This came as a call from a nearby house earlier today: Could I take a look urgently please?

The new cooker had come from a well-known electrical chain store which offered delivery, installation, and removal/disposal of the old unit as part of the deal.

It seems that the crew turned up with the new unit and then refused to install it. The message I got at first was a little garbled, something about "C earthing" and a change to the regulations. [Linked Image]

Anyway, when I got there the handwritten message on the delivery note said that they would not install it as there was no RCCD (sic) on the cooker circuit. It then went on to say that they were unable to remove the old cooker as there was no "spur unit" on the wall.

The plate on the wall just took the cable into the box and out through a plate, so it's fair enough that they wouldn't disconnect and leave a bare-ended cable. Why the refusal to connect though?

The main service gear looks to be the original 1960s equipment from when the house was built: MEM 4-way box with rewireable fuses plus a Crabtree E50 voltage-operated ELCB with TT earthing.
The ELCB is obsolete, of course, but there are still hundreds in use around here. Everything checked out fine, breaker working perfectly, 30A circuit to cooker point all O.K., etc., so in went the new cooker.

During the ensuing chat, it emerged that head of the crew had said that they couldn't install because of "new regulations which came into force in January."

So is this a complete misinterpretation of Part P, or is somebody trying to use it as an excuse?

(For those outside the U.K., let me point out that the current version of BS7671/IEE Regs. doesn't actually require an RCD on cookers anyway!)