20 Nov 2011: DNC writes: I did another email to some of our past 'Solar Enquirers' to see how many installed, and it's nice to hear how many have actually managed to instal before the December 2011 deadline. The idea was to move them out of the mailing list, so I don't have to bother them with future emails.
Paul Cosgriff writes, with some ideas on being cautious about products and installers :
"We have been very pleased with the performance to date. We waited for a Which report before proceeding. The report highlighted the problem of companies making unrealistic promises about the payback period and also mentioned that inverters can fail and are expensive to replace (this was something that no one had ever mentioned to us!).
We also agreed with the report's recommendation that the Government should fund a pool of independent advisors, so that householders can check all the facts before proceeding. For example, all companies claim that their panels are the best, but without expert independent advice, it is difficult for the householder to make a sound judgement.
We obtained 3 quotations and found that the level of professionalism varied - one just looked at the roof from the garden, another went up a ladder and measured the roof, and the third both measured the roof accurately and inspected inside the loft. The company which we chose also had an electrician on the staff who was able to give us assurances regarding our preferred positioning of the meter.
The installation was carried out in a professional manner, but the supervisor told us that he had decided to work for just 3 companies as he had found that some other companies gave quotes without any on-site survey, just relying on Google Earth, so that when the installation team turned up on site, they found that there were major problems, e.g. the roof was not strong enough to support the panels! I can see that this practice could quickly tarnish the industry with a bad reputation.
As I said, in our case, we feel we made all the right decisions, and that fact that the sun is still shining in November makes us pretty optimistic."
Editor's Note : this idea of Which is rather like what Rushcliffe Solar have been doing, providing an independent source of advice without any commercial motive at all.
No comments:
Post a Comment
Comments will be moderated before showing. Please make them relevant to the subject of the posting. Comments which advertise commercial products will usually be deleted.