Customer Moving House - Wants To Take Pv With Him.

[kme]

2 years ago, we installed a 3KW PV on this guy`s bungalow - he was E-W, so had some panels on front, and some on back.  Yes, I know.

So he calls today - looking to move into the next street - bigger bungalow, but faces South. Tiled roof. Wants to know if / how much to remove, and reinstall.

We can reuse most of the fixings; and I have spare rails and clips - and the brackets can be removed & re fitted without damage (roofer`s job, anyway :slap )

Does anyone know where this will stand with regard to FITs and MCS cert. I`m an accredited installer, but didn`t get MCS certified - is it going to need to be re-certified on the new property?

Thoughts guys?

 

[Sidewinder]

IIRC it will only now attract the "new" level of FIT.

 

[steptoe]

He cant take his FIT with him,

he will only get the new, lower, level of FIT.

you need to be REAL registered  for your customer to qualify for FIT if you instal a system.

 

[binky]

panels and inverters have improved since his installation was fitted aswell as dropping severly in price - better off with a new set.

 

[ProDave]

When selling the house, draw up a fact sheet detailing what the FIT means at the old higher rate, and what the likely income is over the remaining period of it's contract. Then invite offers for the installed solar PV system on top of the offer price for the house.

 

[kme]

Thanks guys - I`ll put this to him tomorrow, and see where he wants to go with it.

 

[SLIPSHOD & SLAPDASH]

Is the FIT registered to him or the property though ?

 

[kme]

Didn`t know you could choose, mate - and I don`t know, from a legal standpoint, how that would work.

On the one hand, YOU register the FIT with a provider - separate from your electricity supplier.

But you register it at your address - I don`t suppose they`d let you "move" it..........

 

[ProDave]

This subject is a bit confusing, and it's not helped by some of the Solar PV companies telling wrong information (one of them told me you could move it to a new house when you move, which turns out to be wrong)

If you read the FIT contract, it's basically tied to the MPAN of the meter of the house where it's installed.

There IS provision in the contract to assign the payments to a different person at a different address. That's for rent a roof schemes, or for instance if you let the property, you could still receive the payments at your new address as long as you were able to get a meter reading every quarter.

You might think you could quietly move the system to your new house and just use that to tell them you have moved. That would work for a short while, but there is a problem.

It's written into the contract that the generation meter must be read by a meter reader every two years. So when he turns up at the installed address to read the meter, and it's not there, then the brown stinky stuff would hit the rotating device.

I am going to be in the same boat when we move in a few years.  In my case I hope we will at least have reached pay back for the system, so I won't "lose" any money. So I'm hoping the buyer of this house will recognise the true value of the system and make a sensible offer for it.