How To Set Up Solar Pv Install Company

[EdinburghSolarGuy]

Hi Folks, I'm sure most people are going to tell me not to bother, however this is something I'm keen to do.

I'm a qualified Electrical and Electronic Engineer, and have a sales company which is currently selling pv solar panels for a few companies.  We also do the green deal pv solar sales for companies as well.

As good as it is I'd obviously prefer to do everything myself on the sold panels myself.

I have experience in the renewables sector and in the ECO sector.

Now I understand it's not an easy road to become fully accredited, however I'd like to know exactly what I'd need to do?

Thanks in advance.

 

[EdinburghSolarGuy]

Ok, so 40 views and no replies....  No one knows what to do?  Or is it I'm not telling you, you'll become competition?

I'll find out anyway... LOL.

I know its these things,

1.  Set up a company

2.  Get MCS Accreditation

3.  Get PAS 20/30

4.  Get Green Deal Accreditation

5.  Get Consumer Credit Agreement

This is what I think I need to do.  Can anyone confirm the process please?

 

[binky]

look at MCS website, it tells you what you need to know about becoming accredited

 

[EdinburghSolarGuy]

1a. You need to be electrically qualified, Scheme approved (Napit, ECA, Elecsa etc) and have something like C&G2399 for solar

Hi Canoeboy, I'm not planning on actually doing the install personally, I'm planning on recruiting installers who have the accrediataions.  I'll check it out though.

 

[binky]

Most will probably tell you to go forth, you may get lucky, but it causes confusion. Customer buys off you and gets certs etc from a.n.other company as the MCS registered installer as there is no way f putting your name on the certs. Because it's a bit of a closed shop, then there is little need to work for sales companies, and any that have approached me want to pay so firkin little for my time, skill and legal liability that they have all been resoundly told to shove it!

If you are going down this route pay a decent rate like about £750 / £800 and you may get a decent installer.

 

[EdinburghSolarGuy]

Maybe I'm getting you confused.

I'm going to get all the accreditations for my company.  My plan is to do everything froom sale to install.  Surely I can hire installers and get the accreditations for my company having my employees to do the install?

 

[binky]

Maybe I'm getting you confused.

I'm going to get all the accreditations for my company.  My plan is to do everything froom sale to install.  Surely I can hire installers and get the accreditations for my company having my employees to do the install?

that's not what i understood from your previous post. Of course you can do this, same as i did. I did the training, set up all the paperwork systems, then taught my team what to do. If you are too busy running the show, you need someone to do the training, an experienced electrican works best, it is after all an electrical system. You then need an experienced roofer to cope with all the **** roofs that are out there (especially slate). The training will teach how to design a system and install roof hooks, wind loadings etc etc. With regards to the paperwork I would recommend buying P-clip or easy MCS to save a shed load of time.

 

[Steve3948]

Most will probably tell you to go forth, you may get lucky, but it causes confusion. Customer buys off you and gets certs etc from a.n.other company as the MCS registered installer as there is no way f putting your name on the certs. Because it's a bit of a closed shop, then there is little need to work for sales companies, and any that have approached me want to pay so firkin little for my time, skill and legal liability that they have all been resoundly told to shove it!

If you are going down this route pay a decent rate like about £750 / £800 and you may get a decent installer.

Binky,  is that a day or per roof  :innocent

 

[binky]

per roof, but a lot of companies are paying far less leading to lots of corner cutting by installers

 

[EdinburghSolarGuy]

If you are sub-contracting then they have to be MCS approved, if you are employing them they need to be qualified

Thanks Canoeboy, If I'm employing I need to be MCS approved?

that's not what i understood from your previous post. Of course you can do this, same as i did. I did the training, set up all the paperwork systems, then taught my team what to do. If you are too busy running the show, you need someone to do the training, an experienced electrican works best, it is after all an electrical system. You then need an experienced roofer to cope with all the **** roofs that are out there (especially slate). The training will teach how to design a system and install roof hooks, wind loadings etc etc. With regards to the paperwork I would recommend buying P-clip or easy MCS to save a shed load of time.

Thnaks Binky!  I'll be able to do the training, (you mean the MCS stuff?).  At the moment we are not doing slate roofs, or rosemary clay, because of the problems associated with them, only concrete.  Remember I have a door 2 door sales company so I control the sales side, as in where we go.

The only issue I have is what to do as in start here then do this, then that etc.  Any advice on this would be magic.

 

[binky]

rosemary is appalling unless new! crunch crunch firk! X(

I would advise you do the training yourself  - you're not likely to leave. Question is do you have time to design systems? I think staff need some installation training these days - worth it anyway to avoid future leaky roofs. I started before this requirement and trained my own guys, so ignored this bit as we had been installing for 2 years prior. Worth having a roofer or someone with roofing experience on-board to deal with arising issues even on concrete, such as holes in felting, lose ridge tiles, and anything else you can get blamed for.

 

[Cindy Mayer]

It is truth that not all installers are equal and it is great that we can get more authentic information and learn about the experience. Actually, most people usually pay their attention at the product itself and the price, choosing the Solar Panels Company. However, it is not the right strategy and reading different stories, people share you become even more aware of it. So, just hope to see many useful tips and information that will help people like me.
 

 

[binky]

Hi Cindy and welcome to the forum.

Quality of the installation is important, PV is a long life system 30years+, so little details make a difference, like not leaving cables 'swinging in the breeze' under the panels. The criteria for fitting solar in the USA is a bit different due to having different electrical regulations. Micro-inverters being the choice for your systems as I understand it, and En-phase seems to be the market leader.

As you are located in Florida, which is somewhat warmer and sunnier than the UK, heat saturation of the panels is also worth considering, ie the panels get too hot and lose performance. The most heat resistant panel I know of is Panasonic HiT range, not cheap but a quality unit. On the odd occasion we get heat issues here (about 2 weeks of the year max), systems I have fitted using Panasonic have continued to work as normal, where as everything else has lost output - still work well, but peak output down by about 20%

 

[elecman1]

Good advice down here, it might be good to go on a course which packages things together so you have a current checklist of memberships and qualifications to get. NIC run courses as do many others.