Renewables are crucial when it comes to achieving the very highest EPC ratings. This means solar PV, solar thermal, wind, heat pumps and biomass. Which ones will help you get the best rating however, and what can hold back your property from achieving that A rating?

Solar PV

Solar PV is one of the most popular renewable technologies for the home. You can see them on many homes across the UK and they really do help cut your home’s electricity costs. PV can be input into the EPC using either assumed defaults based on the observed sized of the system, or using precise figures from the installer and MCS certificate. Solar will usually provide a good boost to the EPC rating, taking the score up by a whole rating band in many cases, but this will depend on the size of the system. There is a limit to how many panels you can fit on the average roof!

Solar Thermal

Solar thermal heats hot water directly, rather than creating electricity. Like PV, it can be entered into the software using defaults or by entering the specifications of the system in question. Solar thermal has much less of a bearing on the final EPC rating for most properties, usually only making a couple of points’ difference. Whilst there are plenty of good reasons to get a solar thermal system, improving the EPC rating should rank pretty low down on the list for this reason.

Wind Turbines

Wind turbines are not particularly common in a domestic setting, and if they are it is usually on quite a small scale, or in combination with commercial activity like farming.

If you do happen to have a wind turbine, the rating will depend on a couple of factor: how big the diameter of the turbine is, how many turbines you have, and the height of the turbine. If your area is classified as rural rather than suburban, there will be a big bump in the rating as a result, presumably because there are likely to be less obstructions and a higher wind speed in these areas. Likewise, if the turbine is in a dense urban area, there will be a considerable negative hit on the rating.

If you have a small turbine with a span of just a metre or so, the EPC rating is not going to change much. If you have a larger turbine with a span of 4-5m, then you will see a big uptick in your EPC rating, and could even exceed the 100-point rating, meaning that the home is actually generating more energy than it is using. If you have the space, a turbine can be a good choice to improve your rating, but it is only practical in a small number of properties – and it will take a good size turbine to really make the difference.

Biomass and Heat Pumps

Other forms of renewable heating, like heat pumps and biomass, could also help improve the rating on the EPC in some situations. Generally speaking, they will only improve the rating in properties that are off the gas grid. Gas heating is always going to be the cheapest way to heat and therefore electric forms of heating will reduce the energy rating, even if they are particularly efficient electric heating systems. Biomass is similar in that the cost of a unit of biomass is still more than a unit of gas, but it is less than oil or LPG, making it a good substitute for rural areas.

The rating increase will vary based on a number of factors, but you are not likely to get up to the very highest ratings using only these renewable technologies, you will likely need to combine with solar or wind to make the property A-rated.

Getting an A rating

Getting up to an A rating is incredibly tough. It is true that you can get there with a ton of solar and wind, but the best way is to go for a holistic approach. Combining high levels of insulation surrounding the thermal envelope of the property, an efficient heating system and a generous renewable energy system is the way to get to the higher levels without creating your own renewable power plant in your back garden!

We should also note that if your renewable system is used in conjunction with a industrial use, (like helping to power a farm or holiday homes), then it would not be considered part of the EPC for the domestic property.

There has been a big push over the last 20 years to improve the efficiency of home and commercial lighting. In the context of a building as a whole, how important is lighting at improving efficiency and making energy savings? Let’s take a look at some typical lighting technology and what sort of impact it has on your EPC rating.

Incandescent Lighting

The oldest and least efficient way to light a property is with a standard incandescent light bulb. This technology has been around for over 100 years, and the standard incandescent will give off much more energy in heat than light. They are incredibly inefficient and are being phased out to the point where you cannot buy them in the UK any more.

Halogen Spotlights

Halogen lighting can still be bought in the UK. They are primarily found in spotlight fittings, but you can also get halogen bulbs in other formats. Whilst they are slightly more efficient than an incandescent, they are still very inefficient. They are classed as a low efficiency light in the EPC software.

