Ron wrote:

My girlfriend and I recently moved into our newly-purchased house. We
wanted to get the electric meter changed but when the guy came out to
do so, he reported a live reading on the neutral block in our meter
box. This was potentially dangerous, he said, and he called out the
mains engineers. They investigated and couldn't replicate the problem.
They asked if we'd experienced any problems in the house and we hadn't.


He's a cowboy trying to rip you off.

I can't see any basis for that conclusion.

A new house should have an inspection
certificate, so ask for a copy, then contact the person that arranged your
survey and complain.

He never said the house was new, only that he purchased it recently.

What he has measured is the voltage
between neutral and earth.

You know this how?

If you have fluorescent lights this sometimes
happens. It can happen if you have a faulty TV or video.

It can also happen when the sky is cloudy. There is however equally
little connection between the observation and your suggested "cause"

Since then we've had three occurrences of the RCDs in our fuse box
tripping. I today bought a standard socket tester and tested every
socket in the house. I've found the culprit to be the mains outlet in
our spare bedroom, which appears to be incorrectly wired, showing a
live/neutral reverse on the tester.


That would not cause a problem anywhere else, but should have been checked
before you bought the house.

Depends on what survey you paid for.

The socket is not connected to anything else
unless it is in a loop.

Which is highly likely...

My questions, then...

1) Would this explain both the apparent live neutral reading in our
main meter box and the tripping of the RCDs? I always thought RCDs were
only concerned with earthing faults, not live/neutral reverse polarity
type problems


Depending how it is wired and what you use might make one circuit breaker
trip.

What makes you say that?

--
Cheers,

John.

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