How to get solar quotes without being spammed

How the market actually works

Worth understanding, because it explains the behaviour rather than just complaining about it.

Lead generators advertise, collect enquiries, and sell them. A lead for a large home improvement is worth real money, and the same enquiry can be sold to several installers — each of whom then has a commercial reason to call you quickly and repeatedly.

Comparison sites may be lead generators with a comparison interface. Some genuinely compare; some collect.

Installers buy leads because it is often cheaper than advertising. That cost is in your quote.

Agents may sell for several installers, or for none in particular — which is why establishing the contracting entity matters.

None of this is unlawful, and none of it means the eventual installer is bad. It does mean that the route you use to ask for a quote determines how many people end up with your phone number.

What the law prohibits

Calls. Regulation 21 of PECR provides that unsolicited calls for direct marketing purposes must not be made where the subscriber “has previously notified the caller that such calls should not for the time being be made on that line”, or where the number is “listed in the register kept under regulation 26” — the Telephone Preference Service.

Two practical consequences:

• Register with the TPS. It is free. There is a 28-day grace period before a caller can be held to it.
• Telling a caller to stop is itself legally effective, independently of the register. Say it clearly, and follow it up in writing so there is a record.

Email. Regulation 22 prohibits unsolicited direct marketing by electronic mail unless “the recipient of the electronic mail has previously notified the sender that he consents”.

There is a narrow soft opt-in: where the sender obtained your details “in the course of the sale or negotiations for the sale of a product or service”, the marketing is for “similar products and services only”, and every message gives “a simple means of refusing” free of charge — both when the details were collected and in each subsequent message.

That exception covers a company you actually asked for a quote from. It does not cover a company that bought your details from someone else.

Getting three quotes the direct way

Slower than one form, and it keeps your number out of the market.

1. Find installers yourself. Use the MCS register and the RECC and HIES member directories. Search by area. These are public and free.

2. Check each before contacting them. Companies House, certifications, how long they have traded — the five checks on checking an installer.

3. Approach them individually, by email where possible. You then know exactly who has your details, and you have a written channel — which matters, because what a trader writes to you can become a contract term.

4. Give every installer the same measured information. Pitch, orientation, shading, roof covering, your annual consumption. Our quote checker sheet has the fields, and using the same figures for all three removes a variable that otherwise makes quotes incomparable.

5. Ask your questions in that first email. The 25 on the sheet are grouped so they can be pasted in.

Reducing the damage if you already filled one in

Tell each caller, in writing, not to contact you again. This engages regulation 21 directly and creates the record you would need for a complaint.

Ask the original site who your data was shared with. You have a right to know, and the answer tells you how many more calls to expect.

Exercise your objection rights with each recipient, not just the original site.

Register with the TPS, if you have not.

Do not engage with the call to explain why you are not interested. A long conversation marks the lead as live.

Complain to the ICO if calls continue after you have objected. It will not stop your particular caller quickly, and it is how patterns are identified.

What good practice looks like from an installer

The contrast is instructive:

• contact only from the company you approached
• a named person, not a call centre rotation
• a written quotation, sent without a further call being required
• no pressure to book a survey before you have compared anything
• a clear answer to “who else has my details?” — which should be nobody

An installer who bought your lead and one you approached directly behave very differently on first contact, and the difference is usually audible in the first thirty seconds.

A note on “free” comparison services

They are free to you because someone else pays, and the person paying is the installer buying the lead — which means the cost reaches you inside the quote.

That is not a reason to avoid them absolutely. It is a reason to know which kind of service you are using, and to weigh the convenience of one form against several months of calls and a marketing cost embedded in the price.