LED Lighting

LEDs are the most efficient way to light a property, whatever the situation. All new build properties and refurbished properties will usually have LEDs installed as standard these days, and it is easy to see why. They have extremely long lifespans in comparison to other types of bulb, they have a full range of colour temperatures and beam angles, plus they are much cheaper to run than the competition.

How is lighting included in domestic EPCs?

Domestic EPCs have a very simple way to input the lighting in the building. All the lights are counted, and the total number of energy efficient lights are input. There is no consideration of the different types of light and the relative efficiencies – it is a very simple process that obviously has its drawbacks.

So what difference does it make to the final rating? In the average domestic property, going from old lighting to new energy efficient lighting throughout the property will only improve the energy rating by 1 or 2 points. That is not to say that it isn’t worth doing! A single point can make the difference between a C and a D rating for example, and the savings per bulb mean that the payback time is actually very short. It makes sense to get it done, but if you are trying to boost your EPC rating, you will have to do something more.

How is lighting included in commercial EPCs?

There is a stark difference in how a commercial and domestic EPC considers lighting. As we have discussed, lighting in domestic properties is very simple to input and does not really make a big difference to the final EPC. Commercial spaces tend to use a lot more lighting, and will have much bigger gulfs between the most and least efficient lighting. You can probably imagine that a 1,000 square meter warehouse is going to take quite a bit of money to light 24/7 and improving the efficiency of the bulbs by 90% or more is going to be huge for the power consumption.

The commercial EPC software is much more comprehensive, and there are a range of different options for inputting the type of lighting. You can choose to do the following:

• If a full lighting design has been carried out for the building, then it is possible to input the lux and wattage levels for each area of the building. This allows you to be incredibly accurate and if the design is up to current building regulations, you will get a very efficient and low rating for the lighting segment of the EPC.
• If there is not a full lighting design, but it is possible to get a lumen per circuit watt figure for the system, then this can be entered in the software. It will also reflect the lighting very accurately and should give a fair reflection of the lighting present.
• If the lighting is entered based on a simple visual inspection on the day, then the assessor can either enter the type of bulb in each area (eg. T8 fluorescent, Halogen, Incandescent etc), or a default of T8 fitting can be assumed if the type of bulb cannot be conclusively ascertained. This will give the property a reduced rating compared to having the lighting data, and in some cases this can make a huge difference in the final score.

Lighting Controls

Lighting controls are not considered at all in domestic properties, but they can have some impact in non-domestic EPCs. Properties with movement activation sensors and auto dimming relative to daylight will get a slight boost in their ratings. This is often crucial in getting a property up to the very highest EPC levels and is factored in mostly for new builds. Some buildings will have integrated illumination control systems which will improve the rating further.

It is fair to say that lighting can make a big difference in commercial properties. Whereas domestic properties only see a small change in their rating from improving lighting, commercial certificates can see a rating boost of several grades in the most extreme cases. Lighting is also by far the cheapest way to improve a commercial property’s rating, so make sure you check to see whether yours is up to scratch when you get your EPC.

Boilers are an important part of an EPC. How you heat your home, (whether that be with an ultra-efficient modern boiler, or a 40 year old floor-standing boiler), the EPC rating will be heavily influenced by it. That said, is changing your heating a good way to improve the rating, or should you focus on other options to get the rating up? With EPC ratings becoming ever more crucial for rental purposes, this can be an important decision.

Boiler Efficiency

The oldest boilers installed in households are around 65% efficient, usually floor mounted and open-flued. The most efficient boilers are usually wall-mounted condensing boilers, and can be up to 90% efficient. With that in mind, lets take a pretty average older property with an old boiler currently installed.

I have assumed that the heating controls are exactly the same and that hot water is drawn from the boiler, so only the boiler is changed. Before replacing, the house is F36 rated. After replacing the boiler, the rating leaps to E54. That is a fairly dramatic change, which now makes it marketable for rental under the new legislation.

Heating Controls

In the above example, we have not included any heating controls in the calculating software at all. If we take the property with a new boiler and add in some basic heating controls – that is a programmer thermostat and thermostatic valves – you will boost the rating by 3 points to D57. Add a slightly more complex zonal control system and you will get to a D60 rating, that is a whole 6-point increase just for having good heating controls.

