EPCs: making the most of the data

Thanks for the EPC but what about the data?

Richard Macphail, consultant with National Energy Services, NHER looks at one of the issues that social housing providers should be considering alongside ensuring they meet their obligations in issuing EPCs to prospective tenants.

The obligation for landlords to provide prospective tenants with an Energy Performance Certificate (EPC) as part of the process of letting a property was introduced in October 2008. And from what we can gauge, on an informal basis, there appears to be a high level of compliance. So in this context the requirement seems to be meeting its aim and prospective (and the eventual) tenants are getting to see an energy report about the property they are considering renting.

What benefit does the EPC provide? In the social sector there has always been some hesitation regarding the value of an EPC as a tool to inform the choice of the prospective tenant.  While clearly it provides information most people will accept a tenancy offered to them without reference to the EPC as it is housing need that is the overriding issue rather energy efficiency.

So if it is open for debate whether the EPC provides a specific benefit to the tenant does it provide one to the housing provider?  And is there a risk that this benefit will be missed?

Social housing providers have for a long time been required to be aware of the energy efficiency of their stock:

• annual reporting of the average SAP

• ensuring the thermal element of the decency of the stock

• making sure that dwellings are not at risk of a Category 1 hazard in respect of excess cold

• calculating whether low income and vulnerable tenants can afford to live in their managed dwellings

Energy Performance Certificates provide a fantastic opportunity to obtain high quality detailed information about the energy characteristics of managed dwellings alongside the obligation to provide them to tenants.

It is a great opportunity – BUT it needs some planning.

So what do you need to do? The starting point is probably “who are you using to collect your data and issue your EPCs?” If it is collected in house then you will have control over the process. If it is an external contractor it will largely depend on how specific your contract with them is and what it includes.

The minimum requirement is to issue and provide the EPC on an agreed timescale to enable the landlord to provide it to the prospective tenant. The next step will be to ask for the data that was used to create the EPC as well. This is clearly a sensible step but not as straightforward as you might assume.

Every reasonable contractor is likely to agree to supply the data they used to create the EPC – but is it useable? Where and how can you store it? Is it compatible with your existing data? How does my asset management system or energy database want the data? Will it involve transcribing or re-keying - potentially risking errors?

These are all vital questions.

I have spoken to many social landlords who have taken the sensible approach to ask for the data, but have then ended up with meaningless spreadsheets or piles of Word documents that while fulfilling the contractual obligation are of no value at all.

Although Energy Performance Certificates are created using a standardised dataset called RDSAP the way that two pieces of software may record it may be completely different from one another. The Accreditation Schemes in England & Wales and Northern Ireland and the Protocol Schemes in Scotland will have their own approach to how they code and record RDSAP. They have obligations to create software that is approved to create EPCs but it may or may not integrate with your database.

You can make sure you stop losing energy data by taking some action right now. To assist you in this process I have come up with a number of questions:

1. Where do you keep your energy data? Is it an asset management system or a standalone energy database?

2. Are you thinking of changing your asset management system in the near future?

3. Does the provider of your asset management system / energy database integrate with one of the Accreditation Scheme software systems?

4. Who produces my EPCs is it in house or outsourced? Which Accreditation Scheme do the DEAs belong to?

5. Could the DEAs producing my EPCs transfer to Accreditation scheme that integrates with my database?

6. What would cost more changing my asset management system or changing the accrediation of my DEAs?

While these questions will not make you mind up for you they will probably assist you thinking about how to make sure you are making the most of EPCs!

Richard Macphail

National Energy Services Ltd

01908 672 787