A 40-room refurb in Brighton wired the minibar into the key card circuit alongside the lighting. Every guest who went out for dinner came back to a warm fridge. The fix was a rewire on 40 rooms, and it was entirely avoidable at first fix.

What Does a Key Card Switch Actually Control?

The module is a 16A switch in a 50 x 50mm Euro module format, sitting inside a standard front plate beside the room door. The guest drops their card in on entry, the circuit closes, and the room's switched loads come live. Pull the card on the way out and the circuit opens after a 30-second delay, which is there so a guest fumbling for their card at the door doesn't get plunged into darkness mid-step.

What it doesn't do is decide for you which circuits it governs. That's a design decision made at first fix, and getting it wrong is what generates guest complaints rather than energy savings.

What Belongs on the Key Card Circuit, and What Must Not

This is an honest trade opinion rather than a spec rule: leave at least one bedside socket permanently live, outside the key card circuit. Guests charging a phone or a CPAP machine while they're out for the evening is common enough that the energy saved isn't worth the complaint, and it costs nothing at first fix to split one socket off the switched group.

The 800W Inductive Limit Catches People Out

BG's hotel key card modules are rated 16A, but the headline figure hides the detail that actually matters on site. The load rating is 1800W for resistive or incandescent loads and only 800W for inductive or fluorescent loads. Air conditioning units, fan motors and fluorescent fittings are inductive. A room whose total switched load looks comfortable against 1800W can be well over the limit once the AC unit is counted at its inductive rating.

Finish Options and What They Cost

The module is available across both BG ranges, so a hotel refurb doesn't have to compromise the room's finish scheme to get the function. Evolve carries it in Brushed Steel (PCDBSKYCSW), Matt Black (PCDMBKYCSB) and Matt Grey (PCDMGKYCSB). Nexus Screwless carries it in Brushed Steel (FBSKYCSB, or FBSKYCSG with a grey insert) and Black Nickel (FBNKYCSB). All share the same 16A electrical spec and 47mm minimum mounting box depth, so the choice is purely cosmetic.

That 47mm depth is worth checking against the existing back boxes before ordering on a retrofit. It's deeper than a standard switch box, and discovering that on fitting day across 40 rooms is an expensive surprise. If the rest of the room's accessories are being respecced at the same time, the wider BG Evolve range covers matching sockets and switches in the same finishes.

Is This Notifiable Work?

Installing or altering the fixed wiring for a key card circuit is electrical installation work in a commercial premises, assessed under BS 7671 like any other circuit alteration. Separately, the emergency lighting in those corridors and rooms is governed by BS 5266 and must be on its own permanently live supply, which is the single hardest rule to break by accident and the most serious one to get wrong. If a key card switch can de-energise an emergency light, that installation has a real compliance problem, not a design preference.

We've covered the wider socket-count side of hospitality wiring separately in USB-A or USB-C Wall Socket: Which Should You Spec?, which is worth reading alongside this if you're deciding which guest room sockets stay permanently live.

Frequently Asked Questions