Insulation and Retrofit Installer Software

The office side

From the retrofit assessment to
the last photograph lodged.

Loft and cavity at volume, internal and external wall insulation, or a whole house package with ventilation: the measure differs, the evidence behind it does not.

Installing the measure properly is the part a retrofit firm already does well. The difficulty is that most of the work disappears as it is done. Once the render is on or the boards are up, the photograph taken before it is the only proof of what is underneath.
Unibuild is bespoke construction management software for UK contractors: a platform in daily production since 2016, shaped to the way each firm already works. One account carries surveys, the labour run, stage photographs, installer competence, documents, measured valuations and applications for payment.

Built for retrofit

What insulation and retrofit work requires,
and what Unibuild provides.

A retrofit is judged on evidence gathered by the people doing the work, often months before anybody reviews it. Each requirement is followed by what the platform does about it.

Funded work, standard rules

PAS 2030, PAS 2035 and TrustMark sit over every funded measure

Government funded domestic retrofit needs a PAS 2030 certified installer and a TrustMark registered business. A Retrofit Coordinator oversees the project to PAS 2035 and lodges it on the TrustMark Data Warehouse.

The assessment, the design and the installation are separate roles
Each measure is evidenced by the installer, per property
Lodged projects are audited for compliance
A missing record holds up the payment behind it

One record per property, per measure

Each property is a job on the programme carrying its assessment, the measures installed, the installer, photographs and the signed completion. The coordinator and the office lodge from a finished record, and documents and certificates issues the handover on your letterhead.

Runs onClients, projects and jobs Documents and certificates

Covered the same day

The evidence has to be taken before it disappears

External wall insulation is boarded, meshed and rendered. Cavity fill is drilled and made good. Once finished, the fixings, the beads and the fill pattern are out of sight for good.

Photographs at set stages, taken by the installer
Each photograph belongs to one elevation of one property
Product batch and system certificate recorded per measure
A photograph left on a personal phone is evidence nobody can find

Taken on the phone, filed against the property

Progress photographs are taken in the field app and land on the property's record with the time and the person who took them. You choose which of them the client sees.

Runs onProgress photographs The field app

Warmer, then damper

Insulation without ventilation is a damp problem later

Making a home more airtight changes how moisture leaves it. PAS 2035 builds ventilation into the assessment, so extract fans, trickle vents and door undercuts become part of the job rather than an afterthought.

Existing ventilation is recorded at assessment
Ventilation measures are installed and evidenced like insulation
Cold bridges at reveals and eaves are where condensation starts
Condensation reported a year later leads back to the record

The survey and its follow-up on the same property

Engineers reports and site surveys run on the phone with your own forms and photographs. A resident's later report opens against the same property as a call-out, with the original survey and installation already attached.

Runs onSurveys and call-outs The client portal

Qualified per measure

Competence is held against the measure, not the person

An installer qualified for loft and cavity is not automatically qualified for external wall insulation. The certification body checks that every measure was fitted by somebody qualified for that measure.

Qualifications per measure, with the certificate attached
Card schemes and working at height tickets renew on their own dates
System manufacturers train and approve installers for their own systems
Subcontract installers carry the same requirement

One grid, every measure, warned before it lapses

The training matrix holds each qualification and approval against the person with its own date, banded amber inside ninety days. Allocating an EWI crew becomes a filter on who is qualified rather than a phone round.

Runs onTraining and competence Subcontractor management

Hundreds of homes at once

A programme is priced per measure and paid per property

Social landlord and funded programmes run street by street, with access appointments, residents at home and measures priced per property or per square metre. Payment follows completion, sign-off and a clean record.

Rates per measure agreed at tender
Quantities counted per property and signed off
Retention held on larger contracts
A property that cannot be accessed is a cost as well as a delay

Measured per property, priced on the agreed rates

Rate valuations captures the measure where the work is done, prices it from the job rate card, caps it against the estimate and gets it signed. Applications for payment carries the monthly application and the retention still held.

Runs onRate valuations Applications for payment

The guarantee outlives the firm's memory

Guarantees run for decades

Cavity wall insulation fitted by a registered installer carries a 25 year guarantee from CIGA. Wall systems carry system and workmanship guarantees of their own, and all of them are claimed against a property and a date.