Of course, most properties will have some sort of heating control to begin with, so it rarely makes more than a few points difference for the average property.

What about electric heating?

Electric heating is really inefficient, even if you are using it in an off-grid property. Let us take the same house we have been using and make it off grid. As a baseline, we will add simple electric convector heaters with an immersion heater, which gets us to a rating of G8. The property is identical to the one above, just off-grid with electric heating, so you can see how badly the rating is affected by electric heating.

Lets now switch the property to storage heating on a dual or Economy 7 meter. The hot water cylinder now runs off a dual immersion system. The rating has shifted up to E39, just enough to pull it over that rentable level. But is there anything that performs better than storage heaters in terms of EPC rating?

Heat Pumps

Installing a heat pump can sometimes mean a better performance on the EPC, but for this property there is actually no difference between this and storage heaters. We get an E39 if we install a heat pump with programmer, room stat, and hot water running off the heat pump, as well as a switch to a single meter.

If a heat pump is installed in a well insulated property, you might suspect that the rating will show a bigger difference between storage heaters and heat pumps; but actually we found that storage heaters generally are a point or two better in this situation – so heat pumps are rarely the answer to improve your rating it would seem. The exception might be with ground source heat pumps, or an ultra efficient air source heat pump, where a several point improvement can usually be made. Even better is a solar thermal system, which can really help the performance of a heat pump. In our scenario, a basic solar thermal system improved the rating by 6 points when tied to a heat pump, whereas adding solar thermal to a storage heater and immersion system will only provide a 2-point boost in this example.

Using Heating to Improve your EPC rating

If the heating system in your property is a basic electric system, or you have an old boiler, upgrading could make quite a bit of difference to the EPC rating. As always however, every property is different, and we wholeheartedly recommend a full recommendations report from one of our assessors before you look to make any of these improvements. This way you can be absolutely sure what is going to be the most cost-effective way to improve that rating!

EPCs are valid for 10 years before requiring renewal for the purposes of rental or sales. Many EPCs are now 10 years old, given that the launch of the EPC was back in 2007. We sometimes get people querying their new rating as it is lower than the one they received 10 years ago, and in this blog we want to try and explain why this is the case.

How has the EPC changed?

Over the years, the methodology for how the EPC is carried out has changed a little. Mostly these are minor changes in the appearance of the report and in how some of the measurements are carried out. For example, the thickness of the gap between panes in double glazing is now measured, and the amount of partition wall and its insulation is also logged. Most of these changes will make very little difference to the EPC score, perhaps a minor change of 1 or 2 points.

Much more crucial than this is the fact that the numbers used in the EPC software have changed. Over the past few years, there has been periodic tightening of the building regulations. This means what was considered a suitable level of insulation 10 years ago is no longer. The software has been updated to reflect this, so that a B-rating 10 years ago may only be a C-rating now. There have also been some adjustments to how certain technologies are weighted, according to newly available information.

Before we continue, we should make it clear that once the certificate has been issued, it will not change. The certificate has its rating fixed, and any changes to the methodology will only affect new EPCs going forward.

What does this mean for you? Should you get a new EPC?

If your EPC rating will drop, is it a good idea to get another one done? The answer is always going to be yes, for several really good reasons:

• You need an in-date EPC to be able to rent or sell the property, so you are going to have to get one anyway.
• When you get the EPC, it will be valid for the next 10 years – so if you do get an E rating or above, you are covered from any changes in the calculation method of the EPC for at least that time.
• If you still have some time before the old EPC expires, the new one doesn’t need to be lodged. We can carry out the survey, let you know the rating, and (if it has dropped below an E), hold off on issuing the certificate until necessary. This will ensure you know exactly where you stand without committing to lodging the EPC.

It really does make sense to get the EPC done. We have plenty of landlords asking us to block-book their properties to ensure they know which properties require improvement, in good time prior to the new MEES regulations coming into force next year. So don’t delay; book your property in today!

