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An MCS certificate is issued for one installation at one address, and it states that the system was designed, installed and commissioned to a published standard, by a certified company, using certified products. A company describing itself as MCS certified is a separate matter, and the difference matters the moment a Devon grant application depends on it.
Key Takeaways
- An MCS certificate covers one installation at one address. The company’s own certification is a separate thing, and a grant application needs both.
- MCS says the certificate should reach you within 10 days of commissioning, and your installer issues it, not MCS.
- The Boiler Upgrade Scheme needs an MCS certified installation: £9,000 for off-grid oil and LPG homes in England and Wales until 31 March 2027, £7,500 for other eligible homes.
- The voucher has to be applied for within 120 days of the commissioning date shown on the certificate, so the paperwork starts the clock.
- It records the address, the commissioning date, the unit and its capacity, the SCOP, and how planning and building regulations were handled on your Devon property.
- If yours never arrived, your installer is the first call. MCS issues copies only where an installer has stopped trading or lost certification.
Below: what the certificate records, when it should reach you, what to do when it has not, how to check a company before you sign anything, and the design standard sitting behind the document. James Stalker, who runs Eco Pro Renewables from Exmouth, raises these certificates on his own installations.
What an MCS Certificate Is and Who Issues It
MCS stands for the Microgeneration Certification Scheme, and two separate things carry its name. A company holds certification to design and install to MCS standards. An installation gets its own certificate once commissioned, which MCS describes as proof the work was designed, installed and commissioned to industry-recognised standards using MCS certified products.
Company certification
- Held by The installation company
- Covers Designing and installing to MCS standards
- Valid Only while the company keeps it current
- Check it The MCS Find an Installer search
Installation certificate
- Raised by Your installer, on the MCS database
- Covers One installation at one address
- Valid A record of finished work, so it does not expire
- Kept by You, with the record on the database
Your installer creates the certificate on the MCS Installations Database, which holds the record of every MCS certified small-scale low-carbon installation in the UK since 2010. Filling it in is a formal declaration: MCS tells installers that entering the details is a statement that the information is accurate, true and adheres to MCS standards.
A company can hold current certification and still leave a customer without the document, which is the gap worth watching when a grant is riding on it.
What a Heat Pump MCS Certificate Records
None of it is optional. MCS’s guidance for installers raising a heat pump certificate says the mandatory installation details will appear on the certificate the customer receives. Here is what lands on your copy.
Heat pump installation certificate
One installation, one address-
Address and commissioning date The installation address and the commissioning date, which is the date everything else gets measured from.
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Heat pump product The heat pump product, picked from the MCS product directory, and how many units went in.
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Installed capacity The total installed capacity at design conditions, in kW.
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Annual generation The estimated total annual generation in kWh, worked out by the MCS 031 method.
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Flow temperature and SCOP The flow temperature and SCOP for that product, pulled from the product directory rather than typed in. Check this line
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Heating and hot water The space and water heating supply and demand figures, in kWh.
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Planning and building regulations How planning rules were met, either permitted development or an approved application, and how building regulations were notified. Check this line
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Guarantee provider The insurance backed guarantee provider, which is mandatory on a domestic job.
The mandatory installation details as MCS guidance for installers sets them out. Your own certificate carries the values for your property.
Two of those repay a second look. A SCOP is tied to a flow temperature, so an efficiency figure quoted at one temperature and delivered at another describes a different machine in daily use. The planning line is the written record, years later, that the unit was allowed to stand where it stands.
No Certificate, No Grant: How the Boiler Upgrade Scheme Hangs On It
Ofgem’s guidance puts it in one line: eligibility requires installations to be MCS certified. In England and Wales the figures are £7,500 on an eligible air-to-water heat pump and £9,000 for an off-gas-grid property on oil or LPG, that higher route running to 31 March 2027. We claim it for you, and it comes off the quote.
What a grant application needs
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An MCS certified installation Ofgem’s guidance makes it the condition of eligibility, and the certificate is the proof.
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An installing company in an approved consumer code The company that fits the heat pump has to belong to RECC or HIES.
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A voucher applied for within 120 days Ofgem usually takes the commissioning date from the certificate, and once the 120 days pass there is no way back.
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A property that qualifies Eligibility still depends on the property, so it is checked before anything is promised.
The South West has the highest share of off-gas-grid households in Great Britain, so the higher off-grid route is the common one on a Devon quote. The rules are laid out in our guide to the £9,000 off-grid oil and LPG grant.
When Your MCS Certificate Should Arrive and What to Do If It Has Not
MCS’s consumer guidance is that installers issue the certificate to you directly, and that it should reach you within 10 days of commissioning. The window for raising it on the database is widening as MCS rolls out a redeveloped installer scheme through 2026 and into early 2027. A short wait is ordinary; a long silence needs chasing.
The dates that hang off commissioning
Day 0
Commissioning
The system is commissioned and handed over, and the certificate records this date.
