andyscotland

I should have said of course the other caveat is if the company has done all the paperwork honestly but hasn't actually paid the VAT bill due to e.g. lack of funds/cashflow then that is also tricky. HMRC will be pursuing that but again they will be interested in getting the money they think they're due, not in helping/forcing the trader to reduce the amount.

If they have standard rated the invoice but declared it as 0% on the VAT return and pocketed the difference, that would be fraud and HMRC would definitely be interested. But it is much more likely that the VAT shown on the invoice went on the next VAT return and was paid over to HMRC. These days the vast majority of traders are using book-keeping software that does that automatically. You can't just "make a mistake adding it up" like the old days, you'd have to manually adjust the numbers on the computer in a way that leaves a trail and means it's easy to get caught. If that's happened then they have charged you more VAT than they should have, but they have also paid HMRC more VAT than they should have. You're out of pocket, the trader has not gained anything, and HMRC have your money. Sadly HMRC are unlikely to spend much time trying to give it back (and their powers are limited : e.g. they can't charge a penalty to someone for overcharging VAT). Which, as an aside, is why I think it's pretty unfair HMRC won't allow things like this for the self-build scheme - in the majority of cases they will have your money or be about to get it. It's also worth saying that just because a subcontractor hasn't charged VAT doesn't automatically mean the contractor shouldn't charge VAT when they charge it on. Each step in the chain is a new transaction for VAT purposes, and you can get situations where a supply is 0% rated between suppliers but then 20% rated to the final customer. Just as you can get cases where it's 20% rated between suppliers but 0% rated to the final customer. When that happens then - so long as everyone is being honest on their VAT return - none of the traders gain anything, all the "profit" on difference between amount paid and amount charged ends up with HMRC. All you can really do is pursue the action against the company, via the new director, and get them to issue the credit note and correct invoice and your refund. If the new director is not familiar with the history, it might be worth making sure they understand that all they have to do is correct the invoice and reclaim it on their next VAT return: they don't have to pay out of their own pocket. Some people struggle to grasp that! This does all assume that the company is a limited company and is still trading under the same VAT registration as before. If not then it will be more complex as they won't be able to correct a different entity's VAT returns.

Hypothetically, HMRC would probably want to see a reasonable charge for the labour to justify that it was a genuine supply & fit rather than supply only. And you'd then suffer a corporation/income tax hit on getting that back out of the company, so it wouldn't work out quite as much of a saving.

@dpmiller thanks good point on the calibration, I can work around that as I also have an electronic probe hooked up to a data logger. I've been using that to monitor the heating cycle/heat loss but will also allow me to tweak the stat set point if required. Tbh my other soonish plan is to use that probe to give better control of the temp so I can boost it up ahead of morning showers (it's quite a small tank) but keep it lower the rest of the day. But would still want to keep the actual stat as an upper limit stop for safety/in case the automation packs in. So calibration isn't too important overall.

Short version: can I safely enclose a surface-mounted cylinder stat in insulation? Backstory: we have an ancient essentially uninsulated hot water cylinder that leaks heat at an alarming rate. Annoyingly, it is installed in a very confined space - there are (uninsulated) pipes coming out at inaccessible corners, and one side nearly flush to the wall. So it's not feasible to fit a normal tank jacket. Long term plan is to fully replace the heating system. However with costs as they are I'm looking at a short term solution. I have a bunch of waste PIR and mineral wool. So I'm thinking of quickly boxing across the front with PIR, stuffing/pouring wool into the gaps from above, then putting a PIR lid on it. But it has a surface-mounted (and metal cased 😞) stat on the front. I obviously need to keep occasional access. But I can't decide whether to box round & keep it permanently exposed, or put a "hatch" of PIR in front of it and fully enclose it which would obviously be better thermally. My gut says enclosing will be fine, electrically it's very low current and expected to be in contact with the cylinder anyway so overheating seems unlikely, the sensor is electro-mechanical, and it won't go above ~60°. I'm just having a bit of a wobble & can't work out if that's genuine or my brain procrastinating again 🤣

I assume you mean re the proposals to change renewable/nuclear generation pricing so it is not based on gas price. Surely that cost very much depends on the terms of the recontracting and on how hard a bargain is driven by either side. It was always known that the spike would likely drop at some point, and that could have been priced in to any deal. However much the gas price drops, it is never realistically going to go below the marginal cost of renewables generation, even allowing for a return on the capital investment. I still believe, perhaps idiotically, that it would be better all round to remove the link between gas prices and renewable energy generation prices. Also worth noting that in many businesses & economies there is also a value to predictability : a small cost premium may be worth paying if it reduces volatility (which can have much higher short & long term costs than just the price spike itself).

