jack

Of course! That said, we had beef stroganoff in the slow cooker last night, and both of my fussy teenagers (one of whom generally hates anything "sloppy" likes stews or casseroles) wolfed it down.

Yes. It was highly unpleasant episode (discussed at the time on here, I think). He was diagnosed with a serious illness - I want to say it was a brain tumour. They decided to move away from the rat race and cut their costs so they could work less and live a better life so he could reduce his stress levels. But then they mortgaged themselves to the hilt and beyond to build an insanely oversized and overspecced property that would leave them in massive debt for the rest of their lives. It was difficult viewing. They came across as perhaps living a bit of a fantasy world, maybe as a reaction to the stress of his near-death experience.

We've had one of these for at least a decade and never really used it that much in the past. However, over the last few months my wife has started experimenting with it, and we've had some really tasty meals. Most of the time it's just a matter of dumping all the ingredients in and coming back a few hours later. It's a massive time saver.

*high quality, family-friendly content

I'm sure there are cases where they've engaged to work with a self-builder, filmed some or all of the build, and then not made an episode because they couldn't build a suitable narrative. Boring people building a nice enough house with no back-story, on time and on budget, doesn't really make for compelling TV. I remember that small house on Skye (I think it was), built by a local builder for two women. Unfortunately, while the house was nice enough, literally nothing went even slightly wrong. Everything was on time and on budget. They tried to manufacture an oo-er moment around the airtightness test ("the experienced builder has never had a house air-tested to such a tight standard before!!!"), but we came back from the break and it breezed through. Really dull TV.

Some of the numbers that get bandied around on Grand Designs (both the estimates at the start and the answer to "so how much did it actually cost?" at the end) are insane. There was that one on the Isle of Wight where they budgeted something like £800k for an absolutely massive 6-bedroom house. The estimate included a pool, a ground source heat pump, Swiss (I think) 3G windows, and extensive stone cladding (plus that other odd hand-made cladding that took forever to make and install). They admitted to an actual cost of over £2m.

I don't know what Which actually said, but perhaps they were referring to minimum fill amounts. If you have to put in, say 400 mL to cover the element, then you have to boil a lot of excess water to make single 250 mL cup of tea (as compared with a kettle that will boil 250 mL of water, say).

Our architect prepared a comprehensive design and access statement to accompany our application (Waverley Borough Council). I don't know what impact it had, but we went straight to allowance, despite replacing a small bungalow with a large two-storey house with flat roof (which I know Waverley hate, because one of the senior planners said as much when I visited them before starting the process). As you say, it focuses the planner's mind on how the various planning requirements are met, plus adds a bit of colour and context. For example, I very much doubt that it hurts if the planner learns you're building a high quality, low-energy, family home as a long term resident, rather than being a developer trying to build something as cheaply as possible.