The guarantee is issued per property after installation
A claim asks what was fitted, by whom and when
Surveyors and solicitors ask for it on sale
The installer's record is what answers the claim

The installation record, findable years later

Every document, photograph and signature stays against the property, and the full record exports as CSV, XML, JSON and PDF at any time. The question asked in year twelve is answered by opening the address.

Runs onDocuments and certificates Clients, projects and jobs

The week

An ordinary week in a retrofit firm,
and the record it leaves.

Six entries from a retrofit installer's day book, each ending in evidence rather than a note.

A street of British semi detached houses, the housing stock a retrofit programme works through

Monday, the survey

Eight properties on the programme are surveyed. Wall construction, existing ventilation and access are recorded and photographed on the phone against each address.

Surveyed against the property

Tuesday, the planner

Next week's crews go on the labour run. The matrix answers who is qualified for external wall insulation, and the crew is built from that list.

Allocated on competence

Wednesday, the elevation

Insulation boards and fixings go on the gable. The crew photographs the fixing pattern before the mesh goes over it, and each photograph lands on that property.

Evidence before it was covered

Thursday, the loft

A loft is topped up and an extract fan fitted in the bathroom. Depths, the fan and the resident's signature go on the record before the van leaves.

Signed on site

Friday, the office

Completed properties are lodged from finished records, and the week's measures are valued on the agreed rates for the month's application.

Lodged and valued

Twelve years later

A buyer's surveyor asks about the cavity fill. The office opens the address and sends the guarantee, the installer and the photographs the same morning.

Answered from the record

Your system, your app

Shaped to your firm,
published under your name

Anything a firm needs is built for it, and changes asked for after go-live are included in the monthly fee. See how bespoke construction software works at Unibuild.

Your evidence stagesYour survey form, your photograph stages per measure and your completion sheet are set up the way your coordinators and crews already work. Nobody relearns the job to suit the software.
A working startThe build starts from a working platform rather than an empty screen. A firm gets the fit of a bespoke system without the cost, the timescale or the risk of commissioning one from scratch.
Your app on the storesYour staff app is published on the App Store and Google Play under your company's own name and icon. The installer photographing a gable opens your firm's app, not ours. How the branded staff app works.
Your letterheadThe office portal carries your name, logo and colours, and fifty-eight document types generate on your own letterhead, from the survey report to the handover.

The stores

What an insulation and
retrofit firm holds

The warehouse, the vans and the records left behind at every address, and the quirk in each line that breaks ordinary inventory software.

What a UK insulation and retrofit installer holds, and the tracking quirk in each line
Category	Typical items	The tracking quirk
Insulation	Mineral wool rolls, blown fibre and beads, rigid boards, insulated plasterboard	Bought by the pallet and fitted by the property, and the product batch belongs on the record of the house it went into
Wall systems	EWI boards, mechanical fixings, mesh, beads, primers, render and finishes	Components of one certified system, so a substitute fixing or render from another system is a compliance question, not a stock one
Ventilation	Extract fans, trickle vents, ducting, air bricks	Small items that carry the damp risk of the whole measure, and the one most easily left off a van
Machines	Blowing and injection machines, drills, hoses, generators	Each has a service record and a calibration or output check, and a machine that under-fills is invisible until a thermal image
Access	Scaffold on hire, towers, loft boards and ladders	Scaffold stands on a resident's house on hire by the week, and the strike date is set by the render curing, not the calendar
Vans	Vans and lutons loaded per street	Each van carries materials for several properties, so what went into which house is known only if it was booked to it
Records and guarantees	Assessments, stage photographs, completion sheets, lodgement references, guarantees	Not stock, but what the programme is paid on. Each belongs to an address, because that is how it will be asked for

Regulations

The regimes an insulation and
retrofit firm works under

Most of the load comes from funded work, and almost all of it is about evidence. The reference version, kept factual.