This is quite a complex topic. Completion is not formally defined in VAT law and so there are various different things that can trigger "completion", including moving in. HMRC obviously have history of trying to pick the earliest possible "completion date" to minimise the size of their payout, but these have sometimes been challenged & defeated at tribunals. But it often depends on the very specific combination of factors (e.g. what was left to do when you moved in / are those things fundamental planning/building compliance things or just minor stuff etc). Several of those cases have been talked about here over the years - I would recommend searching/browsing through the threads in this subforum and ideally reading the linked tribunal judgments to get a sense of the ways different cases have gone and how they might apply to you. Very loosely, I would say avoid being in a situation where you've moved in and would in theory be eligible for a building control completion certificate but just haven't yet applied for it. But that really is a rough answer, and probably only good enough if you don't have much to pay for after move-in, so losing the VAT would just be an annoyance. If the amount at stake is important, it really is worth getting a full understanding of the history of VAT completion arguments (and potentially professional advice).

It is, but that £1bn is profit after writing down the investment on the original plants that produced it. I imagine they are expecting a decent return on Hinckley once complete (especially since prices/profits increase with inflation but the cash invested in the plant does not - that £23bn will look smaller & smaller over time). Well technically we pay VAT, they just collect it. Likewise the lions share of employee taxes. How much is the government spending to subsidise bills, support struggling businesses, pay benefits to those losing jobs or on reduced working due to the economic situation, not to mention inflationary pressures on pensions and public sector pay? Not convinced Centrica's tax bill will make much of a dent in that, tbh, even if you include everything. Surely it'd be better if energy prices were lower and Government and Bank of England had less to do?

As per @markc and @Temp an EU supplier should not charge any VAT if they are exporting to any customer outside the EU https://europa.eu/youreurope/business/taxation/vat/cross-border-vat/index_en.htm#outsidetheeusellgoods-1 - this is different to the rules for exporting within the EU (where it depends on business/personal status of the customer). If the supplier incorrectly charges you foreign VAT you will not be able to reclaim it. If you are not VAT registered you will be charged UK VAT on arrival of goods in the UK, this can be reclaimed from HMRC on the normal self-build scheme. The only thing I'm not certain of is what VAT territory NI is in at the moment. I am pretty sure it's UK (therefore outside EU) but it's possible there's something in the protocol that fudges that and treats you as being within EU for exports... Worth double checking.

I believe, unless it has changed since I trained, that BS1363-2 double socket outlets are officially rated at 13A across the pair, and are tested to 20A (16A one side and 4A the other). For any sustained high load appliance I would fit a separate single 13A socket (if it absolutely had to be on a 13A plug).

@markharro yes - if you buy direct you will be charged UK VAT (same as if you bought supply-only from a UK company) and can reclaim that along with your materials, assuming you're eligible for the self-build scheme. Import duty is complex but I *think* if the doors are wood https://www.trade-tariff.service.gov.uk/headings/4418?day=8&month=2&year=2023 or aluminium https://www.trade-tariff.service.gov.uk/commodities/7610100000?country=PL# and all components are made in Poland then the rate is 0% - but I'm not certain on this.

Ah, that does sound like you will be snug even without cars and patios. If you manage to get down to the point the car supplies make the difference, another option might be to just terminate those cables into say 6A MCBs and leave the other end without anything on it (or say a 5A lighting socket, though that would be a bit odd). Or take them to a single 16a MCB, stick a single 13A socket on each, and treat them as a radial. There's no reason a protective device can't be less than the theoretical current carrying capacity of the cable (in fact it's quite common if eg a cable is oversized due to voltage drop). That might again allow the electrician to certify everything he's installed including the cabling runs. And then be less drama for a future electrician to consider just upgrading the protective device and installing a charger on the other end knowing the cable run was inspected & signed off previously. It'd be a bit "thinking outside the box" but I think compliant, and if it saved you putting in 3 phase now to commission 5 empty cables then worth a bit of oddity!

Oops, I didn't do that. Did a vertical length up to the corner and then another side to side slightly too long for the width so the joint pushed itself together. I think I must have read that somewhere... Or maybe I just made it up.

And indeed potentially in a metal bath which may (depending on plumbing & age of electrical installation) be earthed - unlike the kitchen floor.

