The deadline for Phase 1 of the Energy Savings Opportunity Scheme (ESOS) was 5th December 2015. Companies that failed to comply may have thought they had avoided any penalties.
However, the Environment Agency has recently published online the first list of companies who have been fined due to non-compliance. Fines of up to £45,000 have been published and these could have been easily avoided if sufficient planning and advice was sought from an ESOS Lead Assessor prior to the Phase 1 deadline.
The fines are designed to increase for each day of non-compliance and can reach:
- 5,000 for failure to maintain records
- £45,000 for businesses that do not comply with enforcement notices
- £45,000 for failure to notify the Environment Agency
- £50,000 for false or misleading statements
- £90,000 for failure to undertake an energy audit
Purchase Direct successfully supported a multitude of businesses through the ESOS compliance process in Phase 1, supporting a number of them through post-deadline compliance auditing by the Environment Agency (where a company had been randomly selected to be audited).
Your organisation may not have qualified for ESOS in Phase 1 but due to growth may now qualify for Phase 2. As a reminder the criteria for qualification is:
Employs at least 250 people (please note that this also applies to an overseas company withUK registered establishment which has 250 or more UK employees paying income tax in the UK
OR
Employs less than 250 people but has an annual turnover in excess of 50 million euro, and an annual balance sheet total in excess of 43 million euro
Purchase Direct can support businesses to ESOS Phase 2 compliance through our in-house team of Energy Specialists and Lead Assessors. Contact us to discuss our service in more detail.