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Your EPC

Your Energy Performance Certificate (EPC) can only be produced by an accredited Domestic Energy Assessor (DEA) or Home Inspector (HI), who is qualified and regulated. The Energy Performance Certificate is a valuable document; you need to know that you have received a quality product, provided by an expert.  So how do you choose an EPC provider?
 
An estate agent may employ a qualified DEA and if not they may suggest you get your EPC from a company they normally use, usually at your expense. You can accept this, or you can instruct your own provider. An EPC provided via the agent is generally more expensive than one you commission independently.

The EPC has to be available within 28 days of marketing your home for sale, and this will shortly be reduced to 7 days; the same applies when you offer a home for rent. Ideally, the EPC should be ready at the start of marketing. To be sure you comply with the law, you’ll want reassurance that the EPC you pay for will be provided promptly.

When choosing your own provider, you have two options: 

1. Choose a local DEA - You deal directly with them. A local DEA will not expect payment until they carry out the survey. They will be very experienced in assessment of building styles and type locally.

2. Buy off the Internet – These internet based companies (Panels) take payment, usually in advance. The DEA they instruct may have no experience of local property style and type as they may well travel some distance to carry out the assessment. This can impact on the time they spend at your property obtaining the relevant data and ultimately on the accuracy of the EPC produced.

There are some ‘rogue’ panels that take payment from you and then do not provide the EPC. Also, some companies fail to pay the DEA that produced your EPC. If you are unlucky enough to fall victim to such a situation, you will need to pay for another energy survey to provide the EPC.

Buying off the internet: how can you protect yourself? 

1. Check that the Company displays, on its website, the company name, address & telephone contact number – an e-mail address alone is not satisfactory.

2. Ask for the Name and Accreditation number of the assessor who will be calling. If they cannot tell you straight away, ask them to call you back when they can. Do not pay until they can tell you this – this is your only opportunity to check the credentials of the assessor.

3. Check the credentials of the assessor using the Landmark website at https://www.epcregister.com/searchAssessor.html

Only when you are completely satisfied, confirm & pay for your assessment. If paying by credit/debit card use Paypal if possible. Credit Card protection is not available for sums below £100.00. Debit Cards have no protection and you have opened the possibility for further monies to be removed if the site is a ‘scam’ site.
 
  
Our DEA - Linn Rafferty           
Why should you use JTec Energy Performance to provide your EPC? All EPCs provided by JTec are produced personally by Linn Rafferty.  Unusually for an accredited DEA, Linn has been a qualified NHER Energy Assessor since 1996 (she can show you her 1996 identity card if you like!). What's more, Linn was the project manager, and a major technical contributer to, the development of the inspection method used by all DEAs - Reduced Data Standard Assessment Procedure (RDSAP).
She currently writes for YouGen as an Energy Expert.

 

Our service

EPCs are a legal requirement if you intend to sell or let your home, but you can instruct us to provide one even if you don't intend moving. For the same reasonable fee your home can have an EPC, together with a recommendations report which tells you how to improve your rating.

The cost of heating, lighting and providing hot water to our homes has vastly increased over the last couple of years, and more rises are on the way.  According to Ofgem, typical household energy bills could rise to well above £2,000 a year - climbing from below £600 five years ago - with increases even higher than the 60% they predicted earlier in 2009.  You can read more about Ofgem's latest warning on the Telegraph Online website. 

If you commission an EPC from us you will learn what can be done to reduce those hefty fuel bills, and the good news is that some of the most effective measures are remarkably inexpensive due to subsidies from your energy supplier.  By acting on the advice provided with your EPC, your energy rating will improve, you will save money on your fuel bills, and you will also reduce the carbon dioxide emissions from your home.  

To prevent unnecessary travel and the carbon dioxide emissions it creates, we do not normally travel over 30 miles to provide an EPC.  We can normally provide your EPC on the same day as the inspection, so you can move quickly to get those improvements ordered and start saving!

Our prices
We offer a fixed price service within our local area (around Northampton, Wellingborough and Milton Keynes) that starts from £50 plus lodgement fee.  Within this area, unless your home is very complex or larger than 4 bedrooms, the price will not exceed £69.  We do not charge VAT.

Our accreditation scheme
EPCs are provided via a complex system, where DEAs can register with any one of about 10 accreditation schemes.  All such schemes are approved by the Government, and all are required to adhere to minimum standards that the Government has specified for them.

Linn is accredited with the NHER accreditation scheme, which started out as the National Home Energy Rating Scheme, operated by the National Energy Foundation.  The NEF, founded in the 1980s, was the forerunner of all energy assessor accreditation schemes. 

Working with the small company that later became National Energy Services, the NHER accreditation scheme operator, and with the Milton Keynes Development Corporation, NEF developed the first ever energy rating scheme.  The scheme operated exclusively in Milton Keynes, a new city that was then being built to higher standards of energy efficiency, and its rating was called the Milton Keynes Energy Cost Index. 

This local system was followed soon after by the National Home Energy Rating, offered UK wide. 
SAP was developed from the NHER in the 1990s, as a simpler version of the rating system, suitable for Building Regulations use. 

With a pedigree like that, it's no surprise that the NHER is now the premier accreditation scheme for DEAs, promoting the benefits to us all of improving the energy efficiency of our homes.