Burning smells, sparking outlets, no power to half the house, or a breaker that won't reset — these aren't jobs that wait for a scheduled appointment. Millar Electrics takes after-hours calls for urgent electrical faults across Melbourne, with a licensed electrician on-site typically within 1–2 hours of your call. Based in Nunawading, we're fastest through the eastern suburbs — most addresses between Hawthorn and Ringwood — but we'll travel further for genuine emergencies. We don't advertise "24/7 coverage" because honestly, one licensed electrician can't reliably do that and still run daytime jobs well. What we do offer is a real human answering calls in the evenings and weekends, a triage conversation so you know what you're dealing with, and an electrician on the road within 1–2 hours for anything genuinely urgent.
Common after-hours calls we take: burning smells from a switchboard, half the house without power after a storm, water damage near electrical fittings, a dead or stuck breaker, or visible sparks from an outlet. If the situation is life-threatening, call 000 first — we'll follow up once the immediate danger is handled.
What to do while you wait
Switch off the affected circuit at the switchboard if you can identify it, or the main switch if you can't. Unplug appliances connected to the affected circuit. Stay clear of any visible damage. Don't reset a breaker that has tripped repeatedly — there's a reason it's protecting that circuit, and resetting it can mask a fault that's about to cause a fire.
After-hours rates and what's covered
Emergency call-outs after 5pm or on weekends carry a higher hourly rate than scheduled work. We agree the rate before dispatch so there are no surprises. Most call-outs include diagnostic time and the immediate make-safe work; larger remediation (board replacement, full rewiring) is quoted separately during business hours.
Standards the make-safe work meets
Isolation and make-safe procedures on an energised installation follow AS/NZS 4836 (safe working on or near low-voltage electrical installations) — isolation, proving dead, and lock-out where the fault is severe enough to need it. Any new or replaced wiring is installed to AS/NZS 3000 (the Wiring Rules). Where the emergency exposes underlying non-compliance — missing RCD coverage, degraded insulation, an overloaded sub-board — we record the finding for the follow-up quote so the next visit fixes the root cause rather than just the symptom.