Fed Up Sparky Builds His Own EICR Tool After NICEIC Portal Becomes "Absolute Dogshit"

Aberdeen Electrician Spent a Year Coding TestFast Because Existing Software Was Costing £400/Month and Killing His Evenings

ABERDEEN, SCOTLAND - You know that feeling when you finish a long day on the tools, and then you've got to sit down and bash out certificates until gone 10pm? Yeah, one electrician in Aberdeen got so fed up with it that he built his own software to sort it out.

Meet the bloke behind TestFast - a qualified supervisor at a sparky company doing 15-20 rewires a week. Every single one needs first and last certs, and the paperwork was genuinely doing his head in. The NICEIC portal wasn't helping either, especially after their recent update made it even worse. And at £300-£400 a month? Mental.

"I'd finish on the tools at 5pm and still be up past 10 wrestling with the clunky NICEIC portal," he said. "It felt like it was actively trying to waste my time."
So he did what any sensible person would do - spent a year building something that actually works.

What Makes TestFast Different?
Here's the thing - this wasn't designed by some corporate team who've never held a tester. This was built by someone who's been doing the job for a decade and knows exactly where the pain points are.

The Features That Actually Matter:
Stupid Fast - No loading spinners. Ever. Click something, it happens instantly. None of that "please wait while we process your request" nonsense.

Works Offline - Lose signal in a basement? Keep working. It syncs when you're back online. Simple as that.

OCR for Handwritten Notes - This is the game changer. Snap a photo of your test sheet, the app reads it and fills in the grid automatically. No more typing every circuit by hand. Absolute life-saver.

Shorthand Observations - Type "no rcd kitchen sockets" and it spits out a properly worded, correctly coded observation. Saves hours of mucking about.
The Results? Pretty Impressive

The company's been using TestFast for the past few months and churned through around 150 reports so far. Previously it took a full day to do 4-5 reports properly (not just filled in for the sake of it). Now? About 10 reports, no issues.
Boss is happy because he's saving hundreds of quid. The developer's happy because he actually gets home at a decent hour to spend time with his 2-year-old instead of being glued to a laptop until bedtime. The backlog is empty. Everyone wins.

It's Free (For Now)
TestFast is in beta right now, which means it's completely free to use. No card details, no limits, just sign up and start. The plan is to add EIC's and smoke detection certificates by the end of the year to fully decouple from the NICEIC portal.

When it does start charging, the developer's looking at around £15 a month with a discounted yearly package. Pretty reasonable compared to what the big boys are charging. Plus early users who join during beta will get a discount (maybe 50% off) for another year just because they've been around since day one.
Built By Someone Who Gets It

The developer actually worked as a software engineer for three years before coming back to electrical work. Job stability in tech was too volatile, and with a family to think about, he wanted something more reliable. But he kept the skills and now geeks out in his free time building tools like this.

What Electricians Are Saying
The response has been class. One user said the auto-detect entry for classifications is brilliant - gave it his rough notes and it processed them perfectly. Another software developer who lurks in electrician forums said the site "oozes polish, professionalism and attention to detail."

Even better, you can add as many users as you want to your account. There's user management in the menu where you can add normal users with limited permissions and admins with full permissions. Plus there's an admin dashboard that gives you metrics about how your company is doing from an EICR perspective - quite handy for getting a snapshot of who's doing what.

The NICEIC Problem
Let's be real - NICEIC reported £10 million in profit last year (you can check it on HMRC). You'd expect something top-notch from a business that size, but it's just a money grab. One user logged into NIC and found that one of their reports from Friday had vanished. £2.5 million a year in revenue and the portal is still broken.
The good news is you don't actually need to use their portal for certificates. As long as your work and cert is compliant with the form from BS7671 (it's at the end of the brown book somewhere), you're fine. Your regional NICEIC assessor won't question it unless it deviates from the original. They've just built their own tool and a place to store it.

When your assessment is due, the assessor won't ask to see reports on the NICEIC portal - they'll ask for the reports to check your work. Could be Easycert, Electraform, TestFast, whatever. Same thing applies for clients. If a letting agency asks for a NICEIC report, as long as your reg number is there, you're good. The logo is more or less a bonus.

Community-Driven Development
The developer's set up a public roadmap at https://testfast.canny.io/ where users can request features and vote on what gets built next. There's also a live support chat where you get to speak to him directly.
"If this helps even one other sparky get their evenings back, I'm more than happy," he said. "Not looking for anything in return - just want to share something that's genuinely made my life better."

A Few Things to Know
For anyone in England, there's a bit about Building Control notifications - you'll still need to submit those through your CPS scheme portal (NICEIC, NAPIT, etc.). The developer looked into building that in, but turns out you need to register as a Competent Person Scheme yourself, which isn't happening. The government set it up that way back in 2005 when they introduced Part P to avoid every electrician having to deal with 300+ different local councils.

But here's the thing - NAPIT users have confirmed they have no issue using TestFast and just submitting the cert via their portal for notification. So it's pretty much a non-issue.

The platform also has proper certificate tracking. When you lock a certificate, it gets a serial number and a lock number. If you need to unlock it, only admins can do that, and it voids the lock number - so you have to be careful. If a certificate is about to expire, the admin dashboard shows you what's expiring in 30, 60, and 90 days.

What's Next?
The developer's got a clear roadmap: EIC and smoke detection certificates by end of year, then minor works certificates, then whatever the community votes for. He's also thinking about adding electrical calculation tools (voltage drop, cable sizing, etc.) as a free-to-use resource for everyone.

With hundreds of signups already and more features coming, TestFast looks like it could be a proper alternative to the overpriced, poorly designed certification software from the big established providers.

And honestly? It's about time someone built something that actually works for electricians, not against them.

Check It Out:
TestFast: https://testfast.uk
Feature Roadmap: https://testfast.canny.io/
Live Support: Available via chat on the website

Quick Note: TestFast works brilliantly for Scottish certification requirements. If you're in England and need to do Building Control notifications, you can still use TestFast for your certs and just submit notifications through your existing CPS scheme portal.

Company Name: TestFast
Press Contact:
Michael Adrian
Email: michael@testfast.uk
Available for interviews and product demonstrations

TestFast is an independent software tool developed by a working electrician in Aberdeen, Scotland, designed to streamline EICR (Electrical Installation Condition Report) certification for electrical contractors and qualified supervisors. Born out of genuine frustration with expensive, clunky industry portals, TestFast offers a modern, fast, and intuitive alternative that's been built by someone who actually uses it on the tools every day.

This release was published on openPR.