SmartScore: what it assesses and how to prepare the evidence

Start with the building’s strategy.

SmartScore is WiredScore’s certification for smart buildings. For an owner, occupier or operating team, preparation starts with a practical question: which building services are you trying to improve, and what information will show how they work?

The official SmartScore overview describes a process from registration and assessment through evidence review to certification. That provides a useful structure for a project, but the team still needs to establish its boundary, responsibilities and applicable requirements.

Connect the certification ambition to the building’s strategy. An existing office, a refurbishment and an assessment submission need different first steps. Agree what the review should establish for the people using and running the building, then choose the technology and evidence work that supports it.

What SmartScore assesses.

WiredScore’s public Office overview groups SmartScore into six areas of user functionality and three technical foundations. Together, they connect the experience offered with the arrangements supporting it.

User functionality

• Access and Navigation: getting into and around the building.
• Wellbeing: the technology supporting indoor conditions and people’s comfort.
• Sustainability Technology: information and tools supporting resource-use decisions.
• Digital Services: the building services people can use through digital tools.
• Safety and Security: technology supporting protective arrangements.
• Operational Excellence: information and services supporting everyday building operation.

Technical foundations

• Systems Integration: how the relevant systems connect.
• Cybersecurity: how those connected services are protected.
• Data Management: how information is defined, maintained and made usable.

Use these areas to explore the possibilities, then develop requirements against the applicable project scorecard. Map each visible service to the systems, agreements and operating procedures that make it work.

Confirm the route, version and boundary.

An occupied building and a development present different evidence. WiredScore’s certification process guidance distinguishes assessing existing buildings from assessing development designs. Confirm the applicable Office route, current scheme version, assessment stage and programme with the certification team before using a checklist.

Record those details at the top of the evidence register. Confirm the project’s requirements and acceptable documents, demonstrations and records with the certification team. Use older guides or another building’s questionnaire as supporting background.

Make the landlord–tenant boundary explicit too. A landlord may operate reception and the access system while an occupier manages employee records and permissions. A shared service may depend on both. State which floors, systems and organisations are included, who can authorise access to information, and which tenant actions or agreements remain outstanding.

Match each evidence item to the areas and occupiers it actually covers, so the team can see what remains to be demonstrated across the agreed building scope.

Show progress from plan to working service.

Use four clear working states in the project register to show delivery progress. Keep the official SmartScore assessment status in a separate record:

Planned

The intended service is described, but the delivery responsibility or solution may still need agreement.

Committed

An agreed scope or other recorded commitment identifies what will be delivered. Check its assumptions, exclusions and dependencies.

Installed

The relevant equipment or configuration is recorded as present. The complete service still needs a defined demonstration.

Working

A defined scenario has been demonstrated, with the result, boundary and exceptions recorded. Ongoing operating arrangements still need an owner.

Link each state to evidence: a brochure for potential capability, an agreed proposal for scope commitments and a test record for demonstrated behaviour. Ask the certification team how each item applies to the submission.

Assess the delivered service against the applicable requirements, including installed connections, operating procedures and accepted evidence. An app purchase or supplier accreditation alone does not establish building credits.

Follow one service across its dependencies.

Consider a hypothetical office whose operator wants a weekly electricity view for agreed floors. A dashboard demonstration looks convincing, but the team has not confirmed which meters cover landlord services and which include tenant loads.

Begin with the operating question: what comparison should help someone decide what to investigate? Then map the path from meter to source system, interface, data store and report. Record identifiers, coverage, units, timestamps and the treatment of missing readings. The integrator and source-system supplier need an agreed division of work; the operator needs to understand the result.

A useful demonstration could trace one known reading into the report, show how an unavailable reading is presented and confirm who investigates a gap. Record exceptions rather than hiding them in a polished screen. Our integration and information planning service starts with these operating questions and interface responsibilities.

This hypothetical example shows how to coordinate service evidence. To evaluate energy savings, also agree the baseline, measurement period and treatment of changes in building use.

Keep a register someone can act on.

Connect every evidence item to the intended outcome, responsible person and next action. Our Excel workbook provides a blank project register, separate worked examples and these core fields:

• Example status, so illustrative entries remain distinct from project records.
• Scheme, route and version.
• Boundary and intended outcome.
• Evidence owner.
• Current state.
• Evidence reference and date.
• Dependencies and open questions.
• Review decision and next action.
• Review owner and due date.

The separate examples cover a planned electricity-reporting service and an installed access-service configuration that still needs an operating demonstration. Use the blank register for your building, with named owners, review dates and evidence references.

Download the SmartScore evidence register (Excel)

Use each review to confirm progress against the requirements, close evidenced items and assign the remaining actions. Maintain the register alongside the formal assessment documents, with sensitive records held under the client’s agreed access and sharing arrangements.

How does SmartScore relate to WELL?

Teams pursuing both SmartScore and WELL can coordinate technology planning, information ownership and wellbeing priorities. Keep the evidence requirements for each programme visible from the outset.

