Grants and funding for air-to-air heat pumps

The funding that actually applies to an air-to-air heat pump

If you are weighing up an air-to-air heat pump, two pots of public money are worth your attention as at July 2026: the flat £2,500 Boiler Upgrade Scheme grant, available in England and Wales only, and the 0% VAT rate that trims the installed price across the whole UK. Almost everything else you may have read — the £7,500, the £9,000 off-gas uplift, ECO4 — does not apply to air-to-air. This page frames what does, who qualifies, and the single catch that stops most people claiming today.

The catch nobody else mentions: the grant is law, but the installers are scarce

The £2,500 is written into legislation and administered by Ofgem, so it is real. The problem is redemption. To claim it you need an MCS-certified installer using an MCS-certified product, and MCS air-to-air certification is still rolling out through 2026. Certification bodies are working through UKAS accreditation to be allowed to certify air-to-air installers, each installer's Technical Supervisor needs an RACHP Level 3 qualification, and MCS has given no fixed completion date — its own wording is that timescales are varying.

The practical effect, as at July 2026, is that MCS-certified air-to-air installers are genuinely thin on the ground. No MCS-certified job means no grant, full stop. So the honest position is this: the grant exists, it is worth £2,500, and it is not yet as claimable as the headlines imply. If an installer promises you the grant today, ask to see their MCS certification for air-to-air specifically before you sign anything. We match you only with installers who can actually redeem it, and we will tell you plainly if the certification is not available in your area yet.

What you can claim, by nation

The Boiler Upgrade Scheme is an England-and-Wales programme, so where you live changes the answer completely. This is the position as at July 2026.

Scotland deserves a specific word. There is no Boiler Upgrade Scheme north of the border, and Home Energy Scotland funding requires a system that provides 100% of both heating and hot water — which air-to-air, by design, cannot. So a Scottish household gets the 0% VAT saving and nothing more. Northern Ireland is the same story: 0% VAT only.

0% VAT: the price cut that reverts on 1 April 2027

This is the funding almost everyone qualifies for, and it is the one with a genuine deadline — not a marketing countdown, an actual change in the law. Under HMRC VAT Notice 708/6, the supply and installation of a permanently-fixed air-to-air unit that provides heating carries 0% VAT across the whole UK, as at July 2026. It applies in Scotland and Northern Ireland where the grant does not, it stacks on top of the £2,500 grant where you can get both, and it needs no MCS certification and no application — the installer simply charges you nothing in VAT.

The relief runs to 31 March 2027, after which the rate rises to 5%, not back to the full 20%. On a typical £4,500 installation the difference between 0% and 5% is a little over £200, so this is not a reason to rush a decision you are not ready to make. But it is a real, dated saving, and it is worth timing an installation you were going to do anyway before the deadline rather than just after it. One important limit: the unit must provide heating. A cooling-only air-conditioner does not qualify, even if it is physically identical hardware.

How to use this before you read the grant details

The individual schemes are listed below with their specific rules. Before you dig in, three quick filters will save you time. First, if you are in Scotland or Northern Ireland, focus on the 0% VAT entry and skip the grant. Second, if you want to keep your gas or oil boiler and add air-to-air only for cooling or a single room, the grant is not for you — it requires you to replace a fossil-fuel or electric heating system, not run alongside it. Third, if you are all-electric, on storage heaters, in a flat or a park home, or replacing an off-gas system, you are exactly who this funding was designed for. Read on, and check installer availability early, because the certification bottleneck is the real constraint, not the money.