Posted by: @springswood

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While heat loss is a very important (and fascinating) subject I find it hard to believe that accounts for a high proportion of the cost of an installation. It's a few hours work on site and a few more translating it to a design. Unless a very high proportion of surveys don't lead to a sale...

Its not really the survey, there was a fairly complete list further up the thread

Posted by: @springswood

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My impression is that it's very variable. But I don't know what makes the difference

It is and what makes the difference is presumably overheads, workload, supurfluous work/components and 'rip off' factor.  In every construction project I have been involved in (a fair few, mostly in  a professional capacity thankfully) there is a factor of 2 at least between cheapest and most expensive quotes.  Often, by no means always, the cheapest dont know what they are doing and the most expensive don't really want the work because they have plenty on, but are willing to do it if the margins are high.  And there are always a few chancers who put in a high price playing the numbers game.  This is no different and the message is work out what you want and SHOP AROUND

To give a concrete example my install cost £4950 after (7.5K) BUS just under 2 years ago.  As it happens this was one of the cheapest quotes I received although there was one only very marginally more expensive from someone equally competent and it was a close call which I went with! I also received quotes as high as 15K+ BUS. 

The install consisted of Heat pump, 4 rads one of which was a fancoil (so ~500), DHW cylinder and the usual peripherals.  The electrical circuit had already been fitted by an electrician (£200) and I did the exposure of the voids through which the primaries were to run, and making good.  Total cost of parts probably 7-8K.  

The single installer (it was literally a one man band) worked 6 days in total, almost all of which were 8am-6pm without a break, and one of which was 8-9pm.  Throughout that time he was working diligently and continuously, except on a couple of occasions where he had to go to the shop to get some bits.  

I would say thats a fair price for a fair job.

Posted by: @springswood

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My heat loss was about 5kW and they specified a 7kW Vaillant heat pump. Total price around £17,000, so £9,500 after the BUS grant. This for a two bed house with 5 radiators, no groundworks needed and no changes to pipework, just some radiator swaps and a mini store hot water tank. Frankly I was shocked. The quotation appeared online through Heat Geek so I can't view it now. I do recall there wasn't enough detail for me to have any idea what was costing so much.

Look elsewhere!

@springswood 

Your real world quotes leave me completely puzzled as to how the prices are justified in cost terms.

Assuming refundable deposits, then that's potentially quite some cost to be covered by those that go through to an actual installation. If only 25% do, then that £250 per survey is turning into a £1000 cost to the customer.

This again brings us back to the concept of a single trusted survey, where the surveyor has liability for the accuracy.

Can anyone comment on what happens with new builds? Does the installer do their own heat loss survey (I think not) or do they rely on detailed figures from the SAP assessment?

If they are fine to rely on SAP, then they should be fine with an independent survey. It's all about who has liability for the cost of fixing things if the heat loss calculation turns out to be an underestimate.

At present the diligent consumer, one way or another, ends up paying multiple times for heat loss surveys, which is just plain wrong in my view.

Posted by: @rob-of-york

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Your real world quotes leave me completely puzzled as to how the prices are justified in cost terms.

They dont have to justify in cost terms, thats how competition works.  Are the prices of Apple products justifiable in cost terms, of course not, but people still buy them, and those who, like me, dont want to pay their ridiculous prices can look elsewhere.

Posted by: @rob-of-york

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At present the diligent consumer, one way or another, ends up paying multiple times for heat loss surveys, which is just plain wrong in my view.

You can avoid this by knowing what your house loss either from a single survey or your gas consumption, and roughly how many rad changes you need (which would be from a survey) and specifying it in your RFQ.  They can then quote against that subject to verification.  Also some installers now offer surveys for free and many will quote against an estimated loss anyway, so you can rule out the jokers.

I'm not arguing that the system is perfect, that is far from the case, but as a consumer you don't have to be a victim if you don't want to be and are prepared to take a bit of control. 

Its not particularly satisfactory, but almost nothing in the construction industry is.  Thats not a defence, just a fact.

Posted by: @rob-of-york

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Posted by: @jamespa 

Thats very interesting, I am on a Local Authority group which is looking at how to smooth the end to end process for various types of retrofit. 

That's a great initiative. Expert help navigating the process and knowing what questions to ask would be a huge help to many embarking on the heat pump journey.

As a suggestion, perhaps consider contributing towards / providing / encouraging people to get simple inexpensive weather stations that can be used to log indoor and outdoor average daily temperatures over the coming winter. Along with daily gas and electricity usage from smart meter / supply, as we've seen, this can be used to get a high confidence heat loss estimate based on real data.

I'm guessing you've done this already, but a few hundreds of pounds spent on a couple of thermal cameras that you can lend out would be a great way of showing people where their insulation could usefully be improved.

Thanks.  I am personally on the page of measuring house loss (and I did it myself).  We are not yet at the stage of creating 'content' (but we are getting there), I fully intend there to be strong encouragement to sense check those calculations by some means.  As it happens I also run  a free thermal camera loan scheme with two cameras!