elecricity from EON or similar that the contract of supply of a merchantable product or service sits fairly & squarely with them and as far as I'm involved does not concern who or where they get the electricity that they sell to me so long as what I purchase is within the set parameters set down for a domestic supply. I'm a City & Guilds qualified industrial test and service electronic engineer by trade so have some sound knowledge of what happens electrically . Here goes..... Recently over several days we have been experiencing many dramatic fluctuations in the supply to our home as evidenced by incandescent 12 volt lamps dropping to a barely red output the immediately to so bright that they were close to blowing , in fact several did blow & I replaced them. I would normall only expect to replace one of these bulbs every three to four months not a fist full in a matter of hours. The story unfolds further along the lines of most of the electronic equipment in our home is less than five years old , so I strongly suspect it has some sort of inbuilt surge/spike protection. All computers & printers are protected by an extra Belkin type protector and or a battery backed UPS . I've ended up with numerous electronic equipments being burnt out due to the series of massive induced spikes over several days on faulty an underground cable some 400 mtrs away from me ( I'm almost right on the end of the branch from the local transformer.It ended up with the underground cable finally arcing out and blowing the boards trips some where in their distribution system . A large standby genny big enough to support some 90 homes was brought in by the carrier company whilst the fault was located and a 30 mtr. long trench excavated to effect a repair to eh blown underground cable. Since the repair was effected by the carrier company we have not had the slightest flicker on the mains that Iknow of. The spikes have been of such a magnitude & duration that they have passed through the digital supply meter , through the equipments and caused electrical burn outs as well as electrical derangement. Now I know how the electrical supply comanies work and it's difficult if not nigh impossible to get a remedy easily from them. At present I'm collecting information & ideas of how to progress before I go to the citizens advice folk to lay our my case. Things are further complicated in that I suffer life threatening health problems . A nasty consequence of the spikes & the massive last mega spike which occurred when the underground cable finally blew out is that the the underfloor heating that dries out my wet room it totally burnt out as it was on at the time that's both the control unit and the trace heat cabling set under the slip resist tiles on the floor . ( The shower and toilet facility are used daily by me as I'm incontinent in bowel & bladder ) This electrical burn out has led to mould quickly forming as we cannot get the room fully dry enough even with the central heating on , both windows open & double extractor fan on all day, plus when closed at night the windows are being set to trickle vent setting. The mould spores are starting to affect my already compromised breathing situation. I'd like to obtain details of a nominated higher level responsible manager within the resellers company , so my wife can give details to the family solicitors to persue a case of corporate manslaughter should I become ill and died due to stress or excessive mould spores caused by us not being able to dry out our home. The fact that the cable was not damaged by third parties nor to the best of my knowledge lightening or as some fools put it, " an act of god " is something that I have looked at , I can only conclude that the sensing & monitoring devices that the electricity companies have to provide information / log events and problems for planned repairs was not acted upon soon enough or correctly place or not sufficiently sensitive to detect the " leakance " problem in the first place. We have laid out just over £500 already for a new oven as there are no spares available to replace the control panel that burnt out on it . The £500 incldes a new thermostatic time control unit for the wet room floor but not the under floor cable. I strongly suspect that the end cost of sorting out this spike induced damage will be close £5,000 or even more for I / we may have to move out for a couple of weeks or so out whilst the wet room & toilet facility is out of commission. I've read several of the site subjects related to this sort of problem , do any of you know if the scope of the consumers supply of goods service act applies in this case ? My insurers said as it is not accidental damage they will not entertain any claim , the generating company said as it is not negligence on the part of their employees they won't entertain a claim , the reseller said it is not their problem either. I understand that the Unfair Terms in Customer Contract Regulations my also negate such denials by the seller, carrier or electricity generator . Does anyone know if there is a superseded reference to these regulations or if similar overarching new regulations are in place ? Does anyone know if the County Court adjudication system still runs in England and Wales ? Am I likely to make any head way with the problem if I go the county court route for uninsured losses occasioned because of non compliant electrical specification supplies that caused the damage ?