Last month, we were approached by a very worried landlord who had just heard about the new Minimum Energy Efficiency Standards (MEES) for landlords and rental properties. He, along with a couple of others, owns 6 flats above a pub in central London, and we were asked on behalf of the owners and landlords in the building to carry out some EPC surveys and find out if there was a need for any improvements.

The new standards require that the properties have a minimum efficiency of E. This is usually fairly easy to achieve, but this property was over 100 years old, with ageing boilers and windows.

The properties

On first inspection, each flat looked fairly similar. They are very typical older properties with large sash windows and solid brick walls. There were a few differences, however, which impacted on the rating they would achieve:

• Boilers – Some of the properties had older non-condensing combi boilers. These dragged the rating down because they are much less efficient than modern condensing combis. A couple of the flats had modern condensing boilers so there was a clear difference in these properties. One also had a system boiler installed, which means it had a hot water cylinder as well as the boiler unit. This is less common in flats because they take up more space, but this one was well hidden away in a dead space in the kitchen, and it was a condensing boiler, so actually very efficient.
• Windows – This is often where a lot of attention falls for landlords and this example was no exception. The windows were an area identified before the visit as a potential area for improvement, and on the visit, we could see why. Nearly all the windows in the block were around 30 year old double glazed wooded sash units in very poor condition. They were loose in their frames, draughty and not opening and closing correctly. The width of the panes in the double glazing was very narrow, which leads to poor thermal performance as well. Having said that, the EPC will simply record that there are older double glazed units, and so installing new double glazing will not improve the rating as much as one might first think.
• Floor position – In a block of flats, there must be top floor flats, which have roofs exposed to the elements, ground floor flats where there are suspended or solid floors, and mid floor flats which are sandwiched between other properties. In this block, the ground floor was a commercial unit, with the flats just above having what is defined by the EPC software as an intermittently heated space. The energy rating for these properties will be impacted by this space below, but not as much as the heat lost through the top floor flat, which has an uninsulated flat roof. The mid floor flats will be the most efficient, having the least amount of potential heat loss area in their thermal envelope.

The results – What was the rating?

The rating is the crucial thing for landlords, as without an E rating or above they cannot rent out the property from next April. Fortunately, each of the properties managed to reach at least an E rating. The specific ratings were as follows:

Flats Above Commercial Unit – Both D rated

Mid Floor Flats – Both C rated

Top Floor Flats – Both D rated

Recommendations

Despite the fact that each flat managed to pass the MEES, there is still room for improvement. Here are our broad recommendations for the flats:

• Windows – Changing the windows will not dramatically improve the energy rating of the flats, but there will be a small uplift. Financially, it is not worth changing the windows on energy efficiency grounds alone. Instead, we would recommend changing the units where they are beyond repair, and perhaps getting the units in a better condition to be refurbished. This is much cheaper than new units and will result in the windows being less draughty and opening much more easily.
• Boilers – Whilst some boilers are modern and efficient, others are very old and getting towards the end of their lifespans. It will usually make a half to full rating level difference by upgrading old boilers, so if the EPC rating is important to you, this should be carefully considered. The energy efficiency savings alone usually don’t make the upgrade worthwhile however, and it might be worth waiting for the boiler to fail or become too unreliable before upgrading.
• Roof insulation – The top floor flats have flat roofs with no insulation. It’s a good idea to upgrade the insulation in the roof, as this is where the majority of heat is lost. The cost to replace a flat roof is quite high, but it will make a big difference on the EPC for the top floor flats and improve thermal comfort for the occupants.

It is important to remember that as time goes by, legislation tends to become more strict, meaning that when the current EPC expires in 10 years’ time, upgrades may well be required to meet the new energy standards. By getting in early and making the necessary upgrade work, a lot of this can be preempted, especially when some aspects of the property are due for replacement anyway.

With EPCs becoming ever more important for those with rental properties, we are taking a look at what exactly certain improvements can do to your EPC rating. It should help you understand which measures can make a big difference and which give only minimal value for your rating.

