In Vorarlberg, 31 December counts twice

Anyone who wants to replace their heating in Vorarlberg this year should do the maths now — not in November. The current Richtlinie Heizungstausch 2026 (heating replacement guideline 2026) has a deadline that is often misunderstood.

Two conditions, one date

According to § 15, the guideline comes into force on 1 January 2026 and expires on 31 December 2026. So far, as expected.

What is written next to it is crucial: The last possible application date is also 31 December 2026 — "whereby the commissioning must have taken place".

The date therefore applies twice. It is not enough to have ordered or installed the system. It must be running by then, and the application must have been submitted.

Anyone who orders at the end of October and commissions it in January falls outside this guideline — regardless of how far the work has progressed.

What this means for planning

In practice, there are several weeks between the order and commissioning: delivery date of the device, installation, electrician appointment, commissioning by the installer. In addition, for air source heat pumps in Vorarlberg, the building permit from the municipality must be obtained before installation.

Calculate backwards from 31 December, not forwards from today. And do not plan December as a buffer — it is the month when tradesperson appointments are scarcest.

A detail that helps later

Missing documents can be submitted later, up to 31 December 2027, i.e. one year after the guideline expires. Anyone who just makes the application deadline but does not yet have every document together does not automatically lose the public subsidy as a result. However, if the documents are not submitted on time, the claim expires.

What applies when the guideline changes

According to § 14, the application principle applies to all public subsidy applications: The decisive factor is the guideline that is valid at the time of application. Whether there will be a successor regulation for 2027 and under what conditions has not yet been published.

For you, this means: Today's conditions are not a guarantee for next year. Anyone who can use them should do so this year; anyone who is not building until 2027 anyway should wait for the new version instead of planning based on the old one.

And in Tyrol?

The situation is more relaxed there, but there is also a deadline. The Wohnhaussanierungsrichtlinie (residential building renovation guideline) applies to applications from 1 January 2026 and does not specify an expiry date. Something else is limited there: The public subsidy is granted regardless of income for applications submitted by 31 December 2027.

Anyone in Tyrol who is above the income limit therefore has a good year longer — after that, the income check could apply again.

What you can do now

1. Get a quote and fix an appointment if you still want to replace it in Vorarlberg this year. The bottleneck is the tradesperson appointment, not the application.
2. Clarify the building permit if it is going to be an air source heat pump.
3. Agree on the commissioning date in writing — it is relevant for the public subsidy under this guideline and not just a question of scheduling.

You can find the status of public subsidies in all nine federal states in the subsidy overview, including the date of the last check. The subsidy agency itself is always binding.