IWBI’s current crosswalk guidance, updated 1 October 2026, lists SmartScore as an alignment tool. Alignment tools identify similarities for information and planning. They do not offer streamlined documentation: projects must submit full WELL documentation.

If you pursue both, identify the applicable routes and versions, then coordinate the information owners without assuming an automatic credit transfer. A shared sensor or operating record still has to satisfy each programme’s requirements. Our guide to IWBI, WELL and building technology explores the health and wellbeing context and the questions to bring to the appointed WELL team.

How BREEAM, NABERS UK and LEED score buildings.

A certification target needs a precise brief: the scheme, route, version, assessment stage and building boundary. Those details explain what a published rating actually establishes and which technology records the team needs to collect.

BREEAM: weighted credits and minimum standards

BRE currently identifies New Construction V7.1 as its current New Construction standard. BREEAM combines performance across sustainability categories. The proportion of available credits achieved in each category is multiplied by its weighting, then the category scores are added. The relevant minimum standards must also be met; a high total cannot compensate for a failed mandatory requirement. BRE’s UK New Construction 2018 manual explains that calculation, while later versions change the criteria and weights.

For UK New Construction V7, the rating thresholds are Pass 25%, Good 40%, Very Good 55%, Excellent 70% and Outstanding 85%, alongside the applicable minimum standards. BRE’s V7 publication, PN739, issue 2.0 explains the five percentage point reduction to Pass and Good from the earlier UK thresholds. Use the registered project’s manual and current clarifications for V7.1 or any other version. Confirm whether a claim concerns an interim design assessment, completed construction or the separate In-Use route.

NABERS UK: measured office energy

NABERS UK Energy for Offices rates metered operational energy against benchmarks derived from UK offices, accounting for location and occupancy. CIBSE Certification identifies the current Energy for Offices and Metering and Consumption rules as version 2.1. Its scheme overview describes a one to six star scale.

The boundary matters: Base Building covers central services such as heating, cooling, lifts and lobby lighting; Tenancy covers tenant energy such as lighting and power; Whole Building brings both together. A dashboard must preserve those meter boundaries if it is to support useful preparation.

Design for Performance is a commitment to a target energy rating for a new office or major refurbishment, supported by an Independent Design Review. The subsequent operational rating tests the result in use. New offices and major refurbishments need an eligible 12-month rating period before that assessment. Describe the design-reviewed target and the achieved operational rating separately.

LEED: prerequisites, credit points and the selected route

LEED v5 is the current generation, with Building Design and Construction (BD+C), Interior Design and Construction (ID+C), and Operations and Maintenance (O+M) routes. Projects must meet the applicable prerequisites and earn credit points. USGBC’s commercial certification guide sets the bands at Certified 40–49, Silver 50–59, Gold 60–79 and Platinum 80 or more points. V5 Platinum also has additional requirements: reaching 80 points alone is insufficient.

GBCI reviews the submission. Keep the registered version visible when discussing an older v4 or v4.1 project, because its credit requirements can differ. BD+C design and construction evidence and O+M operational evidence serve different assessment routes; the commercial guide sets a 12-month performance period for O+M, subject to its stated exceptions.

Build the technology brief around the selected requirements: meter coverage, dependable records, commissioning evidence and named operating owners. Confirm each item with the appointed scheme specialists. A shared data source can support several submissions, with each scheme’s acceptance rules applied separately.

Turn the findings into a delivery plan.

A first SmartScore readiness review establishes the route, available records, service scope, evidence owners and priorities. Use the findings to plan the next stage: interface checks, supplier clarification, specification or an operating demonstration.

Good Buildings can help turn priorities into a practical brief and sequence, clarify supplier responsibilities through procurement and delivery review, or coordinate relevant evidence through operational readiness work. Initial workshops establish priorities; later support is scoped around the agreed outcomes. Our consultant appointment guide explains how to agree the outputs and decision owner.

Good preparation connects the strategy to requirements, delivery evidence and the next decision. Designers, integrators, suppliers and operators retain their appointed duties, and WiredScore determines certification through its assessment process.

Sources and further reading.

• WiredScore — SmartScore overview. Purpose and certification process.
• WiredScore — Office certification. SmartScore user functionality and technical foundations.
• WiredScore — certification process guidance. Assessment of existing buildings and developments.
• IWBI — how to use crosswalks. The distinction between SmartScore alignment and streamlined WELL documentation.
• BRE — current BREEAM New Construction standard and V7 resources. Current standard and supporting publications.
• BRE — UK New Construction 2018 manual. The version-labelled example of category weighting and minimum standards.
• BRE — New Construction V7 summary of changes, PN739 issue 2.0. The V7 rating-threshold changes, in a copy hosted by Encon Associates.
• BRE — how BREEAM works. Design, construction and In-Use assessment context.
• CIBSE Certification — NABERS UK Energy for Offices, scheme overview and rules and resources. Operational energy ratings, boundaries and the star scale.
• CIBSE Certification — Design for Performance and the process guide. Design targets and the subsequent operational assessment.
• USGBC — LEED v5 rating systems and scorecards and commercial certification guide. Assessment routes, prerequisites, points and certification levels.