Does a VELUX INTEGRA Need an Electrician?

Everything between an INTEGRA sash and its control unit runs at a low, safe voltage, closer to a doorbell circuit than to a household ring main, so that part of the job sits outside what building law treats as electrical installation work at all.

The control unit does the one job that matters here: it takes a standard mains feed in on one side and puts out a stepped-down, safe voltage on the other, and only that low-voltage side ever reaches the window, the wall keypad or a handheld remote. Fitting the cable from the unit up to the sash, setting the keypad into a wall plate, or pairing a remote to a window is work any competent installer carries out on a normal working day, because none of it is connected directly to the house's fixed wiring. The legal line sits one step further back, at the point where the control unit itself draws its power.

English building law treats most household electrical work as notifiable, meaning it either has to be carried out by a registered electrician or reported to Building Control once finished, and a new fixed electrical connection for an INTEGRA control unit can fall on either side of that line depending on how it is fed.

Plugging a control unit into an existing socket with a standard plug is not notifiable work at all: it is no different, in the eyes of the regulations, to plugging in a lamp or a kettle. The picture changes the moment a socket does not already exist where the unit needs to sit. Running a new fused spur, adding a socket, or wiring the unit into a lighting circuit are all alterations to the fixed wiring of the house, and that is squarely the kind of work Part P covers.

The deciding factor is rarely the window itself; it is almost always whether a socket or a spare way on the consumer unit already sits within reach of where the control unit needs to go.

A loft conversion in one of the newer township estates around Orton, Bretton or Hampton is often still at first-fix stage when the roof windows go in, with sockets and cable routes already planned before the plasterboard closes the room up, so a spare way for a control unit can sometimes be added at the same time with little extra disruption. A Fletton brick terrace being converted room by room tells a different story: the loft is frequently boarded, plastered and decorated already, with no power run anywhere near the rafters, and reaching a socket from there means opening up finished surfaces rather than working in a space that is already stripped back.

• A socket or spare fused way already within a metre or two of the control unit's likely position usually means no new wiring at all.
• A loft with no power run nearby means a cable has to be brought in specially, which is notifiable work.
• A control unit fitted mid-conversion, before the ceiling closes, is far cheaper in disruption than one added afterwards.

This is one reason the control unit's position is worth deciding at survey stage, alongside the window's own position and the view it will give from where you sit. Our guide to VELUX INTEGRA: electric and solar opening explained covers how the mains and solar versions differ once fitted, including the rain sensor and the keypad or remote each version uses.

A solar-charged INTEGRA window has no control unit to feed from the house's wiring at all, because its motor draws power from a small panel set into the frame, charging a battery built into the same assembly.

Nothing about a solar window touches the household's fixed electrics, so there is no new circuit to consider, no spur to run and no question of notifiable work to answer either way. It works from daylight rather than direct sun, which matters through a grey Fenland winter as much as it does on a bright one, and our answer on whether solar VELUX windows work on a north-facing roof sets out what changes on a shaded pitch. Where a loft has already been finished and the thought of opening a ceiling to reach a socket is unwelcome, solar is often the simpler route into electric opening, sidestepping the wiring question rather than answering it.

The survey is where this gets settled, rather than left to be worked out once the roof is already open. We look at the position the control unit needs to sit in against the nearest existing socket or spare way, and we talk through whether that position can move slightly to land on power that already exists, since a control unit does not have to sit directly under the window to work.

Where a socket is close enough, we wire the unit and window ourselves as part of the fitting, in the same visit as the roof work. Where new fixed wiring genuinely has to be run, that part of the job goes to a registered electrician, either one we bring in as part of arranging the visit or one the household already uses, and any notifiable work that results is reported through the correct channel once it is done. We handle the Building Control notification for the roof window installation itself in exactly the same way, so the roof side and the electrical side each get notified through the right route rather than one being assumed to cover the other.

None of this changes the window's position, its frame or bar profile, or the sightline sketch that comes with every quote, showing the view the finished window will give from the bed, the sofa or wherever you actually sit. See our full VELUX window installation service in Peterborough, what affects the cost of a rooflight, and how the sightline sketch plans the view before booking a home visit or messaging us on WhatsApp.

Does fitting the wall keypad itself count as electrical work?

No. The keypad, sometimes called the KLI 310, sits on the low-voltage side of the control unit, wired the same way as the window itself, so fitting it does not involve the house's fixed electrics.

Can my own electrician run the mains feed before the survey?

Yes, if a household already has an electrician they use, that person can run a spare socket or spur to the loft ahead of the visit, and we simply connect the control unit and window to whatever is already there once we arrive.

Does a solar remote or a battery-powered keypad need any wiring at all?

No. A solar window's remote is a small handheld unit paired to the window, and it needs nothing more than its own battery, which is changed the way any handheld remote's battery is.

Is the control unit installed by the roofer or the electrician?

Whichever trade the last connection belongs to fits the unit itself. Where power already exists nearby, we fit and wire the unit as part of the roof work; where new fixed wiring is needed to reach it, the electrician completes that connection.