Electrical Quote Review ($99): A Builder Puts Your Wiring, Panel, EV Charger or Generator Quotes on One Grid and Tells You Which to Sign

Electrical & LightingIndependent review

Electrical Quote Review: A Builder Reads Your Electrician’s Quotes Against Your House Before You Sign

Up to three quotes, or one quote plus your panel photos, on one grid, with a plain answer. No electrician behind it, no commission on who you hire.

Three quotes to wire the same new house: $14,800, $19,500 and $23,900. One includes the underground service and the permit, one says “200 A panel” and nothing about the service, one lists 40 pot lights and the other two say “lighting as per plan”. Or three quotes for a 200 A upgrade where one includes the meter base and the utility disconnect and two do not say. That is normal. The review puts them on one grid, prices what each one left out, and tells you which one to sign or what to ask first.

Reviews are done by an Ontario builder who has been building since 1979, with 300-plus houses behind him; the electrical on his own builds is done by the licensed electrical contractors he hires. Checked October 2026. Turnaround three business days.

What you get

Electrical Quote Review
$99

Up to three quotes, or one quote plus your panel photos. HST added at checkout.

  • Every quote put on the same line-by-line grid, side by side
  • The 7-digit ESA licence number on each quote checked against ESA’s contractor locator
  • What each one leaves out, in dollars: the service and meter base, the utility disconnect, the ESA notification, fixtures, pot light count, exterior work, patching, trenching
  • For a panel, charger or heat pump job: whether the existing service can carry it, explained in plain words from your panel photos and the load calculation, and whether a load manager would do instead of an upgrade
  • For a generator: the size against the loads that matter, the transfer switch, the gas line and who does each part
  • The questions to send back to each electrician
  • A plain answer: sign this one, go back to that one with these questions, or walk
Order the quote review

More than three quotes, or a full new-house electrical package with drawings, is quoted separately; email first. The review is not an electrical design, a load calculation stamped by anyone, or an ESA inspection.

How it works

  1. Order. Pay by card on the Stripe page. HST is added at checkout; you get an emailed receipt and a page telling you exactly what to send.
  2. Send the paper and the pictures. Reply to the receipt email with the quotes as PDFs or clear phone photos, the result from the service capacity calculator or the whole-house cost calculator if you ran one, and photos of the panel with the door open, the panel label and the meter.
  3. Get the answer. Within three business days: the grid, the licence check, the blanks priced, and the recommendation with the questions to send back.
  4. Use it. Send the questions, get the revised quotes, sign the right one. Often the cheap quote comes back higher once the service and the utility are in, and the dear one turns out to be the only one that priced the whole job.

What it is not

It is not a site visit, an electrical design or an inspection. Nobody comes to the house for $99, and nobody opens your panel. The quotes, the calculator sheet and your photos are what gets read. Only a Licensed Electrical Contractor can design and do the work, and only ESA inspects it. If the paper shows something that needs a person first (a warm breaker, aluminum wiring, a service that looks overloaded, a generator connected without a transfer switch), the review says so and says who.

What the review looks for

  • A quote with no ESA licence number on it, from a company that turns out to be a general contractor or a handyman.
  • “200 A upgrade” with nothing about the meter base, the mast or the utility disconnect.
  • A $5,000 service upgrade for an EV charger that a $1,000 load manager would have handled.
  • New-house wiring priced per square foot with “fixtures by owner” and no allowance anywhere.
  • Pot lights “as required” on one quote and 42 on another for the same house.
  • A generator quote with no gas line, no pad and no transfer switch in the price.
  • “ESA permit $450” on a job where ESA’s fee is under $100.

Before you order, the free version

The line-by-line grid is on the site and you can fill it in yourself. The hiring page, the ESA permit page and the inspection checklist cover most of what the review checks. If the grid answers it, keep your $99.

Questions people ask

Can you review just one quote?

Yes. One quote gets the same grid, checked against what a complete quote for your job should include, so you know what to ask before you sign it.

Will you tell me which electrician to use?

I will tell you which quote is the one to sign, and why, and what to ask before you do. I do not keep a list of electricians to send you to and I do not take a commission. If the house is in Simcoe County, Muskoka or the Georgian Bay area and the electrical is part of a build or renovation you want us to price, say so in the email.

Can you tell me if my panel is big enough?

I can show you the load calculation for your house in plain words from what you send, and tell you whether an upgrade, a load manager or nothing looks like the answer. The final word belongs to the Licensed Electrical Contractor who files the notification and to ESA.

Is the fee refundable?

If I cannot read what you send (illegible photos, a quote with no scope at all), I will say so before starting and refund it. Once the review is written, it is not.

Three pieces of paper, one answer

The grid, the licence check and the questions, in three business days, for $99. Then sign the right one.

Order the quote review, $99Back to the section