What is solid wall insulation?

Solid wall insulation is applied either internally or externally to the walls of a property in order to improve the thermal performance of the walls. It is typically used on properties with solid 9-inch brick walls, as opposed to cavity walls with a gap that can be insulated more easily.

This type of insulation is not cheap, often costing around £100 per square metre of wall, but it is extremely effective at bringing a property up to scratch thermally.

Improvement in the EPC rating with SWI

The improvement in your EPC rating will be directly proportional to the amount of exposed wall that is being insulated. So, if you have a mid-terraced house insulated front and back, the improvement is going to be much less than a detached house with all four sides insulated.

To give you an idea of the change you can expect, we’ll look at the example of a typical 100 year-old solid brick end-of-terrace house, with a current rating of F31. Adding thermal insulation to this property would bring the walls up to a U-value of 0.3, changing the property’s rating to D55. This was a huge improvement which ensured that the property now meets the new MEES standard for rentals. SWI would certainly make sense for this particular property.

How much does insulation thickness make a difference?

The first thing to point out here is that the insulation must bring the wall up to a U-value of 0.3 in order to meet building regulations. This is only really achievable on a 9-inch wall by adding 90mm of EPS, or 110mm of Rockwool. You can go above and beyond this level of insulation, but putting any less could mean you fall foul of building regulations.

Let’s take a look at a few scenarios based on thickness of insulation:

We took the same end of terraced mentioned in the scenario earlier and added some more insulation. As you may have worked out, by insulating with 100mm of insulation, the energy rating leapt by 24 points, which is a huge leap in efficiency. By adding an extra 50mm of insulation (taking the U-value to 0.22), the rating only increased by 1 extra point, to a D56. That is a lot of extra insulation for very little reward. Going up to 200mm insulation, (and a U-value of 0.16), the rating increases 1 more point to D57.

What does this mean for the benefit of SWI?

As we can see, solid wall insulation can be a great way to improve an EPC rating. In this our example, it went up two levels from F to D. In some detached properties, the rating increase could be even more stark, up to 3 level increase, whereas in properties with less exposed wall there will be a more modest improvement.

Get a survey and recommendations report

We should point out that every house is different, and we highly recommend getting a scenario analysis of your options via one of our recommendations reports before committing to a specific improvement. You may end up just falling short of the required rating!

In this blog, we are going to look at how loft and cavity insulation can help change your EPC rating. At a time when the EPC rating is growing evermore important (and no longer just a box-ticking exercise), finding a way to improve the energy rating is really important, especially for landlords. Cavity and loft insulation is easy and cheap to do, and will have a decent effect on the rating, so lets take a closer look and see just how much of an influence it can have.

What is cavity and loft insulation?

Most of you probably know what cavity wall and loft insulation are, but perhaps you don’t know the standard thicknesses you should expect. For loft insulation, the current regulations require 270mm of rock wool insulation, for example.

Insulating cavity walls takes less than a day on most properties, and as long as you have a cavity wall that is suitable to insulate, it will be possible. Typically, polystyrene beads or blown fibreglass are used as the insulation material. The thickness of the cavity dictates the amount of insulation you can install, so the performance from cavity insulation will never be as good as that of solid wall insulation, which has no limit on the thickness you can install.

What difference does loft insulation make?

We took a typical 3 bedroom end-terrace property with no loft insulation and gradually added insulation to find the rating improvement. Now, obviously there will be some differences between properties, but the differences in rating points should give you a good idea of the importance of loft insulation to a home:

As you can see from this table, the first 50mm make a huge difference to the score, but as you add more insulation, the returns depreciate significantly. Given the cost of loft insulation, however, it makes sense just to throw in a lot of it – the savings are still there at 270mm of insulation. Adding more than 270mm is probably not necessary however, as the rewards get very small at this depth.

Loft insulation is one of the cheapest ways to insulate your property, so it really does make sense to do even if you don’t need to bump up your rating. Your tenants will be happier too!

