Anyone conduct EPCs?

bylromarha

Appreciate this is a bizarre request:

OH is studying for his EPC. He has never been someone who can learn by reading information, he learns better by doing and on the job learning. (I'm a teacher myself and it's easy to recognise his learning style)

Estate agents have contracted him in for years to take photos and floor plans on their properties and he knows getting the EPC qualification will be another string to his bow and another service to offer his current clients.

He opted to study for his EPC via distance learning (had he consulted me on the decision I'd have pointed out it'd be a waste of £1k, doomed to fail due to his learning style...) - distance learning means he has a pile of PDFs to read through. Worse way for him to learn.

He is getting more and more bogged down with the reading and with the examples his tutor has given him to work through, he has got stuck. The only support his tutor will give him is that all the information he needs is in the pdfs...which is getting him more and more frustrated as he can't see it in the pdfs.

So, are there any wonderful EPC trained people on here which are willing to offer a bit of guidance and help, be a bit more than "go back to the pdf's". He isn't looking for someone to tell him the answers as he knows that won't benefit him, but looking for a bit more help than "go back to the pdfs" - maybe "have you thought about it this way?" or "the answer will be something to do with xxx, so have a read around that"

And if you're worried about him stealing your business - I'm in the West Midlands and you'll know if you regularly meet a wonderful happy friendly guy in houses who is taking photos and measurements whilst you're doing your EPC . If you don't know that guy or are in a different area then you're in a fantastic position to help.

Thanks all - look forward to a pm or 2.

G_M

Seems to me his options are to struggle on with the distance learning, or cut his losses (and investment) and sign up to a more direct form of tuition. But you know that really don't you?

Having said that, EPCs are such a waste of time & money for everyone except the person employed to undertake them that my sympathy is .... tempered.

They are a highly superficial evaluation of a property, with many aspects being presumed/assumed rather than actually checked/confirmed.

The training may be taxing for your OH, but let's be honest - it doesn't really compare with a surveyor's training, and a surveyor will tell a buyer or renter far more that's meaningful about the property's energy efficiency than an EPC. Like whether the walls are solid, or cavity, and if cavity, whether filled or not. Bet they don't train him to answer that definitively!

At the other extreme of course, how much training do you need at all to tell whether there is insulation in the attic and energy efficient bulbs in the lights? Just enough to tick a box? That's hardly rocket science!

bylromarha

He's not been a fan of EPCs since their inception, hence why he resisted so much. We agree they're ridiculous - who thought it would be a good idea to give a house a better rating based on things such as energy efficient lightbulbs being in place or not?!

But you need to pass all of it, not just the energy efficient lightbulb questions...

Anyway shameless bump - anyone willing to help please?