Commercial & Industrial · Hamilton, ON
Commercial Electrician in Hamilton, Ontario
Commercial electrical services in Hamilton: three phase, service upgrades, emergency lighting and maintenance contracts for local businesses. Licensed, WSIB covered, and available at any hour when a premises goes down.
Quick answer
Apollo Electric Inc. is a commercial electrician serving Hamilton and the surrounding region. We handle three phase service upgrades, control panels, lighting retrofits, emergency and exit lighting, tenant fit-outs and maintenance contracts, under ECRA/ESA licence 7009372 with over 30 years in the trade. Emergency cover runs 24 hours.
When a building loses power, the cost is not the repair. It is the spoiled stock, the shift sent home, the tenants calling, and the insurer asking who last certified the work. A commercial electrician is hired to keep that bill from arriving, and to shorten it when it does.
What Does a Commercial Electrician Do Differently?
A commercial electrician works to different voltages, different codes and different consequences. The trade is the same. The exposure is not, which is what sets commercial electrical services apart.
Three phase rather than single phase. Most Hamilton businesses run 208V or 600V three phase service feeding motors, compressors, HVAC plant and kitchen equipment. Diagnosing an unbalanced load or a lost phase is a different job from tracing a dead receptacle, and getting it wrong burns out equipment rather than tripping a breaker.
Continuity of operation is part of the brief. On a house, a shutdown is an inconvenience. On a premises it is lost revenue, so the work is planned around trading hours, scheduled shutdowns and phased changeovers. A commercial electrician who cannot sequence a job around your operation is going to cost you more than the quote says.
Documentation is not optional. Notifiable work closes with an ESA certificate of inspection. That certificate is what your insurer, your landlord and your eventual buyer will ask to see. Missing paperwork on commercial premises has consequences that missing paperwork on a bungalow does not.
Other people are on site. Staff, tenants and the public are in the building while the work happens. That drives WSIB coverage, lockout procedure and how the area is isolated, and it is why a clearance certificate is worth asking for before anyone starts.
Commercial Electrical Services for Hamilton Businesses
This is the range of commercial electrical services a commercial electrician is expected to cover on a Hamilton premises, from a single nuisance trip through to a full service increase.
- Three phase service upgrades and capacity increases where load has outgrown the existing service
- Distribution panels, sub panels, disconnects and control panel work
- Motor, compressor and HVAC connections, plus troubleshooting on equipment that keeps dropping out
- Lighting retrofits to LED, including layout and controls
- Emergency and exit lighting installation and testing
- Tenant fit-outs, unit splits and metering changes
- Data and low voltage rough-in carried out alongside power, where it is part of the same build
- Generator and standby supply connections
- Scheduled maintenance contracts and thermal inspection of panels
- Fault finding on intermittent trips, nuisance tripping and unbalanced loads
Residential work is covered separately on our residential electrical services page. Where a job spans both, for example a mixed-use building with apartments above a unit, it is quoted as one job rather than two.
Sectors We Work In
The equipment changes by sector, and so does the reason a commercial electrician gets called. Our commercial electrical services in Hamilton are shaped around those differences.
| Sector | What usually brings us in |
|---|---|
| Restaurants and food service | Walk-in refrigeration going down, kitchen equipment circuits, hood and make-up air interlocks, added capacity after a menu or equipment change |
| Retail and plazas | Tenant fit-outs, unit metering, signage circuits, parking and exterior lighting |
| Warehousing and light industrial | Three phase distribution, motor and conveyor connections, high bay lighting retrofits, thermal inspection of panels |
| Offices and professional space | Reconfiguration after a churn, lighting controls, emergency and exit lighting testing, supplementary circuits for equipment |
| Multi-unit residential and property management | House panels, common area lighting, laundry and elevator supply, and the recurring question of which side of the meter a fault sits on |
Three Phase, Service Upgrades and Load Growth
The most common call a commercial electrician takes in Hamilton is not a fault. It is a business that has grown past its service and does not know it yet. A restaurant adds a second walk-in. A shop adds a compressor. An office adds twenty workstations and a server cupboard. Nothing fails immediately, so nothing gets looked at, and then the main starts tripping on the busiest afternoon of the month.
The work is a load calculation against the existing service, then a decision: redistribute across the existing capacity, add a sub panel, or increase the service. Those are three very different prices and only one of them is right. Any commercial electrician quoting a service upgrade before doing that calculation is selling, not diagnosing.
Where the service does need increasing, the job involves the distributor. Hamilton, Dundas, Ancaster and Stoney Creek are served by Alectra Utilities. Burlington is served by Burlington Hydro. Their timelines are real and they are not negotiable, so they get built into the schedule rather than discovered halfway through.
Emergency Cover for Business Premises
A commercial electrician is not much use on a schedule. Emergency calls for commercial electrical services are taken 24 hours a day, every day. For commercial premises the usual triggers are loss of refrigeration, a tripped main that will not hold, failed emergency or exit lighting, a burning smell at a distribution panel, or water reaching electrical equipment after a roof or plumbing failure.
What counts as urgent, what can wait for morning, and how to tell whether a fault sits on your side or the distributor's is covered on our 24 hour emergency page and our guide to partial power outages.
If you run a premises where downtime is expensive, the sensible move is a standing arrangement with a commercial electrician rather than a phone number saved for later. A scheduled thermal inspection finds the loose termination before it becomes an outage, and it costs a fraction of the outage.
Compliance, ESA Notification and Your Insurer
Defined categories of work require notification to the Electrical Safety Authority before the work starts, and close with a certificate of inspection. Apollo Electric files those notifications as a matter of course, not on request.