How much difference does cavity wall insulation make?

Now let’s take a closer look at cavity insulation. The depth of insulation is not relevant here as the insulation will just fill whatever gap is present. If we take a typical uninsulated property with a rating of F28 and add insulation to all three external walls, we get to E47. That is an increase of 19 points in this scenario – a big difference that will take the property to a rentable energy rating.

Combing loft and cavity insulation is a powerful combination, often boosting the rating by 25 or 30 points, so if the property hasn’t had these improvements then it is a bit of a no-brainer to do.

Every property is different

We have based these numbers on a semi-detached property, so if you have a detached house you are likely to see even more gains, whilst a flat or a mid terrace is going to benefit less. Every property is different, so don’t rely on these figures for yours. We also understand that some properties just can’t be insulated in this way, either due to an unsuitable wall type, lack of loft space, or planning considerations. This is why we really recommend getting a full recommendations report from us with a site visit. This will help you to understand the problem areas and what would be the most cost-effective way to improve the energy rating up to the required level.

If you have a new build commercial property, you will need an energy performance certificate (EPC) before you can get building control sign-off or rent out the space. This is sometimes carried out as part of the contract with the developer, and sometimes done by the company responsible for building services. Either way, it’s important you get it done!

What is the difference between a New Build and Existing Commercial EPC

With residential buildings, there is a very clear distinction between a new build and existing building EPCs. New builds have what is known as an SAP EPC, which is usually done completely from the plans for the building. Existing buildings use something called RdSAP, or Reduced Data Standard Assessment Procedure. This is done from onsite measurements and observations and is therefore a little less accurate.

Commercial EPCs are a little different. A new build EPC will require a level 4 energy assessor, whereas existing commercial buildings can be level 3 or 4. But this is only a minor consideration as most commercial assessors have level 4 accreditation. Because new builds often have to reach a certain energy efficiency level to be signed off, these EPCs carry a lot more weight and importance. Getting an A or B rating could make the difference between meeting and not meeting the terms of the contract, so there is a lot resting on it.

How is a new build commercial EPC carried out?

Whilst a site survey will need to be carried out, a lot of the work will be done on at a desk. It is essential that all the data relating to the material used and systems installed in the building are made available. This data will be fed into the SBEM software to create the EPC, and missing data can be critical. Typically things that will be needed to achieve the best ratings are: full lighting designs, u-values and k-values for the building fabric, including walls, roof, floor, doors and windows. Also useful are air tightness data and information on the efficiencies of any heating/cooling in the building and extractors. Most new builds will have some form of renewable technology as well, and this will be very important for the final rating. Full specs on any renewable system are essential.

Can anything be assumed with a new build EPC?

If the building is a shell and yet to be fitted out with heating systems for example, then the assessor can potentially assume that the building services compliance guide will be followed. Minimum efficiency standards must be input assuming the building will be kitted out to meet the regulations, but not exceed them. It can never be assumed that a better system will be installed in the future, even if there are assurances from the client that this will be the case. It may be better to get your EPC following fit-out if the rating is important to you, although these assumed values are usually fairly good.

How much does a new build EPC cost?

The work involved in creating one of these EPCs is much more than for a standard EPC. This means that the cost is going to be somewhat higher. It is impossible to give an accurate price without first being provided with quality plans, an idea of the type of property, and what you are looking to achieve from the EPC. Achieving the very highest ratings can be quite tricky, even with all the relevant documentation.

We also ask that you give more time for these EPCs to be completed. Where a typical non-domestic existing building may take 48 hours to pull together, a new build can take a fair bit of back-and-forth with the client, as well as a lot of desktop work. We ask that you leave a minimum of a week for this process, and ideally longer.

If you would like a quote for a new build commercial property, just give us a call and we will be happy to help.

We carry out EPCs on thousands of different properties, and we do sometimes get questioned for giving a low EPC rating. There are a few reasons why the rating you receive isn’t what you expected, and here I want to run through some of them with you.

