Electrical work is one of the few trades where the consequence of hiring badly is not a callback. It is worth five minutes on the phone before anybody is standing in your basement.
Are you licensed, and insured
Both, not one. A license means the work can be permitted and inspected. Insurance means you are covered if something goes wrong. Anybody hesitant about either question has answered it.
Will you pull the permit
If the answer is that the job does not need one, ask which village and what their threshold is. A contractor who works in an area knows this. A contractor who wants to avoid the inspection will steer you away from the question.
How are you quoting this
A number before anybody has opened the panel is a guess, and guesses move. What you want is somebody who looks first, quotes in writing against a defined scope, and stops to talk to you if the scope genuinely changes mid-job.
Ask what happens if they open it up and it is smaller than expected. The answer tells you whether the quote is a scope or a target.
Who actually shows up
Ask whether the person quoting is the person working, and whether any of it is subcontracted. There is nothing wrong with a crew, but you should know who is going to be in your house.
What does done look like
Tested, circuits labelled properly in the panel, site cleaned up, and the closed inspection handed over where a permit was pulled. Labelled panels matter more than people think, because the next person working on that system is reading your labels to decide what is safe to touch.
- Are you licensed and insured? Both, not one.
- Will you pull the permit, and which village is this in?
- How are you quoting this, and what happens if the scope changes?
- Who actually shows up, and is any of it subcontracted?
- What does done look like, and what do I get at the end?
Ask what happens if they open it up and it is smaller than expected. The answer tells you whether the quote is a scope or a target.
Red flags worth walking away from
A number quoted before anybody has looked at the panel. Reluctance to discuss permits. A request for a large deposit in cash. No written scope. And anybody proposing to upsize a breaker to stop it tripping, which is the single clearest sign that the person does not understand what a breaker is for.
Questions we get about this
How do I check a license?
Ask for the license number and the registration it is held under, then verify it. A licensed contractor expects the question and answers without hesitation.
Should I pay a deposit?
A deposit against materials on a large job is normal. A large cash deposit before any work, or pressure to pay outside a written agreement, is not.
What should a quote contain?
A defined scope, the materials involved, whether a permit is included, and what happens if the scope changes. A single number with no scope is a target, not a quote.
Is the cheapest quote right?
Sometimes, if it is scoped the same. The problem is the cheapest number often excludes the permit, the inspection, and corrective work the others included.
How we price and schedule this
We look before we quote. That means somebody comes out, opens the panel, and finds out what is actually behind the wall. Quoting a job like this over the phone produces a number that changes, and a number that changes is worse than no number at all.
What you get is written, itemized against a defined scope. If we open something up and the scope genuinely changes, we stop and tell you before carrying on. Emergencies get same-day attention; scheduled work usually starts within a few days, though anything needing a permit or a utility disconnect runs on the village calendar and ComEd’s as well as ours. We will tell you at the quote which parts we control and which we do not.
What done looks like
The work gets tested, the circuits get labeled properly in the panel, and the site gets cleaned up behind us. Labeled panels matter more than people think, because the next person working on that system is reading your labels to decide what is safe to touch. Where a permit was pulled you get the closed inspection, and where documentation exists, you get it.
Why the permit and the inspection matter here
Illinois municipalities adopt the National Electrical Code on their own schedule, so the rules in one village are not always the rules in the next one over, and permit thresholds differ too. Some places want a permit for a single new circuit; others only for a service change or a panel replacement. We deal with whichever jurisdiction the job sits in rather than guessing, which is part of what you are hiring.
The inspection is not a formality to get through. It is an independent check that what went behind the drywall matches what was supposed to, carried out by somebody with no stake in the invoice. It also puts the work on the public record for the address, which is what a buyer, a buyer’s inspector or an insurer will eventually ask about.
Who does the work
Quik Wire Electric is a licensed Illinois electrical contractor and we carry insurance on every job. Where the village requires a permit we pull it and we meet the inspector, so the work goes on the public record for the address rather than living only in your memory.
The same licensed electricians turn up whether the job is one dead outlet in a bungalow or switchgear in a village facility. We do not run a separate B-team for small work and we do not subcontract the parts nobody wants. You get told who is coming and roughly when, and if we are running late you get a call.
We work out of Des Plaines and cover 24 Illinois counties, from Cook and Lake through DuPage, Kane, McHenry and Will and out to Winnebago, LaSalle and Champaign. The full service area is here if you want to check whether your address is on it.
Want a straight answer about your job?
Call and describe the symptom. We will tell you what it probably is before anybody quotes anything.
Talk to an electrician