Unless the notes have recently changed significantly, this isn't my recollection of what they say. The notes say that something along the lines of the completion certificate being the usual document that will be relied upon, but that the applicant may choose to rely on another document such as a valuation listing confirmation or a letter from their bank confirming that a final stage payment has been made. The three months runs from the date of the chosen document. Basing "completion" on the date of moving in or on which the property is added to the council tax valuation list is a complete distortion of the notes (note: not even the law) accompanying the form, but unfortunately this is what HMRC is doing. This has been repeatedly addressed by tribunals, the majority of which - particularly more recently - have ruled that the moving in or council tax listing date is not relevant to assessing whether the VAT has been reclaimed in a timely fashion. I should add that HMRC often aren't only relying on the valuation date. They're identifying the worst date they can reasonably infer from the facts. So they start with the council tax valuation date, because that's something they can easily and objectively determine from public records. If you can prove significant expenditure on building works after that, then they will likely move the date forward accordingly. I think that's what happened to us - we moved in and paid council tax for several years before getting a completion certificate, but had a couple of significant spends shortly before completion that I suspect dragged us over the line. This whole area is a disgusting mess. The only real way to guarantee that you get your money back is to finish the build promptly, see if you can get the council tax listing delayed until completion, not move in until you get your completion certificate, and then make the claim within 3 months of the completion date. Unfortunately, for a lot of self-builders this is a difficult if not impossible thing to achieve. Unless I've missed a recent case (possible, as I haven't been following it since we got our refund), this has not been tested in court. All of the relevant cases have been at the tribunal level, which means that they don't have the force of precedent. That means that the next tribunal is free to - and sometimes does - make a completely different determination on similar facts. Unless and until someone appeals it to a higher court, this is how things will be. In case anyone's interested, here are some notes I put together when I assumed we'd be arguing this in the tribunal. There may be more recent cases - if anyone knows, please tell me: Tribunal case: [2020] UKFTT 00157 (TC) - John McGarry and Monica McGarry Tribunal case: [2020] TC07553 - Simon & Joanne Cotton v HMRC https://www.accountancydaily.co/diy-expert-builds-winning-case-vat-refund HMRC vs Sansom – Timeline of events The Sansom family moved into the relevant house in 2013 (before work was completed), the final expenditure was incurred in 2016, however for a variety of reasons the certificate of completion was not obtained until June 2018 and the DIY claim was then submitted less than three months later on 1 September 2018. HMRC contended that the claim was made late, arguing that the completion of the building should be assessed by reference to a ‘multi factorial test’ and not just the issue of a completion certificate. https://www.casemine.com/judgement/uk/5e6881d62c94e041f1973047 - Proffit v Revenue & Customs - Latest case? Excellent outcome + refers to internal HMRC guidance about extensions. https://www.constablevat.com/diy-housebuilder-scheme/ - Summary of cases, including case where HMRC won. https://www.icas.com/landing/tax/the-most-expensive-tax-breaks - Another summary. https://www.rossmartin.co.uk/vat/vat-cases/4907-is-a-diy-claim-completion-date-decided-by-reference-to-the-certificate-of-completion https://www.taxationweb.co.uk/forum/vat-diy-rebate-rejected-t33423.html - Shows how the notes accompanying the reclaim form have changed over the years. Used to explicitly say that, in case of any doubt, applicant could safely rely on completion certificate + all building regs met. Because the form asks you what date you moved in on. You'd be game lying to HMRC in writing, given that they have the power to penalise you for making false statements. I saw one tribunal decision where someone had accidentally tried to reclaim VAT on a build where it wasn't appropriate (effectively, they weren't self-builders). It was a simple error on the claimant's part. They answered all the questions perfectly accurately, which was what allowed HMRC to correctly determine that they weren't eligible for a refund. For some reason, instead of just denying the claim, HMRC levied a significant penalty for attempting to falsely reclaim tax. The tribunal was damning in its decision for the applicant, but I'd still rather not have to fight HMRC. Plus as mentioned above, they can generally just look at the valuation date and infer that the house was complete then, without needing to refer to the moving in date. That said, I expect that if you give them a moving in date that's a lot earlier than the valuation date, they'll try to rely on the former to your detriment.

I know it's legal and makes business sense, but what utter cnuts. Where do you get 25p a mile? My absolute worst case in winter is better than 3.5 miles/kWh, and I can charge at 7.5 p/kWh for 4 hours a night at home (like anyone else on Octopus Go). That's a bit over 2 p/mile. I also average more like 5 miles/kWh at this time of the year. Even if I were to always pay the current typical rate of 55 p/kWh at a commercial charger, that still only amounts to about the 15 p/mile you're getting.

I'm genuinely puzzled by what point you think I'm missing given that we seem to be saying the same thing. You said: And I said (having just pointed out low depreciation on EVs): Am I missing something?

Tell me how you get on with that. I was looking at buying ours at the end of the lease period and the depreciation is nowhere near what I'd expected. I've looked at other models and they're no better. For example, I quite like the look of the 64kWh Kona. The most expensive model sold at about £37k retail two years ago, but you can't buy one that's two years old in any condition or mileage for less than about £30k. Low mileage cars are listed at £34k or even £35+k. To be fair, this affects all second hand cars to an extent due to supply shortages on new cars. Another issue is that there aren't many electric cars in the 2 or 3 year old class (my preference for buying to long-term hold) that have the longer range I want from my next car. I suspect that's what's holding up the value of those bigger-batteried cars. I'll certainly be taking a much closer look at this towards the end of the year, but don't hold out much hope of getting a deal unless the economic situation falls over into a screaming heap (in which case that last thing I'll be doing is tying £30+k of my capital up in a car).

The fixing distance is different depending upon the particular track you're installing. Look at the relevant technical catalogue in the "Downloads" section on the right of this page of their website. The spacing for each model is in there.