@Andehh thinking about it a bit more and assuming your 3 car chargers are ~7kW each rather than 22 (and given I think you said you've already bought them): If going 3ph now isn't feasible, another short-term option might be to fit a manual 3-way changeover switch beside the consumer unit - something like this https://uk.rs-online.com/web/p/cam-switches/2937156 in a suitable enclosure, or may be possible to find IP rated ones, that was just a quick Google. Then take a single supply from the CU to that switch, then your separate supplies from the switch to each charger. Fit a 3-phase-ready CU with two spare ways. That would guarantee the total load on that circuit could only ever be a single charger but allow your current electrician to commission & certify all 3 - avoiding any issues about asking a later electrician to certify a concealed supply cable that was installed by someone else but left dormant. Then in future when you actually have any EVs to charge you have options: * Upgrade the supply to 3ph and take charger 2&3 to the spare ways on the CU, removing the switch. So basically what you'd otherwise do now, but later. * Leave the supply as 1ph and fit some as-yet-to-be-determined smart tech to balance demand across the three chargers instead of the manual switch. * keep the manual switch till you figure out something better, you'll still have to turn it at some point in the evening but at least you don't have to go out in the rain to unplug & replug each car 🤣

That worked for me. As @Gone West I've heard the idea of putting in the fridge first, I did mine in January* in Scotland so that wasn't an issue! Cut & fit lengths one at a time - a roll of electrical tape is useful to bind the roll back up tight in between cuts, to stop it expanding as you work. * We have stopped putting years on dates related to our project. It will still, as was always the plan, be complete in "Summer". 🤣

One piece of advice I was given by a lawyer long ago is to be careful writing your own contracts. There is established precedent for interpreting words in a contract that can be quite technical and not exactly the "plain English" meaning of a word that a non-lawyer would expect. His advice was: a) if you might want a court to enforce a contract, ideally have a lawyer write it or b) if you have to DIY then write in your own words, avoid legal-sounding language, and include a statement that "the language should be interpreted as plain English". Then if it does get into a dispute there's less risk of getting bogged down in / caught out by a legal dictionary definition of one word and the test is more likely to be "what would a reasonable person think that sentence meant in context". I have always therefore gone with option (b) as life is too short to be paying lawyers unnecessarily 🤣 So if you do want to use JCTMW as a reference of points to include, fine, but ideally write that as a letter of agreement in your own words rather than copy&pasting the language from the original.

True, it would definitely be feasible to make some sort of load management work. Really, even if 3 car chargers are installed, the requirement is probably just to be able to plug three cars in at teatime and have them charged by morning, without having to go back outside to unplug one and plug in the next. Doesn't necessarily mean they have to charge simultaneously. I'm sure that will become a fairly common requirement for multi-car households so as you say if the kit isn't yet available to do that (off the shelf, I'm sure it's already doable with a Raspberry Pi, some current clamps and some contactors) it probably will be before long.

That's a good point (my training predates EVs!). Assuming of course the chargers are connected at this stage.

Also, although the electrician does have a responsibility to check that the overall design load is reasonable taking account of diversity there is some wriggle room there. Ultimately so long as every cable including the incoming supply is protected by a protective device adequate to the cable rating & installation method, that is the safety side of things covered IMHO. And if any of the kit is cabled but not connected then it is for the electrician that eventually commissions that to sign that off. It is extremely common for the total potential load on a consumer unit to be way higher than the actual maximum. Even before car chargers and the like you could easily have 2x32A ring, a 40A cooker, 16A immersion, 2x6A lighting and a 20A garage supply for a total of 152A worth of circuit breakers off a 60 or 80 Amp supply.

Not sure how you've approached that maths? UK nominal single phase voltage is 230V, current is (loosely, ignoring power factor) power divided by voltage. So 22,000W / 230V = 95.7 amps. Theoretically could just fit on a 100A supply if you turned everything else off...

I saw the notification you'd quoted me and worried I'd done it wrong 🤣 good to have competent sign-off, thanks 😉

Probably a question for someone who knows more about gas than me 🤣 but from my high school physics, steel generally corrodes in presence of oxygen and moisture and I wouldn't expect either of those things to be inside a pipe full of natural gas in any noticeable quantity. Certainly less than in the air on the outside of the pipe, so I would assume corrosion is much more likely from outside-in than inside-out. I'd hate for you to rely on my random-guy-on-the-internet's-opinion but to my completely unqualified mind I'd be amazed if the pipe could affect the boiler other than by leaking & failing to get gas to it at adequate pressure.

That seems very odd. I just looked quickly at the Homeserve T&Cs and they explicitly exclude "any gas supply pipe made of steel" in the "What's not covered" bit. Normally when insurers list exclusions that means they can provide cover so long as a specific claim doesn't relate to one of the excluded items. I would press them hard on whether there's really no way they could offer the policy on that basis. I can't see how it could hurt them to be charging you the full premium but have a whole class of claims they wouldn't ever have to pay out on! 🤣It's not even like it's something where there could be a grey area as to whether it's relevant to a fault.

Ah, your post crossed with mine. So are they refusing cover at all unless you get it upgraded? Or would they be willing to offer a policy with that excluded? I imagine it will depend on what access is like under the floor (can it be done from the crawl space or do the floorboards have to come up) and how much making good is needed. As well as where you are and how much a plumber near you wants the work. Probably hard to advise without seeing it.