24-hour service
Emergency electrical repair, 24 hours a day in Los Angeles
Sparking, burning smells, heat at a panel or a sudden loss of power to part of the building are not next-morning problems. Calls to (213) 584-4180 are answered at any hour.
What counts as an emergency
Not every electrical problem needs a night call, and we will say so on the phone. What does justify one: any smell of burning insulation, visible scorching or heat at a panel, receptacle or switch; sparking or arcing; a breaker that trips the instant it is reset; buzzing or crackling inside equipment; water reaching a panel or subpanel; damaged service conductors; and complete loss of power to a unit or building when neighbors still have theirs.
Diagnosis before parts
Night work goes wrong when someone starts swapping components in the dark. We start at the service equipment, confirm voltage and neutral integrity, then work out toward the affected circuits. Most failures we find are concentrated in a handful of causes: failed neutral connections, degraded splices in old junction boxes, overheated breaker-to-bus connections, water-damaged exterior devices, and rodent damage in attic and crawlspace runs.
Make-safe, then repair
The first objective at 1 a.m. is a building that is safe to sleep in. That sometimes means isolating one circuit and restoring the rest of the panel, then returning in daylight to complete a repair that needs materials, a permit or an inspection. We tell you clearly which of the two you are getting before we start.
What to do before we arrive
If you can reach the panel safely, switch off the affected breaker. Do not reset a breaker repeatedly, and do not use an outlet that has scorched or smells hot. If there is smoke or fire, call 911 first. If the damage involves the service drop or the meter, that portion belongs to the utility and we will help you identify the boundary.
Call immediately if you see
- Burning or fishy smell near a panel or outlet
- Scorch marks or discoloration on a device
- Sparks or a visible arc
- A breaker that trips instantly on reset
- Buzzing or crackling from the panel
- Water in or near electrical equipment
Situations we are called out for most
Half the house is dead
Usually a failing main neutral or a lost leg of the service. Symptoms include some rooms dark, others working, and lights brightening or dimming oddly.
Breaker will not hold
A hard short or ground fault somewhere on the circuit. We isolate loads until the fault is located rather than upsizing the breaker.
Hot or discolored outlet
Loose terminations create resistance, and resistance creates heat. The device and often the conductor terminations need replacing.
Panel is buzzing
Frequently a loose breaker-to-bus connection or a failing breaker. This is one of the few things worth shutting down for.
Storm and water damage
Rain driven into exterior receptacles, meter pedestals and detached garage feeds. Wet equipment gets replaced, not dried out.
Power restored but nothing works
After a utility event, surge damage often shows up in specific circuits and equipment. We test rather than guess at what survived.
How the work goes
You call and describe it
We ask a short set of questions to judge urgency and to know what to bring. If it is something you can safely check yourself, we will walk you through it.
Arrival window
We give a realistic window based on distance from our Jefferson Boulevard shop and the calls ahead of you.
Diagnosis and make-safe
We locate the fault, isolate it, and confirm the rest of the system is safe to energize.
Repair and written scope
Repairs completed on the spot are documented. Anything needing permit, inspection or ordered material is scheduled with a written scope.
Questions about emergency work
Do you charge more at night?
After-hours work carries a higher rate than a scheduled daytime visit, which is standard in the trade. You will be told the rate on the phone before we dispatch, not after we arrive.
Can you restore power tonight, or will it take days?
Most faults we find are repairable in the same visit. The exceptions are service-level failures that need utility coordination and panel replacements that need parts and inspection. In those cases we make the building safe and restore whatever can be safely energized.
My whole block is out. Do I need an electrician?
No. A block-wide outage is a utility problem and only the utility can fix it. If the outage stops at your property line, that is when to call us.
Is a tripped GFCI an emergency?
Rarely. Press reset once. If it will not hold, there is a genuine ground fault on that circuit and it should be diagnosed, but it can usually wait for daylight if the affected circuit stays off. Read more in our GFCI and outlet page.
Where we do this work
Available in West Adams, Mid-City, Culver City, Baldwin Hills and Crenshaw, Inglewood, and Palms and Mar Vista. See the full service area list.
Related services
Emergency calls frequently turn into planned work once the immediate fault is cleared, most often at the panel or in older branch wiring.
Electrical emergency right now?
Call (213) 584-4180. The line is answered 24 hours a day, seven days a week.