2.5 years with a BEV for us and I wouldn't go back despite the drawbacks. They're expensive, although I think we're ahead given cheaper per mile running costs (especially given we already have a lot of PV), lower servicing costs, and much lower BIK (currently leasing through my business).

I'm not seeing any photos... 😞

We seem to be talking at cross purposes. I'm talking solely about @Bitpipe's scenario, where only a single microinverter has stopped reporting. I'm just saying that it's premature to conclude that the problem is with the Envoy. I don't know how they can remotely tell the difference between noise on the powerlines and an issue with the Envoy (e.g., one or more components in the input filter of the Envoy deteriorating or failing). The fact that the replacement Envoy solved the problem without other changes suggests noise was not the core issue. I looked into this when considering whether to go the microinverter route in 2015, and you're right, it's just the unit that gets replaced under warranty. In my case, it's easy to get onto the flat roof for access without the need for scaffolding, so I concluded it wouldn't be a big issue if I did need to make a warranty claim. My main question was really whether they keep a stock of old models on their shelves for 20+ years for warranty purposes, or ensure that their newer models are backwards compatible. Most likely the latter, I'd have thought.

I know the Envoy unit isn't covered by the warranty, but at this stage it isn't confirmed that the Envoy is where the problem lies. A single microinverter not reporting for some time seems more likely to be a microinverter problem than an Envoy problem. All the microinverters piggyback their data onto the same power connection, so it seems unusual for the Envoy to fail in such a way that it's suddenly unable to read data from just one of many microinverters. Indeed, it might not actually be a microinverter failure. It could be that the connection at the microinverter has deteriorated enough that power still gets through, but the injected data is a bit too noisy for the Envoy to read. Hopefully Techfor can confirm what's actually gone wrong. An interesting question is how they might deal with a warranty claim a long time after installation. Presumably they don't keep stocks of inverter models they no longer make, so how do they replace a failed microinverter that's 10, 15, or even 20 years old? Perhaps their later units are backwards compatible? Let us know how you get on @Bitpipe. I'm interested to see what the problem is given how similar my own setup is.

Another Techforenergy customer here. By the sound of it, I can expect a failure of some sort in the near future! 🤣

I have the same system. I seem to recall that the microinverters came with a very long warranty - 20 or 25 years, I think. If you can't get in contact with the original installer, I guess the distributor is the next port of call?

We mostly get away with 4 hours a night, it's just when we do a long drive and then need the car again quickly. Maybe a handful of times a month. I doubt it'll pay for itself all that quickly, but it'll be nice to not continuously be thinking about how to optimise charging.

Ours bumped from 5p to 7.5p /kWh a few months back. Still amazing value compared to the peak rate. The inability to properly take advantage of the 4-hour cheaper overnight rate on a 13A plug is a major factor for getting the charger installed now.

Still on a 13 amp plug after 2 years! We're about to have a Zappi installed, to go with the Eddi diverter we already have. The recent increase in electricity price when we came off our fixed price deal means we really need to be able to take better advantage of the 4 cheap hours we get overnight.

Massive NO to the Pod Point for me. I can't tell you how much trouble I've had with their public chargers (mainly the app forgetting that I've claimed the session and then refusing to release my car). The last time I was forced to use one of their chargers, it refused to disconnect. In the end, I had to change the max charge setting on my car to force it to break the session. It took me over 20 minutes to think of this solution, so I had to buy a lot of expensive electricity that I didn't want or need. Unbelievably, they no longer have a phone number you can call for help, either. I sent them a message via their (very difficult to find) contact form when I couldn't disconnect and it took them over 24 hours to reply. That was event though I'd selected the "I can't release my car" from the drop-down in the contact form (which would seem like an urgent issue to me!) I don't believe there's phone support for their home chargers either, but check. Also, take a look at the online reviews about support generally.

I drove past a wheat field being harvested on Sunday. The dust cloud it generated was visible a mile away!

I had to help our sales team during a startup I was involved with many years ago. I was basically the industry specialist who knew the details of the business we operated in, and got wheeled in when potential clients got the point of asking questions beyond what was in the salespeople's flowcharts. Some of our salespeople used to get frustrated with me answering questions honestly, because the honest answer sometimes involved acknowledging the existence of a compromise. However, what we were offering had massive advantages to the average potential customer, and my opinion was that if anyone was going to get hung up on the inevitable slight compromises that led to us being able to offer these advantages, we probably didn't want them as a customer. Interestingly, our most successful salespeople were never the ones who had issues with me being honest.