Insurance News Archive

EPC without HCR 'less powerful'

The Energy Performance Certificate (EPC), one of the documents in home information packs (Hips) is not powerful on its own, according to one Hip provider.

While the EPC contains important information and is an integral part of the Hips, Lesley Sorridimi of Hip Hip Hooray has said that it was more valuable to homebuyers as part of a Home Condition Report (HCR) as it was originally meant to be.

The HCR was to be a mandatory component of Hips that detailed the general condition of the property but is now only optional.

Ms Sorridimi said that the EPC on its own had lost some of the importance that the HCR had, adding that it is just as important as the other documents required by a Hip.

She said: "If I'm being brutally honest, I think it plays just as an important part as the register titles and the searches do, because they're the things that normally wouldn't be ordered until you've put your offer in. That can hold up the process, whereas this way you've got it upfront."

30 Nov 2007