The day that estate agents and home owners will be able to order their EPCs from their nearest DIY store or supermarket has come closer, following the acquisition of one of the largest EPC suppliers, National Energy Services, by B&Q.
B&Q’s owners, the Kingfisher Group who are Europe’s biggest DIY retailers, have refused to say how much they paid for National Energy Services, which includes the DEA accreditation body NHER, and also SAVA, the body originally set up by HIP enthusiast and one-time government adviser Christopher LeGrand.
A Kingfisher spokeswoman said: “I can confirm that we have bought NES, and this is part of the group’s eco-strategy. I can also say that it will be business as usual at NES.”
She would neither confirm nor deny whether the acquisition is part of B&Q’s Green Deal strategy, but B&Q, along with Tesco and Marks & Spencer, is one of the firms set to sell insulation and home energy improvements as part of the Government’s flagship programme.
The Government chose a B&Q store to launch the Green Deal apprentice scheme, which will spawn a new industry of ‘green’ home inspectors, who will not necessarily be Domestic Energy Assessors, to visit people’s homes and advise on measures such as insulation, solar panels and new boilers.
B&Q plans to have an eco adviser in every store and is already running an eco-trial of homes in south London.
The purchase by Kingfisher of NES is not announced on either website but could worry the 3,031 accredited DEAs registered with NES. There are 685 Home Inspectors who are members of the SAVA certification scheme and qualified to do voluntary Home Condition Surveys.
In order to become qualified Green Deal inspectors, all would need further training.
Neil Kurz, an estate agent who is also a DEA, heading up NRG Experts, said: “It’s certainly an interesting move by B&Q / Kingfisher and this acquisition has bought them direct access to probably the largest and most experienced pool of energy assessors in preparation for the Green Deal.
“Although I’m not expecting energy assessors to be issued with B&Q orange branded Minis any time soon, I do think it likely that Green Deal assessors visiting domestic properties will have the double incentive of commission on products and services sold by them at the property, as well as offering the occupiers B&Q discount vouchers.”
He went on: “Home Inspectors will fear for the future if SAVA/NHER is now directed to focus on regaining the revenue they lost when the energy assessor training extravaganza dried up 18 months ago.
“SAVA and BRE have jointly helped with the rollout of the Home Condition Survey product, but it’s too early for either accreditation scheme to be profitable running the HCS part of their businesses. Home Inspectors will hope this isn’t the very final nail in their respective surveying coffin.”
NES, which was set up as a charity, describes itself as ‘the UK’s home for independent energy assessors, home inspectors and low carbon professionals’.
In 2010 Milton Keynes-based NES had a turnover of £5.850m – well down from the £9.447m the year before – and scraped a profit of £40,544 compared with a profit of £315,271 the previous year.
Whilst B&Q is the first to acquire an EPC firm, there is speculation that the likes of Tesco will follow as the Green Deal gets closer.
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Comments
SGHI,
Sorry mate, everyone with two brain cells knows this is about tax and I don’t think I've herd an estate agent on here claim otherwise. The article points out that we are soon to be in a position where yet again big companies are going to ride the gravy train for all its worth while the government looks at ways to have people like estate agents implement it for them, for free.
I don’t like it and nor should you.
Why should estate agents embrace this? Does it make good business sense to promote something that nobody wants or cares/asks for. If there was a demand then it would be plastered all over my window but the sad truth is its not.
p.s another 6 pages attached to property brochures is hardly saving the planet is it?
Ah Fun Boy Agent appears to miss the obvious as so many Agents have.
This is a european wide piece of legislation imposed on all 27 member states, so unless the Condem's take us out of the EU it won't scrapped...point one!
Point 2 is...if you think this is just about informing the public think a little harder about what's really going on.
We pay raod tax based on carbon emissions and have done for some time now, we didn't like it when it can in, but it is now in the mindset of all of us, the bigger tha gas guzzler the more you pay...are you with me yet?
Most initiatives are 3 phased i.e. measure, incentivise and tax.
The EPC is still in the measurment stage which will be tightened up to ensure full compliance. there may well even be a drop dead date when all buildings will have to have one regardless of changing hands.
The Green deal, RHI, boiler amnesty and so on is the second stage...'Being seen to offer help to prompt change'.
The third stage will be when all buildings have been measured, incentives have passed then it's taxation all the way. Energy band linked to Council tax or yet another form of carbon tax would be the simplest thing to devise and enforce.
Carbon is the new gold!...a nice little money spinner for Governments world wide.
...and like road tax none of it I guess will make back into circulation to improve buildings, just like road tax goes elsewhere.
Fight all you like, if there was any apppetite/possibility for some kind of scrappage don't you think the current Government would have done it when they kicked the HIP into the long grass??
