Build Your Home's Service History From Scratch

A car comes with a service history and a house comes with a carrier bag, if you are lucky. Much of what is missing still exists in somebody else's records. This guide shows who holds each one, what you need to ask for it, what a copy costs and what cannot be recreated.

Buy a ten year old car and it comes with a folder: stamps, dates, receipts and an MOT history you can look up on your phone in about eight seconds. Buy a hundred year old house and you get a carrier bag with a boiler manual in it, if the last owner was organised.

The good news is that a lot of your house's history already sits in somebody else's records: the council, the installers' schemes, HM Land Registry, the EPC register and your own solicitor. None of them will send it to you unprompted. Most of it is free or costs a few pounds a record. You can do the bulk of it in an evening.

This guide is about recovering what happened before you, for homes in England and Wales, with notes for Scotland and Northern Ireland. For keeping evidence of work you have done yourself, see how to prove work was done on your home.

The short version

Start with your own conveyancing file, which usually holds the seller's property information form and the certificates they handed over.
The EPC register and your council's planning register are free to search by address; HM Land Registry's title register is £7.
Gas Safe can reissue a boiler's compliance certificate for £8.40, but only for work from 5 October 2011.
FENSA reissues window and door certificates for £30; MCS reissues solar and heat pump certificates for £36 when the installer cannot.
Some history cannot be recreated, including servicing nobody wrote down and the routes of pipes and cables behind finished walls.
Writing down what you could not find is useful too, because it tells the next person that somebody looked.

Start with what is already in the house

Before paying anybody for anything, empty the drawer. All of it, onto a table.

You are looking for four kinds of thing. Certificates, which are the valuable ones. Manuals, which tell you the make, model and often the installation date of everything fixed. Invoices, which are weaker evidence but tell you who did what and when. And anything with a company name on it, because a name is a thread you can pull.

Then look at the house itself. The boiler has a data plate with the make, model, GC number and serial number, usually behind the front panel or underneath. The consumer unit often carries a sticker from whoever installed or last tested it, with a date and a phone number. Sealed window units often have a manufacturer's mark or a date printed on the spacer bar between the panes. Meters, radiators, thermostats and extractor fans all have model or serial numbers.

Photograph the lot. It takes twenty minutes and turns a house full of anonymous equipment into a list you can work through.

The recovery checklist, in order

Work through it in this order. Each step tells you what to look for in the next one.

Empty the drawer and photograph the labels. Twenty minutes that gives you makes, models, serial numbers and dates.
Ask your conveyancer for your purchase file. The seller's answers and certificates, often in one go.
Look up the EPC register. Free at GOV.UK's Find an energy certificate for England, Wales and Northern Ireland, or the Scottish EPC Register. A certificate page lists earlier certificates for the same address. Comparing them shows what changed: insulation, glazing, a new boiler. Our free home lookup puts the EPC, the home's recorded sale prices and the planning designations over it in one place.
Search the council's planning register. Free through GOV.UK's planning decisions search in England and Wales. Note every application, its reference and its decision.
Ask building control about the work you found. Give the address and the planning references. Ask too about work that needed approval without planning, such as a removed wall or a loft room.
Get the title register and plan from HM Land Registry. £7 each online. If the register mentions deeds marked as filed, an official copy of each is £11. HM Land Registry does not keep original paper deeds.
Order replacement certificates. Gas Safe for the boiler, FENSA or CERTASS for windows, Check My Notification or NAPIT for electrics, MCS for solar and heat pumps, HETAS for stoves, OFTEC for oil.
Contact manufacturers. Ask about any guarantee on the boiler, heat pump, panels or appliances. Register them in your name so recall notices reach you.
Ask the previous owner and the trades. More on that below.
Write down the gaps and start the record from today. A fresh boiler service or an electrical condition report gives you a dated starting point where the history runs out.

In Scotland, building warrants and completion certificates are held by the council's building standards team and title records by Registers of Scotland. In Northern Ireland, planning history is on the NI Planning Portal, building control sits with the 11 councils and title records with Land and Property Services. Gas Safe's building regulations certificate covers England and Wales only.

Boilers, electrics, solar and heat pumps

Each record below follows the same pattern: who may hold it, how to search, what you'll need and whether you can get a copy, with a note where something cannot be got back.

Boiler and other gas appliances

Who may hold it. Gas Safe Register, for installations by a registered engineer; the manufacturer, for any guarantee registration; the installer; the Benchmark checklist and service record in the manual.
How to search. Order a duplicate certificate online from Gas Safe or call 0800 408 5500. Ask the manufacturer about the guarantee, quoting the model and serial number.
What you'll need. The address and postcode, roughly when it was fitted and the details on the data plate.
Can you get a copy? For work notified from 5 October 2011, yes, for £8.40. For older installations, no: Gas Safe's data retention policy means those copies are gone. Before April 2009 gas engineers registered with CORGI rather than Gas Safe.
What cannot be recreated. Servicing is recorded in the service record and in the engineers' own files, not on any public register. If nobody wrote it down, it is gone.

