No inspection dossier, no connection: the administrative burden every electrical engineer knows but nobody solves

There is no electrical engineer in Belgium who does not know what an AREI inspection dossier is. It is the document they must submit to an accredited inspection body after every completed installation. Without that dossier, the inspection cannot take place. Without inspection, the installation cannot be put into service. The power stays off.

And yet that dossier is the most time-consuming, most postponed and most error-prone administrative task in the sector. The as-built diagram gets drawn after the work, sometimes weeks later. Measurement values get retyped from a test device. Non-conformities only come to light when the inspector is already on-site.

What the AREI requires

The General Regulation on Electrical Installations requires for every new installation or significant modification a complete inspection application dossier containing:

• —As-built single-line diagram: every circuit, every fuse, every socket and switch
• —Insulation resistance measurement per circuit: value in MOhm, test voltage, pass/fail
• —Earth resistance measurement: measured value, limit 30 ohm for residential
• —RCD test per residual current device: tripping current and tripping time measured
• —Short-circuit current calculation or measurement at the distribution board
• —Declaration of conformity signed by the accredited installer with accreditation number

That dossier goes to the inspection body. The inspector verifies whether the dossier is complete, conducts their own check, and issues a conformity certificate — or a list of non-conformities that must be resolved before a re-inspection.

Why the dossier is so often incomplete

The as-built diagram: the biggest stumbling block

Drawing an as-built diagram is time-intensive. Most small electrical companies do not have CAD software or the time to learn it. They draw by hand, use a basic drawing program, or copy a diagram from a previous similar project and adapt it. The result often does not meet AREI requirements.

And when the work runs over schedule — as always in construction — the diagram gets produced from memory, not from what was actually installed. The inspector finds discrepancies between the diagram and reality. Non-conformity.

Measurement values that get retyped

An electrician measures on-site the insulation resistance of every circuit, tests every RCD, measures the earth resistance. All those values are noted on a paper form or in a notes app. At home they are typed into a Word document or Excel table.

For an installation with 20 circuits, that is 20 insulation values, 4 to 6 RCD tests, and an earth measurement. Every manually retyped figure is a potential error. And an error in a measurement protocol means: inspection fails, come back again.

The re-inspection wave coming

Homes built before 2001 are coming up for their 25-year re-inspection. That is a wave of installations for which no digital archive exists. The electrician must re-measure everything and produce a completely new dossier. Without a tool, that is half a day of administration per home.

The EV charging point: a new dossier with every installation

Every charging point is a new electrical installation under the AREI. Separate circuit, separate measurement, separate conformity certificate. Most electricians installing charging points are the same ones doing regular installations — but they have no standardised workflow for the EVSE dossier. They do it ad hoc, differently every time.

With the explosive growth of electric vehicles, this segment has only grown larger. An electrical company installing ten charging points per week needs ten inspection dossiers per week. That is currently ten times manual work.

What automation looks like

A technician finishes an installation. On their phone they enter the measurement values per circuit: insulation resistance, RCD tripping current, RCD tripping time. Their accreditation number is already filled in. They indicate which circuits are present and their characteristics.

The measurement protocol is automatically generated: all values, the limit values alongside, pass/fail per measurement. The as-built diagram is built up based on the entered circuit data. The complete inspection dossier is ready before they leave the site.

• —No retyping of measurement values: entered on-site, directly into the dossier.
• —Pass/fail automatically calculated based on AREI limit values.
• —As-built diagram generated based on circuit data.
• —Non-conformities flagged for follow-up before the inspector sees them.
• —New-build project: bulk generate dossiers per apartment from a shared template.
• —Archive per address: every dossier retrievable at re-inspection or incident.

The market that is waiting for this product

There are more than 10,000 accredited electrical installation companies in Belgium. The vast majority are SMEs of 2 to 20 technicians. They work in new build, renovation, industry and the growing EV charging market. They produce a dossier with every completed installation.

No tool exists that is specifically built for the AREI inspection dossier of the small electrician. The inspection bodies have their own portals, but those are made for the inspector, not the installer. The gap is clear, the market is there, and the pain is felt every day.

Electrical installations: equivalent standards in the Netherlands, Germany and France

The Belgian AREI has its equivalent in every European country. In the Netherlands, NEN 1010 is the technical standard for low-voltage installations, with inspection by accredited bodies such as Kema Keuringen or Bureau Veritas. NEN 3140 additionally governs periodic safety inspection of electrical installations in commercial premises. In Germany, DIN VDE 0100 (low-voltage installations) and DGUV Vorschrift 3 are the reference standards, with mandatory Prüfung by certified electricians for commercial installations.

In France, NF C 15-100 is the reference standard for electrical installations, with Consuel (Comité National pour la Sécurité des Usagers de l'Électricité) as the body that issues the conformity declaration before EDF activates the power connection — exactly the same principle as the Belgian AREI inspection dossier with an accredited inspection body. At the European level, IEC 60364 / EN 60364 is the international base standard on which all these national implementations are founded.