So embrace it become a Green Estate Agent and tell people what the really should be waking up to, that tastefully decorated and charming period cottage running on oil central heating with listed staus and conservation restrictions is going to be an albatross in the next 15 to 20 years with skyhigh carbon taxation and running costs the size of a small Country as peak oil goes over the cliff edge into terminal decline.
Don't you think it is ironic that the buying and renting public have no interest in the EPC (yes the odd greenie asks, but not the mainstream) and Vendors see it as an unnecessary expense?
Is there no politician gutsy enough to gain votes by standing on a manifesto of 'get rid' of it? votes, votes, votes?
It's a winner
Well we will have to agree to disagree Phillip, the way i see it there is a danger that employed GDA's (green deal advisors) will be under pressure from their bossess to push certain products that may not be needed, we all know surveys can be manipulated, i can't possibly see how an employed GDA working for a green deal company can be impartial, it may undermine the whole scheme and the tabloids will have a field day with it.
Yes I am cynical having been in this game and wholly dependent upon it for my living, I have been shafted by a variety of moves and U turns like the rest of my confederates.
NES is not an EPC supplier as CH points out, it would have made more sense just to buy Sava BX if that's what they wanted. Buying the whole thing gives them access to vast numbers of members, a whopper of a database of lodeged EPC both residential and commercial, not to mention public building DEC's.
Plus a BIG BIG chunk of goodwill and credibility.
If they wanted purely a 'supplier' then there are a number of so called panels squeaking at the seams financially they could have bought.
As for GDA's being employed by vested interests, I assume the Home Owner will no doubt seek a visit from several to get a balanced view from one organisation over the next. I still don't see how impartiality will work although Philip seems to accept it will.
The green deal HEA qualification is still up in the air, having signed on to one such course there was still no clear guidance on whether the level 3 NVQ offered by Asset Skills would do it, or require additional top up training.
So, after 27 exams, 5 portfolio's strikes we are all in for yet another ride.
Mind you with the recent news regaridng how much in bed Politicians are the News Corporation, I guess it should be no surpise that everything ends up owned by one corporate body or another.
Corporate Government here we come!
MJ (Michael?), the Green Deal works on the basis of the Golden Rule, and hence "unneeded & unwanted products" will not qualify. I agree that impartiality is important, but if there is a transparent process for recommendations then what does it matter who the GDA is employed by?
Ultimately isn't the purpose of the Green Deal to increase energy efficiency? So if that means a homeowner gets B&Q insulation installed - isn't that a good thing?
Don't get me wrong, I fully support independent GDAs, but think it a step too far to insist on only indepedents.
A little light just came on in my head regarding the headline content "a major EPC Supplier" This is incorrect as NHER are the accreditation scheme and not an EPC supplier to vendors or agents. Just makes it more interesting i think that Kingfisher have bought what is effectively not an EPC "selling" business.
It's vital in my view that GDA's are seen to be impartial and independent in order for the public to have confidence in the scheme, the last thing people want is hard sell, salesman like site surveyors pushing unneeded & unwanted products onto them, please support the facebook campaign "green deal advisors should be independent and impartial" thank you.
Contrarary to other comments I see the move as positive. The big energy companies are already gearing up for their Green Advisor sales poeple and it will take something the size of the Kingfisher Group to set up an effective competitor. The Green deal advisors will i hope by and large be DEAs who have "upgraded" and hopefully they will not bebthe "In & Out" cheapo DEAs that work for panels for peanuts (£25.00 for an EPC) which the vendor can then pay c£70.00 for at the top of the food chain.
One governing body for Green Deal advisors should be set up and that way all wil be controlled the same way unlike today where there are 8 different accreditation schemes for DEAs and despite the legislation they do not all work to the same level of diligence I am sure. At a 1% audit rate there are DEAs who fudge EPCs and play the odds "percentage game"
I await the next announcment from NHER retgarding this exciting development.
Superb, I can pop down to B & Q's for my solar panels now. I wonder if they will fit them for me as well? At a mere £7000 i will be able to save an £35 a year!.....bargin
Stunned silence!!!
Not quite, whatever happened to the "conflict of interest" aspect that was so heavily drummed into all of us way back in 2006/7??...impartiality? I think not!
The green deal is going to be a frenzy of everyman and dog pushing products to the poor unsuspecting Home Owner who will now have no idea whether they are being advised correctly or merely being sold to. A goldrush for the Traders, a potential nightmare for the general public.
Good old NES...thanks for selling your membership up the river, you might have stood in better light had you decided to float the business giving all members a chance to buy shares if you were in financial difficulty...and still retain an independent standing.
This now explains why 'Plan Assessor' has been lagging behind competitors, no funds = no development. Yet you still have the cheek to charge OCDEA's £250 per year licence fee! when others provide their software free?
All 4 strands of my accreditaion with you will now been cancelled.
I guess Brian Scannell will get some charmed position somewhere in the Kingfisher Group, or maybe he might end up as an Eco Adviser in his local store in Milton Keynes...that would be funny!