Rogue solar sellers are writing the industry’s next rulebook

Demand is not solar’s problem. Trust is. Complaints to Utilities Disputes about solar have risen more than 170 percent in the past four years, several high-profile providers have collapsed, and University of Auckland law professor Alex Sims now says New Zealand should follow Australia and regulate the sector properly.

She is probably right. The compliant majority of installers, financiers and retailers can resent that, or they can get ahead of it.

The curve is steeper than the headline

The 170 percent figure understates how fast this has moved. Utilities Disputes’ granular data shows solar complaints climbing from 58 in 2022-23 to 432 in 2025-26, with 829 projected for 2026-27, a roughly 14-fold jump. Solar now makes up 5.2 percent of all electricity complaints, up from 3.7 percent a year earlier, and half of all complaints accepted for formal investigation have a solar element.

Context matters. Complaints across every utility type rose 62 percent in 2025-26, so households are grumpier about bills generally. Solar is still running far ahead of that trend.

The nature of the complaints is the giveaway. Among marketing complaints, 86 percent relate to promised savings or returns that never materialised, while 68 percent of all solar complaints involve basic customer service failures. This is not a technology problem. Panels work. Sales pitches, export credit maths and after-sales service are what’s breaking.

One collapse, a sector-wide hangover

SolarZero is the outsized case. With about 0.5 percent of the national electricity market, it generated roughly a fifth of complaints, and its late-2024 liquidation left about 15,000 customers on contracts now serviced by a third party. The watchdog was already warning of “gaps” in consumer protection back in May, so this has been building all year.

What caught Sims’s eye was SolarZero’s 20-year contract that restarted if a customer moved house. “The imbalance is clear: the customer bears the cost of an ordinary life event, while the company gains a fresh 20 years of revenue from the same hardware,” she wrote this week, noting the Commerce Commission had logged 162 complaints about SolarZero by late 2025 and opened a preliminary investigation. She also highlights a structural flaw. Leased or subscription customers can use Utilities Disputes, but people who buy panels outright are left with the Disputes Tribunal or the courts.

That is a slower, costlier route for exactly the buyers the industry most wants to keep winning.

Australia has already written the template

Across the Tasman, years of government-driven uptake produced a dedicated oversight body and tighter rules. Western Australia is going further, introducing mandatory solar-specific consumer protection standards from early 2027, covering marketing, billing, hardship and disconnection for companies selling solar electricity.

Sims wants New Zealand to copy the model but harden it. “The lesson is to emulate Australia’s approach but make the core parts mandatory: accredited installers, approved products, clear disclosure of long-term costs, and a dispute scheme covering all solar purchases,” she argues, adding that “people will only keep investing if they trust the market”.

That framing matters for a centre-right reader. This is not a case against solar, or an argument for subsidies. It is a case for the basic market conditions, honest disclosure and enforceable contracts, that let private investment scale without the state picking it up when things go wrong.

The choice in front of the industry

Trade press has reached the same conclusion. Building Today describes the disproportionate complaint rate as evidence of “systemic trust and quality issues” that need attention before regulatory intervention becomes inevitable.

For installers, finance providers, retailers and commercial property owners weighing rooftop systems, the risk is clear. A bad fringe, concentrated heavily around one collapsed provider and its leasing model, is setting the terms for everyone. Leases are already complicating house sales, export credit promises are being tested in disputes, and a Commerce Commission inquiry is live.

The smart move is for industry bodies to pre-empt Wellington with credible accreditation, standardised savings disclosure and a single dispute pathway covering both leased and purchased systems. Self-regulation only works if it bites, though. If the sector waits, it will get a regulator designed around its worst operators, with the compliant majority paying the compliance bill. With Western Australia’s rules landing in a few months, the window to shape New Zealand’s version is closing.

Sources

• RNZ: More regulation needed for solar panel industry, expert says (2026-10-31)
• interest.co.nz: Utilities Disputes Distributed Generation and Meters (2026-10)
• Utilities Disputes: 2025-2026 Annual Report (2026)
• RNZ: Angry customers complain about SolarZero contracts (2026-07-14)
• Newsroom: Watchdog warns of ‘gaps’ in protection as SolarZero complaints mount (2026-05-01)
• University of Auckland: Harsh lessons from solar panel saga (2026-10-29)
• RNZ: Huge surge in solar complaints with a plea for more consumer protections (2026-10-16)
• Building Today: Solar complaints continue to surge (2026-10-27)