I was personally sad to hear the news this week that Consumer Energy Solutions would be put into administration and the company wound down, because following the announcement that the Eco 4 scheme -which promised free heatpumps, solar panels and insulation for low income households- was going to be scrapped, they were unable to take enough orders to keep the company going. The company did a large volume of installations, and were able to bring to many people the incredible benefits of solar panels (although not batteries or EV charging), who otherwise wouldn’t have been able to afford it. I know they had mixed reviews, but that sort of thing is almost inevitable when the customer isn’t paying and the company gets their money as soon as note is signed to say the work has been done, with installers being pressurised to chuck the kit in as cheaply and as profitably as possible, so that they can move onto the next job. Its unfortunate now that a large part of their customer base will have to forgo the benefits of solar, to say nothing of the fact that there a climate crisis unfolding, as well as national and international carbon reduction targets to hit, and our political leaders are doing the opposite of what a responsible leadership should be doing.
It’s true that as a business, the free solar panel companies never really affected us. We´re the opposite end of the market. We offer genuine expertise at every turn, the strongest guarantees on the market, the best aftercare, the most products, etc, etc. We’re always available for our customers, and because we do everything properly, we very rarely have to go back on a job, but if we ever are required to, our customers can get hold of us straight away, and we come out promptly. That also, is completely unlike the service people could have expected from a free solar panel installer. We have done a few jobs for customers who did qualify under the ECO4 scheme, but who wouldn’t touch any of those companies ´with a barge-pole´as one gentleman from Neath put it, but im not aware of a single customer that we lost out to the free providers.
We are probably the only company canvassing throughout South Wales for proper solar panel sales -as opposed to the ECO 4 scheme and the rent your roof con that we’re still hearing about- and whilst the high preponderance of poorly designed, badly fitted free solar jobs does feedback to us on the doorsteps, we think that most people who were genuinely interested until they heard about a horror story involving a friend who’d had free solar panels, usually acknowledge that a using company like Ecotekk would mean a vastly superior experience, and are happy for us to show them what we can do for their home, while the people who say that ´so, and so had it, and has nothing but problems ever since´, well we suspect that they were so closed minded, they would never buy anyway, despite it being to their considerable advantage to do so, whether or not they had to borrow the money.
For people reading this who would like to have solar panels but are put off by the initial outlay, Ecotekk offer a range of financial products, including 12 months interest free credit; secured and unsecured loans -if you had qualified under ECO4, you might well have dodged a bullet, because you’ll get much better equipment, service, guarantees, aftercare, and most of all, better advice, with Ecotekk. And you wont have to miss out on having a battery with your Solar PV system and the batteries are half the benefits -financially speaking.