I didn’t shout at their booth full of smiling salespeople. I waited until the owner finished selling “energy freedom” to a young family, then I set a folder on his table and asked him one quiet question: which permit number did he pull for my roof?
He didn’t have one. That was the whole thing coming undone. In Florida, a solar installation has to be done by a licensed contractor, permitted with the city, and passed through an electrical inspection and a utility interconnection before it can ever make a watt. He’d skipped every single step. My panels never worked because they were never legally, or even properly, installed. That’s not the manufacturer’s fault. That’s fraud.
What he’d forgotten is that a licensed contractor has to carry a surety bond and answer to a state board. I filed a claim against his bond, a complaint with the Construction Industry Licensing Board, and a report with the state’s consumer protection division. His “you can’t prove it” collapsed the moment they pulled the permit records that didn’t exist.
His smile was gone by the time his own customers started listening in.
The bond and the state’s action got our savings back. His license was suspended, and it turned out a dozen other retired couples had been cheated the same way — they’re being made whole too.
He told a retired couple to read the fine print — he never dreamed we’d read the public records instead.
We hired a real, licensed crew this spring. The panels work now; our meter actually runs backward on sunny days, and it’s most days here. Our bills are a fraction of what they were. The retirement we planned for is exactly the one we’re living.