New 'clarification' on EPCs has been issued by the Government department for Communities and Local Government.
The fresh guidance, issued yesterday afternoon, is to do with the requirement – and agents’ ability – to attach the first page of the EPC to ‘written particulars’, including those published online.
The original guidance that was issued last month did not allow for the first page of the EPC to be separated from the full, typically four-page electronic document, making it impossible for agents who wished to circulate any property particulars in e-format to comply with the new requirements. Software firms then stepped into the breach to supply the solution.
Whilst yesterday’s email is not a model of clarity – and indeed, yesterday evening, the department was unsure as to whether it had even issued new guidance – it does say that agents are not restricted in the methods they use to extract the first page of the EPC.
Agents will now apparently be able to request the first page of the EPC from Landmark, the private company owned by the Daily Mail which runs the EPC database.
However, the latest guidance – and it is not clear who or how many agents will have received the CLG email – does emphasise that agents must not alter the document in any way – for example, they must not redact the property’s address or turn the EPC into a jpeg. The requirement to attach the first page of the new-look EPC came in on April 6.
The email, from Phil Beschizza at CLG, says: “At the request of property agents DCLG and Landmark were asked to develop an electronic solution that would allow the EPC to be attached to on-line property details. This service was implemented as requested on 2 April. This service also allows the printing of the first page of the EPC for attaching in hard copy written particulars. To ensure that the most up to date EPC is provided the services require the EPC to be retrieved directly from the Register.
“DCLG and Landmark have developed the most cost effective solution to meet these requirements, without placing an additional cost burden on the tax payer (i.e. the payer of the Register EPC lodgement fee) by developing alternative solutions whose use cannot be mandated.
“We are aware that there are products on the market which allow the first page to be extracted from EPC PDF.
“The Regulations do not restrict how a copy of the first page is provided. It is, therefore, acceptable for the first page of the EPC to be provided in marketing materials using alternative solutions. It is not acceptable, however, for the information contained on the first page to be altered, amended or changed in any way.”
“DCLG and Landmark must also ensure that the security of the EPC is maintained. Several instances of fraudulent EPCs have been brought to DCLG’s attention and the security levels and the PDF format of the EPC currently in operation is an attempt to respond to these concerns. Producing EPCs in alternative formats, such as JPEG, would effectively reduce security of the PDF certificate and potentially increase the likelihood of fraudulent or address redacted copies where they are not permitted.
“DCLG could consider the option of adding more services directly from the Register, perhaps this service which will allow the first page of the EPC to be provided to property agents on request. How to implement this process will, however, need to be the subject of further discussion and will not happen immediately nor would we be able to relax the security of the PDF.”
Trade body the Property and Energy Professionals Association (PEPA) offered a translation to the CLG email and said it welcomed the revised guidance.
It said that after lobbying the Government to make urgent amendments to the guidance, to allow the first page of the new-style EPC to be separated from the full document, PEPA congratulated the Government on a swift and proactive response.
Stephen O’Hara, chairman of PEPA said: “We are delighted that the Government has listened to the industry and our calls for this vital amendment to be introduced. We have been lobbying the Government to revise the guidance, to allow the first page of an electronic EPC to be separated and to exist as a single, stand-alone page, since the regulations first came into force.”
He continued: “PEPA is a strong supporter of the revised EPC regulations and the positive impact they stand to have on improving the energy efficiency of the UK’s buildings.
“By ensuring that the first page of the new-style EPC, which now includes practical advice and guidance on how to improve the energy efficiency of a building, is attached to all property particulars, we can be confident that buyers and tenants will be able to access more upfront, practical information.
“This will allow them to not only make a more informed purchase decision but to reduce both their carbon emissions and their fuel bills.
“We look forward to continuing to work with both the industry and the Government to ensure that these new regulations are adhered to and to support consumers in making a better informed decision about their future home.”
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Comments
Bring back HIPs I say.
Note to buying public.
Want to see an EPC? look this up
https://www.epcregister.com
Search the property you are interested in, see EPC. Buy or not as you wish. No need for all this duplication, printing and waste. Think Green
Chris, 43,000 EA??? Really. Work together, you must be joking.
In the same way Rightmove have a hold over the industry, there will be no hope in hell that the government or anyone else will manage to get estate agents to publish the full address of each property on the web.
Publishing the address will lead to other agents targeting your stock and there is one thing we fear the most, is each other. Agents can't trust other agents to walk away from Rightmove when they do, so we all stay (Well all in my area do anyway) and no agent wants to be the first to publish the full addresses of their stock online in full view of the competition. It's not the sqatters we worry about, it's other estate agents.
So the govenment, trading standards, NAEA, Property Ombudsman and anyone else might as well drop this one before they lose anyway. It's like forcing shops to leave all their stock on the pavement overnight and expect it to still be there in the morning! It's not going to happen!! Hell will freeze over first put it that way.
On this one, "together we stand, divided we fall"!! I can't see the govenment taking 43,000 estate agents to court, can you?
Rob you are being slightly dim, read 'Again with this' or contact Landmark who will confirm you can't upload a URL for the first page only!
The advantage of access to the first page of a LOCKED pdf is for CREATING your written particulars.
Keep up Rob!
@anon coward
What a time consuming process so who pays for the time and effort? Get back to flogging houses and stuff the consequences. We are as a body of professionals who actually know what we are doing wasting time which is energy which is not green. This bunch of wasters running the country should be hung out to dry. Someone said other countries take no notice so what’s the point here? Other posts here state that so many are ignoring the rules I think it would be hard for the Trading Standard bloke to prosecute every agent not complying. He just does not have the time or resources.
