How the audit process works

A commercial energy audit done properly is an investigation with a fixed sequence: interrogate the data, survey against it, cost what you find, and package the evidence for whatever regime needs it. Here is each stage, including the parts that are your job.

Stage 1: scoping (free, two working days)

We establish what is driving the work — ESOS Phase 4, SECR, cost pressure, a net-zero commitment — because the driver sets the deliverable. We map the estate, check what metering exists, identify which sites a sampling approach can cover without visits, and return a fixed-fee proposal. Nothing is billed at this stage.

Stage 2: data analysis — before anyone travels

Twelve months of half-hourly electricity data is the foundation. From it we build the load profile: base load, occupancy-driven load, weather-driven load, and the anomalies. Out-of-hours consumption is the headline act — heating, cooling and equipment running for empty buildings typically explains 5–15% of commercial spend and is visible from a desk. Gas, water and transport data join the model where in scope.

What we need from you at this stage: a letter of authority to pull supply data, recent bills for each meter, and an estate list with floor areas and operating hours. Organisations that can produce these inside a week shorten the whole programme by a month.

Stage 3: the site survey

The survey tests the data's hypotheses against physical reality. The auditor walks plant rooms, distribution boards, roof plant, production areas and back-of-house spaces with the load profile in hand: if the data shows a 40 kW overnight base load, the survey's job is to find it. Lighting schedules, control setpoints, compressed air systems, refrigeration condition, fabric issues and metering gaps all get recorded — photographed and referenced, because the evidence pack matters as much as the findings.

Survey duration runs from one day for a simple site to three for a complex industrial plant. Occupied operation is normal; we need an escort with plant-room keys and tolerance for questions, not a shutdown.

Stage 4: the savings register

Every viable measure is written up with capital cost, annual saving in kWh and pounds, payback, carbon impact and implementation notes — including the unglamorous dependencies (access, downtime, landlord consent) that determine whether things actually happen. Measures are sequenced: no-cost operational fixes first, then short-payback capital items, then the structural decisions like plant replacement or the solar pathway, which should follow the efficiency work rather than precede it.

We present the register in a working session rather than emailing a PDF into silence. The difference in implementation rates is dramatic, and implementation is the only metric that matters.

Stage 5: compliance packaging

The same evidence base is then formatted for the applicable regimes: ESOS evidence pack with lead assessor review and Environment Agency notification; SECR figures and narrative for the directors' report; TM44 reports lodged where cooling crossed the threshold. Done in this order, compliance is a formatting exercise on top of work that already paid for itself — which is the entire design philosophy. Fees for each configuration are on the cost page.

Timescales

End to end: six to ten weeks for most single organisations. The variable is almost always data access — which is also the first thing the scoping call sorts out.