// VICTRON FOR BUSINESS · UK
Victron for business: resilience, carbon, and the tax question
Power cuts that do not stop you trading, cheap electricity stored for expensive hours, and carbon figures backed by meter readings rather than estimates. Plus the capital allowances point most solar marketing gets wrong.
- ● Victron Recommended Software Integrator
- ● HMRC-sourced tax references
- ● We run our own business on one
Being off-grid is one use, not the point
Most businesses meet Victron in the context of boats, vans and remote cabins, and conclude it is not for them. That is a shame, because the same equipment does four things that ordinary commercial premises genuinely need.
| What it does | Who it is actually for |
|---|---|
| Rides through a power cut without a blink | Anyone whose tills, servers, cold storage or production line does not enjoy an unplanned restart. It holds the load rather than gracefully shutting it down. |
| Stores cheap electricity for expensive hours | Businesses on a tariff with a meaningful day/night spread. You buy when it is cheap and use it when it is not. |
| Makes solar you already own worth more | Anyone exporting midday generation for very little and buying it back at four in the afternoon for a great deal more. |
| Runs things where there is no mains | Yards, outbuildings, remote units, temporary sites — where a grid connection is a five-figure quote and a long wait. |
We are not neutral on this: our own business runs off one. Our office is a van, and it is powered by exactly the sort of system described here. You can see our live data on the off-grid page — not a demo, our actual working system.
Carbon you can evidence, not estimate
Carbon reporting has quietly stopped being optional. If you tender for public sector work, supply a larger company, or answer a procurement questionnaire, you have probably already been asked for numbers — and most businesses answer with an estimate from a spreadsheet.
A monitored energy system answers with meter readings. What was generated, what was stored, what was drawn from the grid, hour by hour, going back months. That is a materially stronger answer, and it is the difference between a figure you can put in a tender response and one you would rather nobody probed.
This is where our own work sits. We build custom Victron dashboards for customers worldwide, and being able to produce a defensible carbon and consumption report is one of the most common reasons businesses ask for one.
The honest caveat: a battery on its own does not reduce carbon. Storing grid electricity and using it later moves consumption around; it does not create clean energy. The reduction comes from generation you own and from displacing high-carbon peak grid supply. We would rather say that plainly than let a system be bought on a promise it cannot keep.
The UK tax position — and the bit almost everyone gets wrong
We are not tax advisers. What follows is sourced to HMRC’s own published material and named so that you and your accountant can check it. Do not act on it without professional advice — rates and thresholds change at every Budget.
With that said, here is the point that a great deal of solar marketing gets wrong, and it is worth knowing before you read anyone’s savings figure.
Solar is a special rate asset, not main rate. HMRC’s Capital Allowances Manual at CA22335 states that all capital expenditure on the provision of solar panels is designated special rate — and has been since April 2012. Full expensing applies to main rate plant and machinery. So a claim that solar attracts “100% relief in year one under full expensing” is, as stated, wrong.
That does not mean there is no relief. It means the route is different, and the difference matters to your cash flow:
- The Annual Investment Allowance does cover special rate expenditure, and for many small and medium businesses this is the route to full relief in the year of purchase. It is capped, and the cap is shared across all your qualifying spend for the period — so a solar project may compete with the van and the machinery.
- The 50% first-year allowance for special rate expenditure gives half in year one, with the balance going into the special rate pool in the following accounting period.
- The special rate pool writes down more slowly than the main pool. Same total relief eventually; different timing, and timing is the whole point of a tax question.
The practical upshot: ask your accountant which route applies to your business and your accounting period, before you commit. The answer depends on your profits, your other capital spend that year and your VAT position, none of which an installer knows.
We publish no savings figure on this page for exactly that reason. Anyone showing you one without having seen your accounts is showing you a number they invented.
Source: HMRC Capital Allowances Manual CA22335 (solar panels), and HMRC guidance on capital allowance rates and pools. Referenced July 2026 — confirm current treatment before relying on it.
Why an IT firm, and why us
A fair question. Plenty of firms will sell and fit the hardware.
What tends to be missing afterwards is the software, the monitoring and the reporting — knowing what the system is actually doing, proving it to a procurement team, spotting a fault before it becomes an outage, and integrating it with the rest of the business. That is our trade rather than a sideline.
In July 2026 we were accepted into Victron’s Recommended Software Integrator programme — a recognition of exactly that work. We are not a box-shifter, and we are not pretending to be an electrical contractor: installation is done by properly qualified people. What we bring is what happens after the kit is on the wall.
And, again, we run our own company on one. When we say a system holds a load through a power cut, that is because ours does, daily, for a business that cannot afford to be offline.
// GOOD QUESTIONS
Frequently asked
Can a business claim 100% tax relief on solar in year one?
Not through full expensing, which is the route most people have in mind. HMRC's capital allowances manual (CA22335) designates all capital expenditure on solar panels as special rate, and full expensing applies to main rate plant and machinery. Special rate assets can still attract relief - through the Annual Investment Allowance, or the 50% first-year allowance for special rate expenditure with the balance going to the special rate pool - but the mechanism and the limits are different. Your accountant should confirm which applies to your business and accounting period.
What is the special rate pool and why does it matter for solar?
It is the pool HMRC uses for integral features of buildings - electrical systems, heating and ventilation - and for long-life assets expected to last 25 years or more. Solar panels were specifically designated special rate from April 2012. It matters because relief in the pool is given at a lower writing-down rate than the main pool, so the timing of your relief is different from what a general 'plant and machinery' assumption would suggest.
Do you give tax advice?
No, and we would be wary of any installer who did. We are an IT firm that designs and supports Victron systems. What we can do is point you at the actual HMRC references so you and your accountant are working from the source rather than from a sales brochure. Anything on this page should be confirmed with a qualified adviser before it informs a purchase.
What does Victron actually do for a business that is not off-grid?
Rather more than most people assume. It is genuinely good at riding through power cuts without the interruption a conventional UPS still allows, at storing cheap overnight electricity to use during expensive hours, at making solar you already own more useful by storing what you would otherwise export, and at running equipment somewhere with no mains at all. Being off-grid is one use, not the point.
How do you measure the carbon saving rather than estimate it?
By reading the system, not a spreadsheet. Victron records what was generated, what was stored and what was drawn from the grid, so the figure comes from meters rather than assumptions. That is the difference between a carbon number you can put in a tender response and one you would rather not be asked about.
Are you a Victron dealer?
We are not a box-shifter. 365 Techies was accepted into the Victron Recommended Software Integrator programme in July 2026, which is a recognition of the software and monitoring work we do on top of Victron systems. We also run our own business off one, because our office is a van - so the advice comes from operating it daily, not from a product sheet.
Worth a conversation before anyone quotes you
Tell us what you are trying to achieve — resilience, running costs, carbon reporting, or power somewhere there is none. We will tell you honestly whether Victron is the right answer, including when it is not.
01202 775566 · help@365techies.co.uk · MON–FRI 9AM–5PM