Grant eligibility checker: methodology

What this tool does

It applies the published eligibility rules of eight UK schemes to the answers you give, and tells you which ones you appear to qualify for. It is a rules engine over public criteria, not a prediction and not an application.

Where the answers go

Nowhere. The rules run in your browser. There is no request to our servers carrying your answers, nothing written to storage, and no analytics event containing them. We have deliberately not built a way to receive them.

This matters more here than on the other calculators. Eligibility for most of these schemes turns on which means-tested benefits you receive and roughly what you earn. That is sensitive information, and in this market it is also valuable: a completed eligibility enquiry from someone about to spend thousands on heating is a lead worth real money to an installer. Every checker that asks for your name and email is monetising that. We would rather answer the question.

The four-value verdict

Results are not a simple yes or no, because the truth often isn’t.

• Eligible — the published rules say yes and there is no discretion in the way. Realistically this only applies to the non-means-tested schemes.
• Likely eligible — you meet the criteria we can test, but an assessor, survey or benefit check stands between you and the money.
• Worth checking — genuinely undecidable from a form. Council participation varies, some schemes ration by budget, and Nest operates a reserve list. We say so rather than guessing.
• Not eligible — a published rule rules you out, and we show which one.

We err towards sending you to check. Telling someone not to bother when the answer was actually “ask your council” costs them more than an unnecessary phone call does.

Schemes modelled

Rules that are easy to get wrong

Several of these appear incorrectly on installer and comparison sites, so they are worth stating plainly.

• The Boiler Upgrade Scheme has no EPC or insulation requirement. Loft and cavity insulation are advisory, not conditions. Many pages claim otherwise.
• The £9,000 off-grid rate applies only to oil and LPG replacements. Coal, hybrid and electric replacements stay at £7,500 even off the gas grid.
• Scotland’s heat pump grant is not means-tested — but it is restricted to owner-occupiers in their principal residence, which catches more people out.
• Nest and the Boiler Upgrade Scheme cannot be stacked for the same heat pump. It is one route or the other.
• ECO4 needs measures installed, not approved, before 1 January 2027.
• Northern Ireland’s Affordable Warmth Scheme does not fund heat pumps. NISEP does.

What we deliberately leave out

• The consolidated low-income scheme replacing ECO4. Announced but no criteria, budget or opening date published yet.
• Warm Home Discount. Two government sources disagree on the qualifying benefit list for 2026/27, so we will not give a yes or no.
• Warm Homes Fund loans. Announced; not open to consumers.

The Warm Home Discount omission is worth expanding on, because it is the kind of thing a less careful tool would just answer. The DESNZ eligibility statement for 2026/27 lists four qualifying benefits; Ofgem’s own page lists six, adding income-based Jobseeker’s Allowance and Income Support. Both are primary sources and they disagree. Wrongly telling an Income Support claimant they don’t qualify would cost them £150, so we give no verdict until we can resolve which is right.

Limitations

• We model national rules. Councils run their own local schemes and their own ECO4 Flex criteria, and we cannot see those.
• Several schemes are budget-limited and first-come first-served. Qualifying on paper is not the same as getting an award, particularly for NISEP and Warmer Homes Scotland.
• We approximate SAP scores from EPC bands for the Nest test. If you are near the boundary, the actual SAP number on your certificate is what counts.
• The published Nest income table stops at two children. For larger households we use the highest published threshold, which is the generous read — it sends you to check rather than turning you away.

How this stays current

Every scheme carries the primary source it came from and the date we last checked it, both shown on your results. Schemes with an announced end date retire themselves: ECO4 will stop appearing on 1 January 2027 without anyone editing the code.

Spotted a rule we have wrong? Email hello@energycosting.co.uk. Accuracy here is the entire point, and a wrong threshold costs someone real money.

Back to the grant eligibility checker, or read heat pump vs gas: the honest UK numbers.