If we can’t see it, we can’t include it

An EPC is a very simple visual inspection. If you had insulation installed on your internal walls or in your roof room, and this is not apparent from a visual inspection of the area, then we will require documentation proving that the insulation is present before it can be included in the EPC. Defaults may have to be assumed for the heating and renewables if the model and other information is not apparent. Again – if you have any information on the model, this will help boost the rating.

It only takes one bad apple in some cases…

There are a few aspects of a home that can really drag a rating down. If you have one of the following then your rating is likely to be lower than you might first expect:

• No heating or electric-only heating
• High amount of poorly insulated heat loss walls
• Poor loft insulation or no evidence of loft insulation.

An A-rating is really hard to achieve.

An A-rating is reserved for only the very highest levels of energy efficiency. To get to this level, you will probably need to have renewable technology present, very high levels of insulation, a very efficient modern heating system, and documentation for all of this (to ensure defaults are not assumed). In my time carrying out assessments I am actually yet to see an A-rated property. This is usually only seen in new builds built to a very high spec with quality renewable heating and electricity systems.

Customers are not familiar with the rating system

Whilst we would be the last to say that our customers are wrong, there is very little knowledge outside of the energy assessors themselves as to what constitutes a certain rating level. Unfortunately, many people just don’t know what a C or an E rating actually means, which can lead to some confusion and reluctance to accept their rating as correct. Please bear in mind the average rating of a UK property is a D-60. Anything above this is actually a pretty good rating, and there a whole raft of reasons why you might have a low rating. It can take just a few poor aspects of the home to bring the rating down, whilst a couple of well-performing factors can have the opposite effect.

Get a Recommendations Report

If you are not happy with your rating, and want to get it higher, the best thing to do is look at getting a tailored recommendations report. This document will pick out the main reasons for a low rating and the easiest steps you can take to get the rating up, as well as the expected rating from following through with those improvements.

Depending on the detail you are looking for, there will be a report for you, so simply give us a call and we can discuss your requirements.

What is a business EPC/Commercial EPC?

Often called a business or commercial EPC, the correct term is actually a non-domestic EPC. It differs from a residential EPC in a few ways, but essentially the idea is to create a document that gives the property a rating in terms of how energy efficient it is.

The efficiency of the property is given on a scale from A to G, with A being highly efficient to G being the least efficient.

Does it matter what rating I get on my business EPC?

From 2018, there is new legislation (MEES) that means any rented property below an E rating will not be lettable. This is really big news because there is a huge amount of commercial premises that do not make the grade. It is therefore really important to get your EPC done and find out whether you need to improve the rating.

If you own the property and use it yourself, the rating will not force you to carry out any remedial works, but you may want to take the rating into consideration and to carry out practical works which could help lower your heating bills.

How much does a business EPC cost?

You can find more about our costs here, but the price does vary fairly depending on the type of property, its size and how complicated it is going to be to put into the software. Business EPCs also cost more to lodge than domestic EPCs. Prices start from around £120 for the smallest commercial spaces, up to £1,000 or more for the largest and most complicated buildings.

What does the survey entail for a business EPC?

The process is really straightforward. You will book your survey in with us, which involves a quick visit to carry out some measurements and collect evidence. For the smallest properties, this visit is only 20 minutes or so, whilst larger properties may take several hours.

The surveyor will then go away to put all the data into the government software. This process takes several hours and once complete, a draft of the EPC will be sent to you to check you are happy with the details. Once we receive payment, the final EPC will be released to you and issued on the online EPC register.

All we require is some very simple cooperation from yourselves or the tenant to ensure this process runs smoothly. Access to the whole property will be required on the visit, as well as access to electric and gas meters and the heating and cooling systems. If you have floor plans of the property, even if they aren’t to scale, these can be very helpful and avoid too much inconvenience for the tenants on the visit.

To achieve the best ratings, we ask that you provide any evidence of insulation that has been installed, and model numbers of any heating, cooling or renewable systems. If defaults have to be assumed, the rating will be negatively affected.

If you would like a quote, just give us a call and we can help!