OpenSolar, developer of a world leading online solar design and sales application, and loan matching outfit LoanOptions.ai have joined forces to help consumers access finance to invest in rooftop PV and batteries.
The partnership has produced a “Financing Available” widget that can be embedded in OpenSolar proposals, putting access to a streamlined, five-minute loan application process a click away.
LoanOptions provides access to competitive finance deals from more than 90 lenders, and promises to have no impact on the customer’s credit score.
The integration brings financing into the solar installation process, rather than carving it off into a separate and more complex additional step.
It also relieves solar businesses of the burden of offering financing options in their proposals, which can lead to expensive dealer fees being added to the cost of install.
“By integrating financing directly into the platforms businesses already use, we’re helping them offer more value to customers while removing traditional barriers to affordability.”
For OpenSolar, the addition of a financing widget adds to what has been billed as the “world’s first” free, end-to-end solar design and sales application.
The sophisticated software tool provides solar retailers and installers with a a one-stop service ranging from marketing and lead management to solar system design, sales, installation, and service.
“Solar installers are at the forefront of Australia’s transition to clean energy, and partnerships like this make it easier for them to provide exceptional service to their customers,” said Sophie Wright, OpenSolar general manager of Australia and New Zealand.
“LoanOptions.ai’s technology is a game-changer, not just for solar, but for any industry where financing is key to delivering the best customer experience.”
Whether this integration will solve the underlying lack of equitable access to energy financing for lower income households, as highlighted by this week’s Rewiring Australia report, is unclear, as LoanOptions.ai can only compare financing options that currently exist.
And, as the Rewiring Australia report made clear, “banks and finance providers often more or less ignore energy economics. In this way our financing system fundamentally favours fossil fuels, where upfront costs are low and long-term costs are high and more volatile.”
