Electrical Method Statement Template (UK)

An electrical method statement is a written, site-specific description of how a defined piece of electrical work will be carried out — step by step — with the control measures that keep workers, occupants and the installation safe. It is the second half of a RAMS pack: the risk assessment identifies the hazards and rates them; the method statement says what you will actually do, in what order, to keep those risks controlled.

Method statements are not a marketing document, not a generic safety policy, and not a copy-paste from the last job. The HSE publication INDG163 ("Risk assessment: A brief guide to controlling risks in the workplace") and the CDM 2015 Approved Code of Practice both make the same point: documentation must be specific to the work, the site and the people doing it.

In practical terms, the UK electrical industry expects to see a method statement for: any work on a construction site, any work for a commercial client, any work involving live testing or temporary energisation, any work where more than one trade is on site simultaneously, and any work involving the supply intake, distribution boards or large equipment. Domestic single-circuit alterations sometimes get away without one — but most domestic landlords and managing agents now ask anyway, and the generator approach makes that trivial.

A UK electrical method statement that will satisfy a principal contractor, a CDM client and (if it ever comes to it) an HSE inspector contains the following sections in this order. Each section is non-negotiable — leaving any out is the most common reason method statements get rejected and bounced back during pre-start checks.

1. Cover / identifying information — document title, project name, site address, client name, principal contractor name, contractor (your) company name, document reference, version number, date of issue, document author, document approver, and the revision history table.
2. Scope statement — exactly what electrical work this method statement covers (and, by exclusion, what it does not). For example: "Installation of one 7.4 kW EV charger on dedicated 32 A radial from existing consumer unit, Type B RCD protection, external mounting on rear elevation. Does not cover: consumer unit upgrade, supply uprate, or DNO liaison."
3. Applicable regulations and standards — the specific clauses and documents that govern this work. As a minimum: BS 7671:2018+A4:2026, the Electricity at Work Regulations 1989, the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974, CDM 2015, and any product or sector-specific standards (e.g. BS EN 61851 for EV charging, BS EN 62446 for solar PV, BS 5839 for fire alarm work).
4. Team and responsibilities — names, roles, qualifications, registration numbers, and what each person is responsible for. Typically: site supervisor, qualified supervisor / lead electrician, approving electrician (for test results), apprentice (with explicit "shall not work unsupervised" line), and any sub-contractors.
5. Sequence of work — the numbered, ordered steps. This is the longest and most job-specific section. Each step says what is done, by whom, with what tools, in what order, and what the safety controls are at that step.
6. Hazards and control measures — a table mapping each significant hazard to the controls in place. Standard rows include: electric shock, arc flash and burns, working at height, manual handling, dust and debris, hot works (if applicable), trips and falls from trailing cables, working alongside other trades, working in occupied premises.
7. Safe isolation procedure — the specific isolation point(s), the lock-off device used, the GS38-compliant voltage indicator and proving unit used, who carries out isolation, who retains the key, and how re-energisation will be controlled.
8. PPE list — the personal protective equipment required for each stage of the work, with the relevant standards (e.g. arc-rated gloves to BS EN 60903, safety footwear to BS EN ISO 20345).
9. Emergency procedures — what happens if someone is shocked or burned, the location of the on-site first aider, the route to the nearest A&E, the local hospital phone number, the contact name and number for the principal contractor out of hours, and the procedure for reporting under RIDDOR.
10. Sign-off lines — the document is read, understood and signed by every person carrying out or supervising the work, with name, signature, date and time. This is the "competent persons briefed" evidence that closes the loop with CDM 2015 Regulation 15.

The hazards section is where method statements either earn their keep or descend into copy-paste. The structure is a simple table — hazard, who is at risk, the controls in place, the residual risk rating — but the contents must be specific to this job. Below are the rows that every UK electrical method statement should contain at minimum, plus the controls you would expect to see for each. Add or remove rows depending on the work.

Safe isolation is the single most important section in any electrical method statement — and the one most often written as a vague paragraph. A compliant section names the specific isolation point on this job, the device used to lock it off, the proving unit used to confirm dead, and the person responsible for re-energisation control. Anything less is non-compliant with EAWR 1989 Regulations 13 and 14.

1. Identify the source of supply for the circuit(s) being worked on — by reference to the schedule of test results or the consumer unit / distribution board legend, not by guesswork.
2. Notify the duty holder / occupant / principal contractor of the planned isolation and obtain agreement.
3. Switch off the relevant device — MCB, RCBO, switch-fuse or main switch as appropriate.
4. Lock off the device with a proprietary lock-off kit. The unique key is retained by the person carrying out the work. No master keys, no key shared between trades.
5. Post a "Caution: Men at Work" notice at the point of isolation.
6. Prove the voltage indicator on a known live source — a Drummond-style proving unit is industry standard for this.
7. Test for absence of voltage at the point of work, between all relevant combinations (line-to-line, line-to-neutral, line-to-earth, neutral-to-earth on 3-phase).
8. Re-prove the voltage indicator on the known live source to confirm it did not fail during the test.
9. Work proceeds only after this sequence is complete.
10. On completion, re-energisation is controlled by the same person who isolated — no one else re-energises a circuit they did not isolate.

For a deeper breakdown of safe isolation including diagrams of two-pole proving and 3-phase isolation, see the Method Statement: Safe Isolation reference guide.

The template structure is the same for every electrical job, but the contents of the scope, sequence and hazards sections differ materially. Below are the variants that cover the bulk of UK electrical work. Each links to a more detailed RAMS-specific guide.

For the underlying CDM 2015 framework that drives most of these variants, see CDM 2015 for Electricians.

Every UK electrical firm has the same folder somewhere on a shared drive: a "RAMS template" Word document, last meaningfully updated five years ago, with the previous job's site address still in the header. It gets opened, find-and-replaced, and emailed off. It satisfies no one — not the contractor reading it, not the client receiving it, and definitely not the HSE if it ever has to be produced after an incident.

A UK electrical method statement is not a marketing nice-to-have. It sits inside three statutory frameworks that determine your liability if anything goes wrong.