Knowledge/Accreditation and audits/What your accredited person pays you, and why nobody publishes it
What your accredited person pays you, and why nobody publishes it
Nothing regulates it. The Act, Regulations and Specifications behind Victorian Energy Upgrades set a minimum co-payment, the least the customer must pay. They say nothing about what an accredited person (AP) pays an installer. That's a private contract, and we found no published rate cards anywhere in the market.
- Regulated?
- Nonot in the Act, Regulations or Specifications
- What is set
- Co-paymentthe minimum the customer pays
- Published rate cards
- None foundanywhere we looked
- So the rate is
- Whatever you negotiateget it in writing
How does the money actually move?
Whoever owns the certificates gets their value. That's the accredited person, or the installer if the AP passes it on under a commercial deal.
In practice the AP sells the VEECs (Victorian energy efficiency certificates). You get the value as an upfront discount, less the AP's service fee, and you take that discount off the customer's invoice.
The law only sets the least the customer has to pay, called the minimum co-payment. It doesn't set the customer's discount, and it doesn't set your rate. People mix those two up all the time.
No
made-up
numbers
The rate is a private contract, so any figure would be somebody's guess
We looked for a rate set by law and there isn't one. We looked for published rate cards and found none. There are figures going around, quoted by people with an interest in the number, and we're not going to repeat them as if they were real rates.
A made-up rate would hurt you, because you'd take it into a negotiation as a benchmark and it isn't one.
What we can tell you is how it works, which is more useful. The rate isn't regulated, it's negotiable, and the other side knows the number while you generally don't.
Why do they keep it quiet?
Every accredited person and aggregator in this market has a commercial reason to keep VEEC rates and payment terms quiet. That isn't a conspiracy. A business that lives on its margin makes more when the other side can't see how big that margin is.
So don't waste time hunting for the market rate. Ask questions that make your own deal clear.
What should you ask for in writing?
- The rate per certificate, and whether it moves with the VEEC spot price (the day's market price) or is fixed
- Who pays the $4.35 creation fee on each certificate
- When you get paid, in days after the certificates are registered
- What happens to your payment if the claim is later rejected on audit
- Whether the rate changes when the co-payment changes
- Who's responsible for getting the current assignment form
That last one matters more than it looks. The assignment is the document that makes the job valid at all, and the form it has to follow is set in guidelines from the ESC (Essential Services Commission, the scheme's regulator), which get updated.
The fourth one is the question most installers never ask. A claim can be rejected months after the job. If you've already been paid, whether they can take that money back depends on your contract, not the law.
Working out whether to get accredited?
It's a real decision with real numbers on both sides, and most of the people offering advice make money whichever way you go.
Kevin has no stake in which way you go. Ask him.
Who this is for: small and medium HVAC contractors in Victoria. If you're a homeowner after a rebate or a repair, you need a licensed contractor, not us, and yours can point you the right way.
Related
- The training evidence your accredited person needs before you startThe rule change on 9 September 2026 (section 14FA). What you have to prove, who you prove it to, and which activities don't list VEU-specific training units.
- The assignment of rights that makes the job validYour customer hands their right to create certificates to the accredited person. What makes that valid, and why a pre-July 2025 template may not comply.
- On a rental job, the landlord signs the assignmentThe tenant holds the energy account, but section 16(2) treats the landlord as the consumer so they can sign. Likely to come up far more often from 2027.
- No certificate without these two declarationsRegulation 17 needs a declaration from your customer and one from the accredited person. Plus the rule against bringing in an old unit just to rip it out.
Review date: 1 January 2027. Figures in this area change without much notice and this page carries some that will go stale. Every number above is dated and sourced so you can check it yourself. If you find something out of date here, tell us and we will fix it.