Now forgive me if I am being completely stupid here but what exactly is the advantage of a URL to the first page? The only reason I can see for the first page only is to save on printing all the pages. How does this help for online details? They are online and not printed.
VOTE UKIP!
Kafkaesque :
1. Marked by a senseless, disorienting, often menacing complexity.
2. Kafkaesque bureaucracies.
3. Marked by surreal distortion and often a sense of impending danger.
The KeyAGENT PDF Dividing tool is completely free to use and requires no registration:
http://www.keyagent.co.uk/keyagent-tools
The tool will send you the 1st page.
KeyAGENT has developed this divider to help the industry.
'The email, from Phil Beschizza at CLG, says: “At the request of property agents DCLG and Landmark were asked to develop an electronic solution that would allow the EPC to be attached to on-line property details. This service was implemented as requested on 2 April'.
This is the PARS system. You register with Landmark and they allow you to upload a URL to online portals instead of the EPC but it still links back to the full EPC.
'Agents will now apparently be able to request the first page of the EPC from Landmark, the private company owned by the Daily Mail which runs the EPC database'.
Sorry Roz but you're wrong here, this can't be done!
Whether you upload the first page, all the pages or the URL the EPC cannot be changed in content or format so it must be a pdf and it must have the correct full address. (Seems simpler just to go for the URL).
As for written particulars just capture them with whatever software you have (or good old screen print) then add them in A5 format!
With reference to A Coward's suggestion, we have always used that method. Works well and we have no intention of worrying about using JPGs.
We are a small independent and comply with the rules , always have, but enough is enough.
Revolution is right.
Will Landmark be charging for releasing the version we can all use?
I have worked out a very simple way to extract the first page of an EPC from the original PDF which is good enough quality to use and then turn it in to a JPEG.
Save Landmark PDF to your local hard drive.
Open PDF file using Adobe Acrobat.
In the menu bar click edit and choose "Take a snapshot"
Go to the top left of the first page of the EPC, left click and drag the box to bottom right corner and let go.
If Acrobat doesn't automatically copy it for you, right click anywhere in the selection box and choose Copy.
Open ANY painting program (Paint, Paint.net, GIMP, Photoshop - seriously any image manipulation software) and paste in the image.
Save file
Edit if you need to remove address.
Job done
How on earth can this be called clarification? The technical issue of how to extract the first page only is just that - a technical issue, which was solved days after the initial edict on attaching the first page to a web entry and weeks before CLG did anything.
The real issue is the address and EPC number being given out to any crook or squatter that wants it - the self- congratulating Stephen O’Hara should start addressing the issue and not pandering to CLG .
Around 80% of the agents in my area are currently not complying with EPC regs. Some are avoiding this by not putting the road name on the details (and so they interpret the legislation to mean there is no need to attach an EPC) and others are simply not bothering either because they are small independents and don't care (or don't know) but there are plenty of corporates who are just not complying. As a small independent who is complying it is a source of some irritation. Issuing further guidance when the vast majority of agents are not bothering with what is there is completely pointless.
There is now so much smoke nobody can see the 'fire' to put it out.
How much more of this 'eurocrap' can we be expected to take on board?
There is one major difference between a JPEG and a PDF.
A computer can index a PDF file very easily and quickly.
Whilst it is still possible with a JPEG it is far from simple.
So, the nasty people who are checking that we are complying with their stupid laws can get a computer to see a PDF file and say "That agent is compliant" whereas if you use a JPEG they will have to read it for themselves.
I say that everyone should stop using PDFs straight away because the workload would make the job impossible to cope with.
VIVE LA REVOLUTION!
Where, when and how.
I'm an estate agent, I do not call reading this stuff in EAT being "issued with clarification".
I call it finding it out for myself!
I am duly registered with Money Laundering and all of the other legal requirements so that I can open my front door.
This whole thing is a complete FARCE.
Even Charlie Chaplin couldn't have been this slapstick.
Laurel & Hardy could have made a living from it.
It's a complete JOKE.
Could someone please clarify
Is there any legal reason why we should not attach the full EPC
My website provider has set my system up to do this, and I really do not want to change it again
"...PEPA said: “We are delighted that the Government has listened to the industry...".
Sorry, but it's a bit late to claim that isn't it?
If PEPA, NAEA and these other so called 'representative' bodies had any real clout we wouldn't be in this present mess, these and other questions would have been discussed and resolved well before 6th April.
All that has happened is that the Government have realised that there is still much confusion and misinformation surrounding the legislation and there is no consistent interpretation or application.
Security of a jpg epc front page, what a load of crap! the government needs to stand up to this euro shite
Reading the clarification I was struck by this passage....
“The Regulations do not restrict how a copy of the first page is provided. It is, therefore, acceptable for the first page of the EPC to be provided in marketing materials using alternative solutions.....''.
The reference to ''Producing EPCs in alternative formats, such as JPEG'' appears to cover the entire document being produced in any format which is not a pdf.
Perhaps someone like Nick Salmon, who has had years of communication with this Government Dept, can advise me if my interpretation is correct or give me some solace in the thought he might visit me if I am locked up!
Yet another example of how little CLG understand the workings of estate agency and the contempt with which they treat us.
Many agents will not print the EPC page separately and at full size but will reduce it and incorporate it into the pages of printed sales particulars. To do this the PDF page must be turned into a jpeg or similar. Nothing of the EPC information is altered yet now we have CLG telling us that use of a jpeg is not allowed.
Hopeless.