Andrea has been living in her home for almost 60 years. Her adult son, Charles, now owns the property and currently lives with her, which makes the three-bedroom property feel a lot less empty. Although Andrea is in her late-70s, she has continued to work part-time at a local shop; this helps her top up her pension but, with the cost of living continuing to rise, her money doesn’t go as far as it once did.

Over the last few years, Andrea has noticed the increase in the oil she uses for her central heating. In fact, the cost per litre more than doubled during the height of the energy crisis a few years ago and, although the price has come down since, it still takes its toll especially on a system that is starting to show its age. Because of the age of the system, and the amount of oil it was going through, Andrea had started using electric heaters to keep warm over the Winter, but these were increasing her bills even more. It was just after Winter that Andrea received a leaflet in the post about the Home Upgrade Grant.

Andrea phoned the number on the leaflet immediately, as it said that she could qualify for a new heating system because she was an off-gas property. One of our energy advisors, Carwyn, spoke to Andrea, and let her explain her energy situation. He agreed that the Home Upgrade Grant could be a great way to improve her situation, and talked her through everything she needed to know. He asked about her tenure and her income, and explained how the process would work. Carwyn knew it was a lot of information to take in at once, so he assured Andrea that he would send over everything in writing as well, so she didn’t need to worry about forgetting anything. Once Andrea had asked all her questions, Carwyn sent out the application by post for Andrea to fill in and passed the case over to one of the project managers, James.

A couple of weeks later, James received the application back from Andrea and gave her a call to talk her through the next steps. He got confirmation of a few additional details and advised that he would be passing the approved application over to a trusted contractor. They would come round to do a pre-assessment Energy Performance Certificate and, from that, they would talk her through her options. James also let Andrea know that if she needed any support or had anymore questions then she could phone Act on Energy at any time.

Once the contractors got in touch with Andrea, they did a full assessment and discovered that the property was E-rated at only 45 points. They talked Andrea through the installation options and, together, they settled on installing solar panels and replacing the oil boiler with an air source heat pump. The funding was approved, the installation went smoothly, and the installers advised Andrea on how to use the new system. Just with the new heating system alone, Andrea was expected to save over £100 a year but, with the added solar panels, her heating costs would decrease further due to being able to generate her own electricity instead of having to buy all of it.

Andrea’s property was no longer E-rated; it had increased by 44 points and was now B-rated, which put her high above the UK average. Her old property had been rejuvenated, and Andrea couldn’t have been happier.