Electrics

Who may hold it. The electrician, who issued the Electrical Installation Certificate or a Minor Works certificate; their scheme, which sent the compliance certificate for notifiable work; the council's building control, which schemes notify.
How to search. Check My Notification covers NICEIC and ELECSA, though it may not hold notifications more than six years old. For NAPIT, call 0345 543 0330. Then ask the council's building control team. The sticker on the consumer unit often names the firm.
What you'll need. The address, an approximate date and the firm's name if you have it.
Can you get a copy? The compliance certificate often. The Electrical Installation Certificate only if the electrician kept one. Electrical work came under building regulations in England and Wales on 1 January 2005, so nothing earlier ever had a compliance certificate.
What cannot be recreated. A lost Electrical Installation Certificate. An Electrical Installation Condition Report (EICR) from a registered electrician records the condition of the wiring now. Electrical Safety First recommends one at least every 10 years in an owner-occupied home. It does not replace the original certificate, but it gives you a dated, current record.

Solar panels and heat pumps

Who may hold it. The installer; MCS; the manufacturer, for panel, inverter or heat pump warranties; the energy supplier paying you for exported electricity, which may have asked for the MCS certificate when the payments were set up.
How to search. Ask the installer first. MCS issues a copy only if the installer is no longer certified or trading; its helpdesk is on 0333 103 8130.
What you'll need. Proof of address (MCS deals only with the current owner or their representative) and the installation date if you know it.
Can you get a copy? Yes, from MCS for £36 including VAT, within 10 working days of payment. A system that was never MCS certified has no certificate to replace, which can matter because suppliers may ask for one before paying a Smart Export Guarantee tariff.

Windows, extensions and planning

Windows and doors

Who may hold it. FENSA or CERTASS, if the installer was registered with one; otherwise the council's building control.
How to search. FENSA's online search by address and postcode, or the CERTASS replacements portal by postcode.
What you'll need. The address and postcode. The date printed inside a sealed unit narrows down the year.
Can you get a copy? From FENSA, for £30 including VAT, instantly online. CERTASS copies are ordered through its replacements portal; ask CERTASS about the cost. Replacement glazing has needed building regulations approval only since 1 April 2002, so earlier windows never had a certificate.

Extensions, lofts and structural work

Who may hold it. The council's building control team, or the registered building control approver (formerly called an approved inspector) if a private firm inspected it. The architect, the builder or the structural engineer may still have the drawings and calculations.
How to search. Email building control with the address, a description of the work and the approximate date. Some councils publish building control records online beside the planning register.
What you'll need. The address, the type of work, the approximate year and any planning reference.
Can you get a copy? If a certificate was issued, usually, sometimes for an admin fee. Some councils will write a letter confirming what their records show instead. If the work was never approved, the routes are regularisation (for work since 11 November 1985) or, on a sale, indemnity insurance; how to prove work was done explains both.

Planning applications

Who may hold it. The council's planning register in England, Wales and Scotland. In Northern Ireland, the NI Planning Portal, which has basic details of applications from 1973 and maps, plans and decisions from 2010.
How to search. By address or postcode, then by neighbouring addresses for context. How far back the online register goes varies by council. Older files may be on paper or microfiche, so ask the planning team if the trail stops.
What you'll need. The address. A rough idea of when the work was done helps.
Can you get a copy? Decisions are public records, so they rarely vanish. Where work was done without permission long enough ago, a Lawful Development Certificate can confirm that it is lawful.

Warranties, appliances and past servicing

Guarantees and warranties

Who may hold it. The firm that gave it; the insurer, if it was insurance-backed; the product's manufacturer. For cavity wall insulation, CIGA (the Cavity Insulation Guarantee Agency) can say whether one of its guarantees was issued for the address. The seller's answers on the property information form list what they knew about.
How to search. Ask with the address and the date of the work.
What you'll need. The address, the firm's name and roughly when the work was done.
Can you get a copy? A copy, often. Whether it still covers you depends on its terms: some must be transferred to a new owner, while a plain guarantee from a firm that has closed usually lapses.

Appliances

Who may hold it. The manufacturer, if the appliance was registered; the retailer, for the receipt.
How to search. Read the model and serial number off the rating plate. Most manufacturers publish manuals online by model number. Register each appliance in your name with the manufacturer or through Register My Appliance, run by the manufacturers' association AMDEA, so safety recalls reach you. Our free appliance recall checker searches the GOV.UK product recall register.
What you'll need. The model and serial number, plus the purchase date if you know it.
Can you get a copy? Manuals, usually, from the manufacturer. The original purchase receipt, which some warranties ask for, cannot be recreated. How long home appliances last helps you judge what is near the end of its life anyway.

