Solar Victoria intends to raise the bar for safety and quality with a new Audit Program which will coincide with Solar Victoria’s, Solar Homes Program. The Auditing Program aims to ensure solar retailers and installers are meeting CEC standards and hold those accountable that are not.
Retailers and installers found doing wrong by the consumer or not meeting CEC standards may be excluded from the Solar Homes program entirely.
The Audit Program
Solar Victoria will have independent auditors conducting safety and quality inspections for systems installed under the Solar Homes Program. While the number of installations to be inspected and how frequent inspections will be hasn’t been stated, Solar Victoria has said that they will focus on areas where they believe there has been a rising number of complaints as well as signs indicating risk including;
- Higher than average number of installations over a given time
- Length of accreditation or licensing
- High number of negative public or consumer complaints
- Compliance history
- Company age (length of time operating in the industry)
- Lower than average pricing
- Misleading advertising
- Locations with high installation density
See full list of risk factors here
Approximately 70% of the audits will be in Melbourne and the other 30% in regional areas.
Prior to an auditor conducting an inspection the home occupant will be contacted to arrange a suitable day and time to be able to provide access to the household’s roof.
Audit Outcome
Once the system and installation have been assessed the auditor will share their findings with the homeowner. If safety and quality requirements have been met no further actions will be required.
In the instance where a system or installation have not met standards, the solar retailer and installer will be contacted and given instructions as to what will be required from them to the resolve the issues. The installation will continue to be monitored until meeting standards.
All systems and installations that do not meet standards on the first initial inspection will be reported to the CEC and Energy Safe Victoria. This record of non-compliant systems and installations will assist Solar Victoria and the CEC in recognising any consistent trends amongst “dodgy” installers and retailers.
As an extra precaution Solar Victoria is working with WorkSafe and Energy Safe Victoria asking customers to alert them when their installations are going to be carried out, so they can send someone from WorkSafe or Energy Safe Victoria to attend as a work-site visit during the installation.
The Audit Program information was just recently released when Solar Victoria provided updated information on their Solar Homes Program, which will support the installation of more than 650,000 solar PV systems for owner occupiers, 50,000 solar PV systems for landlords and tenants, 10,000 battery storage systems, and 60,000 solar hot water systems over 10 years starting from July 1st.
