Plan · Permit · Prove · Walk away if it isn’t safe
Safe Isolation Starts Before You Touch the Board
The hardest part of safe isolation is not always the tester. Sometimes it is the customer asking, ‘How long will you be?’ The manager saying, ‘Can we keep that bit live?’ The lost day’s pay if you walk away.
This site is a practical learning hub for planning, communicating and carrying out safe electrical isolation in the real world.
Explore the 10-point check. Learn the language. Practise the scenarios. Share the near misses.
Site note
The real job starts before the tools come out
Safe isolation begins at booking — permission, expectations, authority — not when you arrive with a tester. The wiring is the easy part. The agreement to make a circuit dead, and to keep it dead, is the job.
Red flags from the margin
Real-world pressure
- CustomerCan I just finish this meeting?
- Site managerHow long will this take?
- TenantThe freezer is full.
- Business ownerWe can’t shut down card payments.
- EngineerI’ve driven four hours to get here.
Every technical step happens inside a human situation. Pressure changes decisions.
Notebook checklist
The 10-point check
Prove the tester on a known live source, take each reading, then prove the tester again. Tick them off as you go.
10voltage checks · tick each as you confirm dead
These ten tests sit inside the wider procedure — plan, permit, identify, isolate, lock off, prove, test, re-prove. The ten checks are not the whole job.
Clipped references
A learning resource, not a replacement for official guidance.
- IET
- HSE
- Electrical Safety First
- NAPIT
- NICEIC
- BS 7671
- Electricity at Work Regs
- GS38
- HSG85
- IET On-Site Guide
The safest electrician is not the one who can work around every obstacle. It is the one who sees the pressure coming early enough to control it.