10 days
Certificate due
MCS says your installer should issue the certificate to you within 10 days of commissioning.
120 days
Voucher deadline
The grant voucher has to be applied for within 120 days of the commissioning date.
Eco Pro makes the grant application on your behalf and keeps track of the 120 days.
If it has not turned up
Ring your installer
Your installer is the first call, and usually the only one needed. Ask for the certificate to be sent to you.
Installer gone
If the installer has stopped trading or lost certification, MCS issues a copy for £30 plus VAT, £36 in total.
Not sure it exists
The MCS helpdesk searches the database by technology type and the full address, postcode included.
A record sitting on the database means the work was certified, even where the document itself never reached the homeowner.
Check the Installer Before You Sign
MCS runs a Find an Installer search showing whether a company currently holds certification. A company has to hold it throughout rather than collect it once, so the search is worth running three times, with one question to put to the company alongside.
As you take the quote
Look the company up on the day the quote arrives, so you know the certification is current before you weigh anything else on the page.
Find an InstallerBefore you sign
Weeks can pass between a quote and a signature. Run the search again, because certification has to be held throughout rather than collected once.
Same search, second timeBefore work starts
The certificate is raised at commissioning by a certified company. One more search before the first day on site closes the gap between signing and starting.
The last lookDesign or installation
A business can be certified for one of the two heat pump standards and partner with someone else for the other. Where that happens, the certificate names the partner.
One question to askA copy fee and a helpdesk call can recover a certificate that already sits on the database, and neither produces one for a job that never went through the scheme. Ofgem does not pay a grant on an installation that is not MCS certified.
Our guide to choosing a heat pump installer in Devon sets out the other checks worth making before you sign.
The Standards Sitting Behind a Heat Pump Certificate
The design standard is MIS 3005-D. Before installation starts, the heat pump has to be selected from a heat load calculation carried out to BS EN 12831-1:2017, and the installer has to be handed, in writing, all specific room heat losses, the emitter types and dimensions, the design flow temperature, and the SCOP at that flow temperature.
The line that shows the intent
The design emitter temperature is set by the worst performing room in the house rather than an average across the property. James checks that paperwork on other companies’ finished jobs as a freelance MCS assessor for NAPIT, which is where a lot of undersized design gets found.
MCS 031 produces the estimate that comes with your quote. The heat loss survey, waived if you go ahead, does the design behind an air source heat pump installation.
What This Means for a Devon Home on Oil or LPG
On an off-grid Devon property the certificate carries more weight than it does on a mains gas swap, because the higher grant hangs on it. Out on the Blackdown plateau and through the Otter valley, many properties sit well away from the gas main, ground covered on our heat pump installation page for Dunkeswell.
Older stone and cob properties put more of the document to work. The planning and building regulation lines are the written answer to how an install was allowed where it stands, a question that does get asked on those homes. The design side is covered in our post on heat pumps in old houses.
Keep the certificate with the house papers, alongside the handover pack and the warranty registration. Years later it is the one page that answers four questions.
What the certificate answers years later
What was fitted?
When was it commissioned?
At what capacity?
To which standard?
Frequently Asked Questions
It is the document issued for a single installation at a single address, confirming the system was designed, installed and commissioned to MCS standards, using MCS certified products, by an MCS certified installer.
Book my free home assessmentMCS’s consumer guidance says your installer should issue it within 10 days of the system being commissioned. The window for raising it on the database is widening as MCS rolls out its redeveloped installer scheme through 2026.
Book my free home assessmentYes. Ofgem’s guidance states that BUS eligibility requires installations to be MCS certified, and the voucher application has to be properly made within 120 days of the commissioning date on the certificate.
Book my free home assessmentNo. The grant is paid against an MCS certified installation, and the certificate is a declaration made by the company that designed and commissioned the system. A helpdesk call and a copy fee recover a certificate that already sits on the database; neither creates one for work done outside the scheme.
Book my free home assessmentAsk your installer first. MCS generates a copy only where the installer is no longer certified or no longer trading, and asks for proof of address and a fee of £30 plus VAT. Its helpdesk can confirm whether the certificate sits on the database at all.
Book my free home assessmentIt is a record of one installation on one date rather than a permission that runs out, and MCS’s database holds certified installations going back to 2010. The part that has to be kept current is the installer’s own certification.
Book my free home assessmentAsk the Certificate Question Before You Choose
The letters MCS turn up on nearly every heat pump quote in Devon and mean slightly different things in each one. What you actually want to know is which standards the company holds, who does the design work, and when the certificate for your own installation will reach you. James answers all three at the free home assessment, and leaves you with a fixed estimate.
Book my free home assessmentPrefer to talk it through first? Ring 01395 202030. James answers, and he is the person who will price the job.
★★★★★
“Communication was excellent throughout, with quick responses and clear explanations whenever we had questions. The heat pump is almost silent, which was something we were worried about, and the results have been fantastic.”
Grace Murphy · Google review
