The present invention relates to a method for determining a characteristic of a surface layer of a fuser element for fusing a marking material on a recording medium in a printing system. The printing system comprises a capacitive probe, which comprises a first electrode and a second electrode. The second electrode is arranged adjacent to the first electrode in order to form a capacitor. The first electrode and the second electrode are in operation both arranged adjacent to and opposing the surface layer of the fuser element. The method comprises the steps of performing a capacitive measurement on the surface layer by the first electrode and the second electrode of the capacitive probe and determining a characteristic of the surface layer based on the capacitive measurement.