Posted by: @judith

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Oh dear!

How close is their behaviour to fraud? Over the line in my personal judgement. I’d be down to Citizens Advice for chapter and verse if it were me. I hope you have a huge residual payment that you can withhold.

On the grounds that an installation other than by an MCS contractor doesn't qualify for the BUS grant and isn't permitted development then its clearly potentially serious and you would be acting entirely reasonably IMHO if you withheld further payment until this is righted.

I don't know the MCS rules for first installations, IE how you qualify but I do remember seeing some discussions about changing them so it might be worth checking.  It maybe they allow this and have a mechanism to deal with it should the installer not 'psss' for some reason.

@benson If this is what you had installed its the old version circa 2019 it can be black or white, it still functions the same but you are getting old recycled stock so not what you have paid for.

Posted by: @benson

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It has also transpired that they definitely aren’t currently mcs accredited, as I contacted them and ofgem today, so I believe they are going to use my install to accredit themselves?

Wow, your situation has really escalated quickly. Are you receiving a BUS payment?

From my understanding of MCS, it seems unlikely they’d use your installation to gain accreditation at this stage. However, if you’re getting a BUS payment, it’s possible that they might bring in an MCS-accredited installer through the umbrella scheme to sign off once your system is fully installed and commissioned.

And as suggested by others, please withhold all payments until everything is fully sorted out. This will be your only leverage going forward.

Posted by: @benson

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They say they are MCS registered and it would be guaranteed by them

Please clarify: Were they suggesting that the installation would be guaranteed by MCS?
Or does 'them' refer to the contractors?

Even if they were accredited by MCS, that still wouldn't provide a guarantee.
If MCS receive a complaint against a contractor, the extent of their intervention is usually to strike them off from the list.
That provides no redress for the customer.

In this case, now we know that they're not MCS registered, the threat of being struck off isn't present anyway.

If they bring in another contractor, who is MCS-registered, in order to get the online forms completed for the BUS grant, then that contractor also won't be providing you with any guarantee.

I agree with @judith that this case needs referring to Citizens' Advice immediately, whilst the contract hasn't yet been completed.
That provides their Advisors with avenues which are still open for a remedy to be sought.

You should know that the Consumer Rights Act (2015) is administered through Citizens Advice Bureaux.
That was a major change from the previous Sale of Goods Act, which required legal action through the High Court, Small Claims Division.

You still require evidence, but it's less onerous, and there are opportunities for Professional Arbitration.

Take screenshots of you checking online that the Installer is not MCS-registered, because that's likely to be the bedrock on which your 'case' is founded.

Check if you have any evidence of them claiming that they are actually MCS-accredited.
I wonder if they used MCS 'paperwork' to undertake the initial heat-loss survey?
Do you have a copy of that?

Be prepared for things to 'get muddy'.
Perhaps one of the installation engineers has MCS accreditation in their own name...
... or perhaps the company is an amalgamation/partnership of two firms, one of whom was registered under their previous trading name.

Thanks all. To cover all the points and advice:

1. Payment. A significant proportion is outstanding and the total value of current works/kit that is in my house exceeds what I've paid to date.

2. MCS clarified over the phone that they can use my installation to become accredited, albeit clearly dishonest in advertising themselves as a current MCS accredited installer. This is both on their website, and in writing in an email to me. Their account- they weren't doing much work over last few months so suspended membership. They are now getting it back up and running (as from today in fact)

3. Gary. Thanks. That is exactly the Homely node and hub I have. They remain insistent that they ordered that one in for my install. I've told them they are lying. They insist they aren't and that when they order them from their supplier they turn up in either form, the old round one or the updated one. Painful... anyway I've asked them to unbox the new unit in front of me that they have now ordered after I challenged them, as depressing as that is.

4. BUS- yes, the invoice is only for the amount minus BUS. 

5. MCS and guarantee of works. It was the 2yr one I believe that all accredited installers need to offer (to be accredited).

6. Commissioning wise I will get a handover pack with heat losses etc.

@judith it is over the line. But, sadly standard procedure. A now elite heat geek engineer that we used for our unvented cylinder install, failed to install a scale inhibitor when they did my cylinder. He promised to do this (he actually suggested it), I saw the part in our house, and then it mysteriously disappeared when he [thought he was] finishing up and I had to point out it wasn't installed. I also had to get him to move the magnaclean he also put in for me because the pipework configuration left it nigh on impossible to service it. He knew this as he'd already started rounding off the nut you need to undo to clean it, as it was so difficult to access. But...he was happy to leave me with it, and request final payment. I withheld it until he sorted it. He also left me with an utterly useless ABV which wasn't set up properly. There was some good points for sure, on balance he was ok, but all of the above I would consider dishonest.

Another very reputable ASHP installer were happy to quote me the rad upgrades with one of them being incorrect because they forgot to measure the existing emitter. They actually admitted it over the phone to me that they forgot and made it up. Thus I was overquoted and they knew the information they were providing me was false.

All of the above also meets the threshold as well.

I could go on. It is simply because I've learnt our system, learnt a bit of plumbing, and researched and asked on this excellent forum and can spot some of it at least, but it is not uncommon. I'm more annoyed about the second hand Homely that they are repeatedly lying about that doesn't even work, truth be told. At least the rationale regarding suspending MCS accreditation when not actively doing installs makes some sense. 

Sadly situation normal for much if the building industry, at least by my experience, nothing special about heat pumps!

Fortunately you are relatively unlikely to kill people by making mistakes in this part of the trade, unlike some other areas where similarly low standards apparently prevail.

@gary do you have any further details of the Homely versions and when the new one was released? The installers have ordered a new one for me, but I'm getting rather bored of them telling me that it is a misunderstanding, that they recently ordered it and it was all boxed etc, and they are just supplied randomly i.e. sometimes this one, and sometimes the hub with the symbols on the front and the square node. i.e. it would be useful to know if this one was last sold in 2019/2020 for example.

Of course I know this is total cobblers but Homely are also impossible to get hold of and haven't replied to my email.

This is what they have installed in my house. Fresh out of the box apparently, albeit can't provide the box 😆 

@benson I don't know when they changed over, I just know I had that version in 2019.  @toodles has Homely maybe he can tell you what his version is and when it was installed.

@benson Toodles here; I had my Homely installed last November and I know that the ‘new style’ was being supplied very early last year - haven’t any dates though. The installation videos put out on YouTube early last year also featured the current style of unit and node too. You may find a date on the YouTube presentations if you look carefully - my sight may not be up to spotting them. Regards, Toodles.

Posted by: @jamespa

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Fortunately you are relatively unlikely to kill people by making mistakes in this part of the trade,

A couple of years ago I was in conversation with a senior lecturer at an FE College who provided courses for students in the building trades.

He told me that their initial task was to assess the capabilities and IQ of the course participants.

Any who'd chosen to be electricians needed to be in the top echelon.
Those who were more likely to end up killing their customers were persuaded to migrate to something less dangerous, such as block-laying.

Heating engineers were close to the top, slightly lower than electricians, and then plumbers below that.

The main insurers for building trades have a similar scale.

The highest premiums are paid by heating engineers and plumbers.
They are more likely to be making large claims because a mistake tends to flood the house.

@gary @benson, I have just dug out my Homely destructions and on the back page is printed:

”Hub V3Rev 1.2 March 2023”

I hope that helps, Toodles.