The Boiler Upgrade Scheme in plain English: how the £7,500 actually lands on your heat pump quote

If you've been researching heat pumps and the £7,500 Boiler Upgrade Scheme keeps turning up — but nobody's explained clearly how it works, who gets paid, or what you actually hand over — you're in the right place. For most owner-occupiers, this one grant is the difference between a 10-year payback and a 4-year one. The confusion isn't your fault: it's routinely described as a rebate or a cashback, when in reality it's a pre-install voucher we redeem on your behalf.

Over a cup of tea at the kitchen table, the explanation takes about two minutes. Written down, it takes this page. By the end of it you'll know exactly what the £7,500 covers, what you'll really pay, how long everything takes, and the five things that can stall an application if they aren't caught on survey.

So where does the £7,500 actually go?

The £7,500 never lands in your bank account, and it never passes through your hands. Ofgem pays it straight to your installer, and we deduct it line-for-line from your invoice. You pay only the balance. That one sentence explains nine-tenths of the questions we hear about BUS.

Who qualifies in 2026

• You own the home. That includes buy-to-let landlords applying on a tenanted property — tenants can't apply themselves, but your landlord can.
• You're replacing a fossil-fuel heating system (gas, oil or LPG) or an electric direct system like night-storage radiators. Like-for-like heat-pump swaps don't qualify.
• Your EPC is valid (less than 10 years old) and carries no outstanding loft or cavity recommendations. If those are open, they need doing first — and usually can be, grant-funded, through ECO4 or GBIS.
• The property isn't a new build, unless it's your own self-build.
• The installer is MCS-certified. OMEGA is — our MCS number appears on every quote and on the public register.

The line that catches most people out is the one that isn't there. BUS has no income test. A household on £30,000 qualifies on the same terms as one on £130,000, provided the property ticks the boxes above. That's the single biggest difference between BUS and ECO4.

From first call to warm radiators — the real timeline

First call to working heat pump, our median is six to eight weeks. The Ofgem stages take what they take; the only real variable is your own diary. We pin the install day at the quote stage, not once you've signed.

Five things that delay (or kill) a BUS application

1. An EPC with open insulation recommendations. The most common snag, and the easiest to fix — we spot it on survey and quote the insulation alongside. Most of the time it's ECO4 or GBIS funded, so you don't pay for it.
2. A lapsed EPC. Ofgem need a currently valid EPC at the point the voucher issues. If yours has expired, we lodge a fresh one — usually back in under three working days.
3. The BUS consent form signed by the wrong legal owner. On joint ownership both names must match Land Registry. Trusts and corporate ownerships need a bit of extra paperwork — we flag it on survey so nothing stalls later.
4. Putting the install in the diary before the voucher is issued. The voucher has to be live the day engineers commission the system, or Ofgem reject the redemption. We never book an install day until the voucher is confirmed. No exceptions.
5. Changing the system spec after the voucher issues. Swapping air-source for ground-source, or resizing the whole system, means a revoucher application. Small changes like radiator or cylinder spec are fine.

Can BUS be stacked with other grants?

Yes, with one important rule. BUS can't be paired with ECO4 for the same measure — you can't have ECO4 pay for the heat pump and BUS top it up. But you absolutely can use ECO4 or GBIS for the insulation that gets your BUS application over the EPC line, then claim BUS for the heat pump itself. For a sizeable share of our customers, that sequence means zero-cost insulation plus a £7,500-discounted heat pump — a full fabric-first retrofit, done in one diary, often for under £7,000 net.

What happens when you get in touch

A call to 0800 229 4094 or a booking online lines up a free home energy survey — 45 minutes at your kitchen table, Monday to Saturday, real surveyors from the local team. We check your BUS eligibility on the day, design the system around your actual heating demand, and you'll have a fixed written quote within 24 hours with the £7,500 already taken off. The number on the quote is the number you pay. No cost. No obligation. No pressure.