Solar panel retailer warned over financial claims

Solar panels can be expensive to buy. Photo / 123rf

The Commerce Commission has warned a solar panel systems retailer over its claims about the financial benefits of panel installation.

New Zealand Home Services Limited is likely to have breached the Fair Trading Act by making "unsubstantiated representations", the commission said today.

The claims made by the retailer included:

• "Installing a solar system increases the average property value by 3 to 4 per cent and houses that have a solar system installed usually sell twice as fast as other properties on the market."

• "In many ways, your solar power system is a financial product - one that is capable of generating annual returns ranging anywhere from 10 per cent to more than 30 per cent."

• "The cost of power is always increasing - in this case, between 2.5 to 7 per cent each year."

• "Over the past 20 years, electricity prices have risen between 2.5 per cent and 7 per cent every year."

The commission's head of investigations Ritchie Hutton said traders have to substantiate claims that cannot easily be verified.

"Solar panel installation requires significant up-front cost and in our view NZHS made claims about the financial benefits of installing solar systems without sufficiently backing up those claims in the New Zealand market," Hutton said.

The Commission asked the retailer to back up the claims, but Hutton said the materials provided were "of varying degrees of reliability" and from overseas sources not relevant to the New Zealand market.

"NZHS describes itself as an Australasian company, and overseas companies operating in New Zealand must ensure representations made in this country are appropriately substantiated," Hutton said.

The "unsubstantiated representations" provision of the Fair Trading Act came into effect in June 2014.