Vision Solar Reviews

The management team habitually lies to their employees. They begin by promoting the fact that you are a "consultant" who is paid on salary. That is supposed to put customers at ease and not feel pressured. But the bottom line is that you are nothing more than a high pressure salesman. Vision Solar's business model is to get the customer's signature on an agreement in the span of one appointment no matter what the cost. The tactics they use are very deceptive. They supposedly qualify all leads through their call center, but the process is a complete joke. I was sent to the homes of 85-90 year old prospects who were in no position to make such an important financial decision on their own. And the expectation was to make a sale. I have been a sales professional for over 20 years and I love the solar / renewable energy industry. Vision Solar represents everything that is bad about it. If there was a way to give a negative rating, I would do it. Here is why. I have solar panels on my home. So I can speak from experience. But as much as I believe in solar power, there are some homes that are not good candidates. On my last day of employment, I called on a customer whose average utility bill was only $65.00. I asked him if his primary goal was to save more money on his bill, and he said yes. The home was their winter residence. They were only there 4 months out of the year. The general rule of thumb is that if a customer's main goal is to save money, going with solar power is not recommended if the average electricity bill is less than $75. That's too low an amount to justify the investment. There are other ways to bring down the bill that would not require the kind of money needed to get solar panels. I checked with the call center to see if they had a figure for the minimum amount on the electricity bill in order to qualify the home. They told me $70. When I let them know that this customer had an average bill of $60 - $65 they marked him down as not a good candidate. When I got back to the office, I was asked why I disqualified the customer. I told them that actually the call center made that determination after they heard what the average utility bill was. I was told that they had no such guideline. So clearly this was a case of the left hand not knowing what the right hand was doing. Then I was asked by one of the corporate sales why I didn't do a more in depth Q&A to find everything about the customer's needs before deciding not to move forward. I told him the customer stated that saving money on his electricity bill was his top priority. Secondly, the company's call center said that the bill was to low to qualify as a good solar candidate. I further added that based on my experience as a consultant in the renewable energy industry, I could not recommend that this customer invest over $15,000 in a solar array when he could spend about a third as much money to upgrade his insulation and replace his 20+year old air conditioning unit to achieve the same savings. That's when this guy asked me to turn in my iPad, which I did so gladly. My reputation means more to me than anything. Vision Solar doesn't care about anyone's reputation. Their only goal is to strong arm people into signing an agreement. I guarantee you that if anyone in that company reads this review, they'll write it off as another disgruntled employee who was let go because the couldn't sell. The fact is I have sold energy solutions in the six figure range to medium-sized businesses, and they bought from me because they trusted my opinion. I accepted the position with Vision to earn a little extra income while educating customers on solar power. I didn't need the money. It seemed like a good idea at the time. Clearly, I was wrong about that. The plain truth is that Vision Solar lies to their employees, and they don't pay them what they have coming to them. After six weeks, I still hadn't received my last paycheck even though the guy from corporate looked me right in the eye and promised I would be getting any outstanding compensation that was due to me. When I notified them that I filed a claim with the state labor board, and explained the consequences of any further delay, I finally received my money. Vision Solar is a company that those wanting to work in the industry should avoid at all costs. There are hundreds of solar companies out there doing things the right way. Vision Solar is not one of them. Whenever I do lunch an learn consults with different groups of consumers across town, I tell them specifically if they get a call from Vision Solar, instruct them not to call back and hang up the phone. It is my considered opinion that they will continue to give the solar industry a black eye as long as they are in business.