When a café, clinic or office is being fitted out, the electrical work bookends the whole program. It comes in early, as a rough-in that has to be right before the walls close, and again at the end, as the fit-off and compliance sign-off that lets you legally open the doors. Get either wrong and every other trade waits.
Rough-in: the point of no return
Once plasterboard goes up, every cable you didn't run becomes a surface conduit or a wall you re-open. That's why we walk the joinery drawings and the shopfitter's layout before we pull a single cable — power for the coffee machine, data for the POS, the three-phase the kitchen actually draws, the lighting circuits the designer specified, and a dozen power points nobody mentioned but everybody needs.
- Coordinate cable routes with HVAC, hydraulic and data before ceilings close.
- Confirm the real load — kitchens and salons routinely need three-phase.
- Set out switchboard capacity for the fit-out and the next tenant.
- Mark out lighting and emergency lighting to the certified design.
Fit-off and the certificate that opens the doors
At the back end, the work compresses. Fittings, switches, the board, the testing and the certificate of compliance all land in the final week, often while the painters and the signage crew are still on site. This is where an electrician who has done fit-outs earns their keep — staging the fit-off so testing isn't waiting on a benchtop that's late, and having the compliance paperwork ready for council or the building certifier on the day it's needed.
Designing for the next tenant
The smartest fit-out spends a little more on switchboard headroom and cable capacity than today's tenant strictly needs. Retail and hospitality tenancies turn over; a board sized only for this fit-out becomes the next tenant's first expense. We build in sensible spare capacity so the space leases again without ripping the walls open.
Treated as infrastructure rather than a rush at the end, the electrical scope is what lets a fit-out hit its opening date — and stay compliant long after the ribbon is cut.