Past servicing

Who may hold it. The boiler's service record in its manual; the engineers who did the work; chimney sweeps' certificates; the previous owner.
How to search. Ask the previous owner who serviced the boiler, then ask that firm for its records.
What you'll need. The address and the boiler's model and serial number.
Can you get a copy? Only from whoever did the work. Servicing nobody recorded cannot be recreated, so the practical answer is a clean record from the next service onwards. What a boiler service includes shows what that record should say.

Ask the people who did the work

Two groups of people know things about your house that you do not.

The previous owner, if you are on any sort of terms. Estate agents will sometimes pass on a message. It costs nothing to ask and people are often pleased to be asked. You do not want a conversation about the kitchen. You want the boiler's installer, who did the roof and whether the loft insulation was grant funded.

The trades themselves. Plumbers, electricians and roofers keep job records, often for years. A good one will send a copy of an old certificate or invoice. Registered installers have to keep certification records for their scheme anyway. If a company has closed, the scheme it belonged to may still hold the certification. That is the point of a scheme: the record outlives the business.

Photograph what has no paper at all

Some of a house's history is simply gone: services nobody wrote down, guarantees from firms that closed with no insurer behind them, certificates for work done before the schemes existed and the routes of pipes and cables behind finished walls. What you can do is make sure the record starts properly from today.

Some things will never produce a document and are still worth recording:

where the stopcock is and whether it turns
the gas and electricity meters, with their serial numbers
the consumer unit, photographed with the labels legible
paint names and colour codes, while the tins still exist
pipe runs and cable routes, whenever a floor comes up or a wall is opened

That last one is the most useful photograph anybody ever takes of their house. It takes four seconds. Nobody does it. Then somebody drills through a pipe.

Then stop doing archaeology

The reconstruction is a one-off job. Keeping it up is not: the whole thing falls apart the moment the paperwork goes back in the drawer.

One rule covers it: the record gets made at the time of the work, not later. Photograph the certificate when the engineer hands it over. Note the company name while the van is still outside. Write down what it cost while you still remember whether that included the parts. How to prove work was done on your home has the checklist for the day a job finishes. The home maintenance checklist covers the routine jobs worth a dated entry.

Do that and in ten years you will own something few houses have, which is a service history. It saves money the day something breaks, because you know what it is and who fitted it. It also helps when you sell, because a question you can answer with a document does not become a delay. That is the idea behind a digital property logbook.

Sources

Last fact-checked 5 October 2026.

Somewhere to put it all

homehogs holds the certificates, the appliances, the work and the gaps in one place, so the evening you spend rebuilding your home's history is the last one you have to spend on it.

Start free

Alex Wilson

Founder

Common questions

How do I find out what work has been done on my house?

Start with your own conveyancing file, because your solicitor is likely to hold the property information form the seller completed and any certificates they supplied. Then search your council's planning register and the government's Find an energy certificate service, both free. Ask the council's building control team about any work you find. Gas Safe, FENSA, MCS and the electrical schemes hold certificates for the work their members did.

Can I get a replacement certificate for my boiler?

Yes, if it was fitted by a Gas Safe registered engineer and notified from 5 October 2011 onwards. Gas Safe sells a duplicate Building Regulations Compliance Certificate for £8.40 including VAT, online or on 0800 408 5500. Older installations cannot be reissued because of its data retention policy. The certificate covers England and Wales.

How do I find out if building regulations were approved for an extension?

Ask your council's building control team, giving the address, a description of the work and roughly when it was done. If a private approver inspected it instead, the council should still have a record of the notice and can point you to them. If a certificate was issued, a copy is usually available, sometimes for a fee. If nothing was ever approved, regularisation is possible for work carried out on or after 11 November 1985.

How do I get a copy of my electrical certificate?

Ask the electrician who did the work for the Electrical Installation Certificate. For the building regulations compliance certificate, use the Check My Notification service for NICEIC and ELECSA members, which may not hold notifications more than six years old, or call NAPIT. The council's building control team may also hold the notification. Work done before 1 January 2005 never had a compliance certificate.

How much does it cost to get a copy of my title register?

A copy of the title register from HM Land Registry costs £7 online. The title plan is another £7. If the register refers to deeds marked as filed, HM Land Registry holds scanned copies and an official copy of each costs £11. It does not keep original paper deeds.

Can I get my solar panel MCS certificate again?

Ask the installer first. MCS will only issue a copy if the installer is no longer certified or trading. It deals only with the current owner, who must show proof of address. It costs £36 including VAT and arrives within 10 working days of payment. A system that was never MCS certified has no certificate to replace.

What parts of my home's history cannot be recovered?

Servicing that nobody recorded, guarantees from firms that closed without insurance backing, certificates for work done before the schemes existed and the routes of pipes and cables behind finished walls. Gas Safe copies only go back to work notified from 5 October 2011. Recording these as known gaps is still useful. A fresh service or electrical condition report gives you a dated starting point.