Fred James

From my experience, even if you find someone who speaks English they are just as totally useless at sorting out your problem as the Spanish speakers.

Rumour has it that they are trained by Telefonica.

johnnyone

I have decided to increase my potencia. It was set up by my lawyer when I purchased a reform in 2008 at 5.75kw.

i) Will I need a new electrical certificate bearing in mind it was reformed including electrics in 2008?

ii) I live in the UK and only get over every 6 weeks or so. If I make an appointment with Iberdrola how reliable are they at keeping it?


Thanks

snikpoh

i) In all probability - YES. It has to be in your name (not the previous owner or builder) and has to be within a certain date.

ii) I'm not sure if you can make an appointment. In my experience it's much like in UK - 'we will arrive some time on xxx' but here they generally do!

johnnyone

Thanks for the info.

I'm all electric so 5.75 kw is nowhere near enough in the winter as I recently discovered.

snikpoh

...so are we and that's enough for us (hob, oven, hot water, kettle, iron, etc. etc.)

JulianWard

We have 4.4. Usual appliances plus AC / heating.

In the eight years plus, living here, never had any 'tripping problems' and we have always had an ICP controller.

twistedmelon

It's not clear what you mean.
If the house was reformed in 2008 you should have the boletin from Iberdrola. I wouldn't trust a lawyer to set a jelly.
If you do want to increase potencia you will need a new boletin, this can be done by any qualified electrician, this could be done whilst you are here.
You may need some upgrading doing but the electrician could also do that unless you require a new meter.
I have to tell you that this could all be very expensive you may need re-wiring doing etc and especially if you use Iberdrola to do work.
You say that the potencia is not enough, it may well be other factors causing your ICP to trip but if money is no object for the few weeks you are here then go ahead.

Fred James

Not necessarily.

The boletin should show the maximum potencia allowed which may well be far more than the actual contracted potencia.

It depends on the standards to which the house was wired.

I have a boletin rated at 25kw as the house was wired to that standard when it was built.

twistedmelon

I stand corrected. That is a possibility, although I doubt this will stop Iberdrola trying to make a quick buck out of this

snikpoh

Yes, but, the boletin MUST be in your name and can not be too old.

We went through this recently (long story but due to a tenant not paying electricity bill) and the boletin was rejected because it was 3 years old and not in my name (?!)

They wouldn't entertain it what ever the potencia was.


By-the-way (for TWISTEDMELON), it's not Iberdrola who issue the boletin.

johnnyone

I don't understand that, although I do think there is some margin before it trips.
We never have any trouble in the summer, but in the winter if the oven,water heating, elec. heating is on the kettle (3kw) will trip the ICP as will the iron.
As time goes on I think you must get used to turning some appliances off before using others but I would rather have enough supply in reserve. subject to it being straightforward to organise and not too costly.

Thanks again for the replies they are really helpful

snikpoh

Without wishing to be rude, are you sure that it's the ICP that is tripping and not one of the other 'fuses'?

If the system is badly balanced, then a lower rated 'fuse' could be being overloaded.

We had this issue until I put the hob on one circuit, the water boiler on another and then all the kitchen plugs on a further two 'fuses'.

Elsewhere in the house we did the same including having separate circuits for the aircon units.

JulianWard

I had a Spanish friend who was told she needed a rewire as her fuse kept tripping. I told her son to use his fan heater in a socket on a different ring. NO problems, no rewiring.

With 4.4. as I said we have never had a trip (fuse or IPC) and we never consider how many appliances we have on at the same time. However, having 're-designed' the rings in the building process, before we moved into out new apartment, I did make sure the potential loads would be more or less evenly distributed.

johnnyone

[QUOTE=snikpoh;9311486]Without wishing to be rude, are you sure that it's the ICP that is tripping and not one of the other 'fuses'?QUOTE]

That's not rude.

It's the main ICP that is tripping and looking back at what was probably on I am not too surprised.

Water heater
Oven
Hob
Tumble dryer
Washine machine
Elec heating

I think the system manages those, its the kettle or iron that is the final straw.

snikpoh

[QUOTE=johnnyone;9311598]
Crikey! No wonder! All at the same time - I wondered why everything went dim over here as well!