Three documents are worth holding for every job a commercial electrician does on your premises: the ECRA/ESA contractor licence number, a WSIB clearance certificate, and the certificate of inspection for the work itself. Ours is ECRA/ESA 7009372 and it can be checked independently. The reasoning behind checking any contractor, including this one, is set out on our licensed electrician guide, and the obligations that fall on the building owner rather than the contractor are on our electrical safety page.
What a Commercial Electrician Costs, and What Moves the Price
No commercial electrician can honestly quote a flat rate for commercial electrical services, because a lighting retrofit across a warehouse and a lost phase on a compressor are not the same job. What you get is a number in Canadian dollars before the work begins, itemised, with any ESA notification fee stated rather than added later.
| What moves the price | Why |
|---|---|
| Whether the premises can be shut down | Live work, phased changeovers and out-of-hours scheduling all cost more than an empty building on a Tuesday |
| Service size and phase | 600V three phase work carries different equipment, different clearances and different labour from 208V |
| Diagnosis time | An obvious tripped main is minutes. An intermittent fault under load is hours of monitoring before anything is replaced |
| Existing equipment | Obsolete distribution gear often has no drop-in replacement, which turns a swap into a partial rebuild |
| Distributor involvement | Service increases involve Alectra or Burlington Hydro, and their timeline drives the schedule |
| Notification and inspection | Real costs on notifiable work, stated up front |
All work carries a satisfaction guarantee, with a lifetime warranty on select parts and components, and which parts those are is stated at quote time.
How a Commercial Job Runs
Every engagement for commercial electrical services in Hamilton follows the same sequence.
- Site visit and scope. A commercial electrician attends before quoting. Readings at the service, the distribution panels and the affected circuits, plus a load calculation where capacity is in question. Commercial work is not quoted over the phone.
- Written quote. Itemised, in Canadian dollars, including notification fees and any out-of-hours premium, before anything is ordered.
- Schedule around your operation. Shutdown windows, phased changeovers and out-of-hours work agreed in writing, so the disruption is known rather than discovered.
- Notification filed. Where the Ontario Electrical Safety Code requires it, before the work rather than after.
- Work, test, certificate. The job closes with testing and, where notification applied, a certificate of inspection for your records and your insurer.
Service Area
Commercial electrical services are available across Hamilton, Dundas, Ancaster, Waterdown, Stoney Creek, Grimsby, Burlington, Oakville, Milton, Cambridge, Kitchener-Waterloo and surrounding areas including the Greater Toronto Area. Multi-site operators with premises across several of those are quoted as one account rather than site by site. More about the company is on our about page.
What Hamilton Customers Say
The feedback below comes from Hamilton businesses that have used our commercial electrical services.
REPLACE WITH REAL QUOTE ONE, EXACT WORDING FROM GOOGLE OR HOMESTARS.
First name, business type
REPLACE WITH REAL QUOTE TWO, EXACT WORDING.
First name, business type
REPLACE WITH REAL QUOTE THREE, EXACT WORDING.
First name, business type
More feedback is collected on our reviews page.
Frequently Asked Questions
Do you work on three phase systems?
Yes. As a commercial electrician Apollo Electric handles 208V and 600V three phase service upgrades, distribution and sub panels, control panels, motor and HVAC connections, and fault finding on unbalanced loads or a lost phase. Work is carried out under ECRA/ESA licence 7009372.
Can the work be done outside business hours?
Yes. For commercial electrical services, evening, overnight and weekend scheduling is normal on commercial premises where a daytime shutdown is not workable. Out-of-hours work carries a different cost base than a daytime job, and that is stated in the written quote rather than added afterwards.
Will I get a WSIB clearance certificate?
Yes, on request. Apollo Electric is WSIB compliant. If an uninsured worker is injured on your premises the liability can land on the building owner, so a clearance certificate is worth obtaining from any commercial electrician before work starts, including from us.
Do you offer maintenance contracts?
Yes. Scheduled maintenance typically covers thermal inspection of distribution panels, emergency and exit lighting testing, and inspection of the circuits that carry critical equipment. On premises where downtime is expensive, this costs a fraction of a single unplanned outage.
Who handles the service upgrade with the utility?
Apollo Electric coordinates with the local distributor. Hamilton, Dundas, Ancaster and Stoney Creek are served by Alectra Utilities and Burlington is served by Burlington Hydro. Their timelines are built into the schedule at quote stage rather than discovered partway through the job.
What is included in the certificate of inspection?
Where the Ontario Electrical Safety Code requires notification, the Electrical Safety Authority inspects the completed work and issues a certificate of inspection. Keep it. It is the document your insurer, your landlord or a future buyer will ask to see, sometimes years later.
References
- Electrical Safety Authority, notification, inspection and the Ontario Electrical Safety Code
- ESA, finding the right contractor, verifying an ECRA/ESA licence
- Workplace Safety and Insurance Board, coverage and clearance certificates
- Alectra Utilities, distributor for Hamilton, Dundas, Ancaster and Stoney Creek
- Burlington Hydro, distributor for Burlington
- City of Hamilton, building and permit information
Contact and Service Details
Apollo Electric Inc.
83 Ferndale Ave, Hamilton, ON L8K 4L7
Phone: 905-921-5487 (24/7 emergency)
Email: zvonkoapollo@gmail.com
Non-emergency hours: 9:00 am to 8:00 pm, evening and weekend service available
ECRA/ESA 7009372 · WSIB compliant · Fully licensed and bonded · Over 30 years of experience
To arrange a site visit or a maintenance contract, use our contact page.
Reviewed by Zvonko Lipovac, Master Electrician, ECRA/ESA 7009372. Last updated 15 September 2026.