End of FITs in April 2019, end of MCS?

[SolarCity]

With the FIT scheme due to end next April, will this make the MCS redundant? Please say yes.....

 

[whinmoor]

I think MCS will try to find a way to keep itself relevant.

 

[SolarCity]

I don't see what role they'd fill. I'm in the NICEIC as a sparky and that should be good enough.

 

[Gavin A]

MCS is a requirement in permitted development regulations, so non-mcs systems would technically require planning permission.

You can't self certify the roof structure side of things just via the electrical registration with NIC.

An MCS cert or something similar is usually required by EPC assessors as evidence of what the system actually is - and EPC's are shortly to actually start using the MCS certs performance estimate rather than SAP. AFAIK there is nothing else similar to an MCS cert that can do the same job.

Most sub contract tenders spec an MCS certified system,

So for those reasons I'd recommend keeping up your MCS certification if you want to do a significant level of solar PV installation work next year, FIT or no FIT.

 

[SolarCity]

Good points.

 

[Gavin A]

I am currently attempting though to get the MCS scheme improved in various ways to make it so that it's something that actually has some level of value to installers beyond the reasons given above.

It's slow work though.

 

[whinmoor]

I'm most annoyed about how useless MCS and RECC are at enforcement. I'm currently trying to help a lady who had a system installed in 2015 by a company which has since gone into liquidation. Her roof is leaking quite badly in two places and it's going to cost four figures to deal with. Of course her "workmanship warranty" is useless and she seems to be unable to claim on the insurance policy as she doesn't have a copy of her contract.

The original installer drilled badly through slate and made a complete mess. She has water running down her bedroom walls. The only way I can guarantee the job long-term is if we can fit an integrated system using the original panels. That ain't cheap. We can bodge patch-ups but that's just going to turn into a game of whack-a-mole.

The installer has "phoenixed" with a virtually identical trading name from the same location. The new company is on the MCS register and proudly displaying its installs on its Facebook page.

 

[Energetic]

Good riddance to MCS...

They may not be going anywhere but I am. Most of my work is now in Solar Farms and in December I made the decision to finish installing for good.

I just logged on to the MCS database to register what will be my penultimate system ever and found that they've decided to renew the portal and that it will be down for 10 days! I cannot believe that they choose now to do this in the last qtr of Feed in Tariffs ever!

Thanks for all the help over the last 8 years and all the best for 2019 and the future.

 

[whinmoor]

We are pretty busy at the moment. Enquiries coming in from all directions. Everyone seems to want to catch the last bus...