Does a rental safety switch need to be tested or just checked?

It must be tested under load, not simply confirmed as present. Visually identifying that a safety switch is fitted does not satisfy the requirement, and this is the single most common shortcut in a cursory rental check. An RCD can be installed, look perfectly healthy, and still fail to trip — which is precisely the failure the test exists to catch, and precisely the failure that matters when someone in the property contacts a live conductor. Each installed RCD is tripped under load to confirm it operates within the required response time, and what it actually did is recorded. If a Ballarat rental's safety switch does not trip correctly during the check, that is a fault requiring rectification rather than a note for next time.