The Boiler Upgrade Scheme requires the installation to be carried out by an MCS certified installer. Without certification you are not quoting for that work at all, you are watching a certified competitor quote for it.
The Smart Export Guarantee requires MCS certification for the installation before a supplier will pay for exported electricity. On solar and battery work that is often the difference between a yes and a no on the customer’s side.
MCS runs a public installer directory that homeowners are pointed at by grant guidance and by energy suppliers. Being absent from it is not neutral; it reads as a reason to look elsewhere.
Certification proves a standard was met on the day you were assessed. It does not win work on its own, and every certified competitor has the same badge. What it does is make you eligible.
| Scheme being retired | Redeveloped Scheme | |
|---|---|---|
| Consumer Code membership | Mandatory | No longer mandatory |
| Assessment | Standard assessment cycle | Risk-based model, so consistently good work is assessed differently from work that is not |
| Certificate creation window | 14 days after commissioning | 30 days |
| Complaints | Handled through your Consumer Code | Centralised with MCS |
| Your agreement | Held through your certification body | A new Installer Agreement held directly with MCS |
| Support | Through your certification body | A dedicated MCS account manager |
Certification is the part everyone plans for. The part that quietly causes trouble is what happens after each install: every installation has to be registered within the certificate creation window, and under the redeveloped Scheme that window moves from 14 days to 30.
Thirty days sounds generous until it is competing with the next job. The commissioning data is on a phone, the serial numbers are in a photo, someone is waiting on the handover pack, and the clock is running on a deadline nobody is watching. Missing it is not a paperwork problem, it is a customer whose grant or export payment is held up because of you.
Where job management helps, and where it does not. installHUB does not create MCS certificates and does not submit them for you. What it does is hold the install in one record, so the commissioning data, the equipment details, the photos and the sign-off are captured on site rather than reconstructed later, and the job is visibly still open until the registration is done.
The related thing it does handle end to end is the grid connection: DNO notifications file through ENA Connect Direct from the survey data, without re-keying, with the operator’s response tracked against the job.
MCS, the Microgeneration Certification Scheme, certifies both the products used in small-scale renewable installations and the companies that install them. For an installer it is a quality certification held through a certification body, and it is what makes you eligible for the government-backed schemes that fund most domestic renewable work.
No. It is not a licence to trade and you can install solar or a heat pump without it. What you cannot do without it is give the customer access to the Boiler Upgrade Scheme or the Smart Export Guarantee, which is why in practice most domestic work goes to certified installers. It is a commercial requirement rather than a legal one.
MCS has replaced its Installer Scheme following industry consultation. The headline changes are that Consumer Code membership is no longer mandatory, assessment becomes risk-based, complaints are centralised with MCS, installers hold a new agreement directly with MCS with a dedicated account manager, and the certificate creation window moves from 14 days to 30. Certification bodies are moving installers across in phases, with most moving during 2026.
Your certification body manages the move and will contact you when the redeveloped Scheme is available to you, but it is not automatic from your side: you complete a set of checks and application steps with MCS at the same time. The practical advice is to get familiar with the new structure before your certification body calls, rather than after.
Every installation has to be registered within a set period after commissioning. Under the redeveloped Scheme that window is 30 days, up from 14. It is a per-job deadline rather than a one-off, and missing it holds up the customer’s grant or export payment, which makes it a job management problem as much as a compliance one.
No, and we would rather say so plainly. installHUB does not create or submit MCS certificates. It holds the install in one record so the commissioning data, equipment details, photos and sign-off are captured on site and the job stays visibly open until registration is done. The compliance workflow we do handle end to end is the grid connection: DNO notifications filed through ENA Connect Direct from the survey data.
The small-scale renewable technologies used in homes and small businesses, including solar PV, heat pumps, biomass, solar thermal and small wind. Certification is granted per technology, so adding a second technology to your business means adding it to your certification rather than assuming it is covered.
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