What each regime asks of an insulation and retrofit installer
Regime	What it requires
PAS 2035:2023	The framework for domestic retrofit. A whole house approach with assessment, design, installation and evaluation as defined roles, led by a Retrofit Coordinator. It is required on government funded domestic retrofit.
PAS 2030:2023	The installation specification for energy efficiency measures in existing homes. Installers are certified against it per measure, and the certification body audits the installations.
TrustMark	The government endorsed quality scheme. Funded work needs a TrustMark registered business, and the Retrofit Coordinator lodges the project on the TrustMark Data Warehouse, where it is checked for compliance.
Guarantees	Cavity wall insulation fitted by a registered installer carries a 25 year guarantee from CIGA. Other measures carry system and workmanship guarantees, each issued per property.
Building Regulations Parts L, F and C	Renovating a wall or roof can trigger an upgrade of its thermal performance under Part L. Part F covers ventilation, and Part C covers resistance to moisture and condensation.
Work at Height Regulations 2005	External wall insulation is done from scaffold, which is inspected before first use and at intervals while it stands. Loft work brings its own access and fragile surface risks.
CDM 2015 and CIS	Retrofit work is construction work under CDM, domestic clients included. Payments to installation subcontractors fall under the Construction Industry Scheme.

On the record

Questions insulation and
retrofit firms ask

The questions retrofit installers raise on a demonstration, answered on the record.

The marketWhat is the best software for a UK insulation and retrofit installer?

The right system holds every measure on every property with its survey, stage photographs, installer and sign-off, and values the programme from the same record. Unibuild does that on one account. Evidence is captured on the phone and filed against the address, and competence is checked per measure before a crew is sent.

EvidenceCan installers take the PAS 2030 stage photographs in the app?

Yes. Photographs are taken in your own app and land on the property's record with the time and the person who took them. Your evidence stages are set up as your own form, so every crew works through the same stages on every property.

LodgementDoes it help with TrustMark lodgement?

Yes. It holds the record the lodgement is made from. Each property carries its assessment, measures, installers, photographs and signed completion, and every item exports as PDF or CSV. The Retrofit Coordinator lodges from a finished record rather than chasing crews for photographs.

ProgrammesCan it run a social housing retrofit programme?

Yes. Each property is a record on the programme with its survey, measures, evidence and completion. Completed measures are priced from the contract rates and applied for monthly with retention carried. The landlord sees its own properties read only through the client portal.

PricingHow is it priced, and do you charge per installer?

No. One monthly figure covers everything, with unlimited users on every plan, and it is quoted in writing, usually the same working day. It is sized to the firm when quoted and fixed for three years, and taking on more people never changes the fee. Configuration, training and data migration are included, and most firms go live in about two weeks, in phases.

Neighbouring tradesWe also work on high rise cladding. Which page is ours?

This page is domestic and low rise retrofit. High rise facades, cladding remediation and the Building Safety Act sit on facade and cladding contractors. Responsive repairs across a housing stock are covered on housing repairs and maintenance.

Other trades

Not quite your
line of work?

The same platform, written for the trade that runs it.
Each of these is a different set of modules
switched on rather than a different product.
Every one is shaped to the firm's own process,
with its own app under its own name.

Return slip

Half an hour, on your own properties.

Bring one survey and the evidence stages for one measure. We will build the property record and the photograph stages in front of you on the call.

Book a 30-minute demo → Ask for a quote See project management

Bring: One survey and one measure's evidence stages
Takes: 30 minutes
Phone, UK hours: +44 7587 557546
Email: success@unibuild.co.uk
Another trade: Drylining and partitioning

Photographed before it is covered.

From the retrofit assessment to the last photograph lodged.

What insulation and retrofit work requires, and what Unibuild provides.

PAS 2030, PAS 2035 and TrustMark sit over every funded measure

The evidence has to be taken before it disappears

Insulation without ventilation is a damp problem later

Competence is held against the measure, not the person

A programme is priced per measure and paid per property

Guarantees run for decades

An ordinary week in a retrofit firm, and the record it leaves.

Shaped to your firm, published under your name

What an insulation and retrofit firm holds

The regimes an insulation and retrofit firm works under

Questions insulation and retrofit firms ask

Not quite your line of work?