ownergy

Home › Guides

What to do now

Knowing your rate is the first question. These are the ones that come next, answered from the same published data and with the sources shown. None of it is advice, and where the answer depends on your own paperwork we say so rather than guessing.

What you are paid

The rate, the mechanics behind it, and the tax position.

Why your rate changes every April The rate was never a fixed number of pence. Generation and export tariffs are index-linked to RPI and revised every financial year. How the payments actually reach you Readings, the 90 day rule for a first payment, and why for 90% of installations the export figure is not measured at all. Do you pay tax on feed-in tariff payments? For an ordinary domestic installation, no. There is an exemption written for exactly this, with two conditions and an HMRC rule of thumb. How to read your feed-in tariff statement What every line means: the eligibility date that fixes your rate, the readings, the two payments, and the three checks that catch most errors.

If the system changes

Batteries, extra panels, and parts that fail.

Will a battery affect my feed-in tariff? For 90% of installations, no. Not the generation tariff, and not the export payment either. The reason is a quirk of how export is calculated. Adding panels to a system already on the tariff Will the new panels be paid at your old rate? Almost certainly not, and the gap is large enough to change the decision. Replacing an inverter or a failed panel Repairing a system does not forfeit an old high rate. The line that matters is not whether you changed parts, it is whether you changed the capacity. The 0% VAT on solar and batteries Installing panels or a battery in a home is zero-rated for VAT until 31 March 2027, then reverts to 5%. Standalone batteries have qualified since February 2024.

If your circumstances change

Selling up, switching, and the end of the term.

Moving house: what happens to your tariff? The tariff stays with the installation, so you cannot take it with you. The buyer is not paid until the change of generator is registered. Changing the company that pays you You can move your registration, and it will not change your rate. What switching does, and why it is separate from switching your electricity supply. What happens when your feed-in tariff ends? Both payments stop. What the panels are worth after that, and what the Smart Export Guarantee does and does not replace. Inheriting a home with a feed-in tariff The tariff stays with the installation and passes with the property, but the payments do not move until the change of generator is registered.

Export, and what comes after

How your export is measured now, and the scheme that follows when your term ends.

Deemed or metered export: which are you on? Deemed pays you for an assumed half of what you generate; metered measures the real thing. Which pays more depends on how much you use yourself. The Smart Export Guarantee, explained The scheme that replaced the Feed-in Tariff for new applicants. Export only, suppliers set the rates, and you cannot hold it alongside a FIT export payment. The tariff for wind, hydro and other technologies Solar is most of the scheme, not all of it. Tens of thousands of wind, hydro, anaerobic digestion and micro-CHP installations are on it too, each with their own tariffs.

Getting the most from your system

What your electricity is worth now, and how the system ages.

Getting the most from your system now Your generation payment is fixed and, for most people, so is export. That makes every unit you use yourself pure saving. The practical moves. How long solar panels last, and how much they fade Panels fade slowly, a third to two-thirds of a per cent a year, and last 25 years or more. The inverter fails first. What that means for your tariff.

Where these come from

Every figure in these guides is either from the Ofgem register of 869,807 installations, from the published tariff table, or from the scheme rules themselves, and each guide lists its sources at the foot. Where a rule depends on how your licensee applies it, the guide says to ask them rather than offering a confident answer we cannot stand behind.

Two of them lean on guidance published elsewhere rather than on the register: the tax guide quotes HMRC's Business Income Manual, and the scheme mechanics come from Ofgem's guidance for generators. Both are linked from the guides that use them, so you can read the original rather than taking our word for it. How we work is set out in our method.

Start with your own rate if you have not already: the rate finder takes your eligibility date and system size and gives you the figure for 2026-27.