Aussie screwed by ‘horrendous’ practice to bring bills down
As debt collectors descended, one Aussie described the “nightmare” experience she endured as consumer groups call for it to be banned.
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The promise of cheaper power bills and a greener footprint saw Christine Hirchfield jump at a chance to install new solar panels but instead she said the move “blew up in her face”.
More than a year since they were placed on her Victorian rooftop, the solar panels remain unconnected to the grid and Ms Hirchfield has been through a nightmare experience that has involved disputes and debt collectors. Now, the 73-year-old is sharing her experience with news.com.au as consumer groups call for a national ban on an alarming issue.
Ms Hirchfield responded to an advertisement on Facebook before a salesperson from a company called GC Perfect Solar turned up at her door.
She claims she was promised a great deal including an interest-free payment plan, free cleaning of the panels for 10 years and a generous 15-cent feed-in tariff for every kilowatt sent back into the grid. She claims her later inquiries found a tariff return of just 4.9 cents.
While she insisted she needed to digest the information before signing up to anything, she was then told she would receive a free battery after a year, she claims. Given she lost power quite often – this final freebie convinced her to sign on for the solar panels.
The retiree also describes the original document from GC Perfect Solar as quite light on details and expected a more formal contract – but then a few days later she was handing over her bank details for direct debits, she claimed.
“I am sorry the day I let that person into my house because it has been a nightmare and rollercoaster,” she said.
‘Smell a rat’
Ms Hirchfield was actually excited when the solar panels were put on her regional home in March last year but when the finance contract with Brighte, a finance provider specialising in renewable energy, dropped the next day she was shocked.
The agreement she had signed with GC Perfect Solar was to pay $88 a fortnight. But the finance contract had payments of $95 plus fees, which as a pensioner she could not afford.
“That’s not what was discussed and it snowballed from there,” she said. “I got straight on to the bank and I thought I smell a rat. I cancelled my bank card and that’s when everything started to go downhill.”
She lodged complaints with Brighte, GC Perfect Solar and Consumer Affairs Victoria. Brighte investigated the matter and months later released her from the finance agreement with no payments taken.
But the nightmare did not end there. Ms Hirchfield received a letter of demand from a debt collection agency on behalf of GC Perfect Solar for $2200 in September last year.
Then she claims it later demanded the full amount of the contract worth $11,8000. Meanwhile, she had requested that the company remove the solar panels from her house.
Do you have a story? Contact sarah.sharples@news.com.au
That’s when the Consumer Action Law Centre got involved, with the group claiming Ms Hirchfield was subject to unsolicited selling – a practice it wants to see completely banned in Australia.
The centre’s lawyers, in a letter sent to the debt collection agency, claimed Ms Hirchfield had been subject to misleading and deceptive conduct under Australian consumer law and denied she was liable for the debt.
It also outlined that if she was to experience humiliation or distress due to prohibited debt collection by GC Perfect Solar or its agents, she could seek damages up to $10,000.
Since then, Ms Hirchfield has heard nothing but she is concerned that the dispute is effectively ongoing.
She said the experience had made her far less trusting.
“It would have blown people who aren’t as switched on. It would have been so demeaning and overawing and if I can spare one person from the pain then I hope I can,” she said.
“I know what it did to me mentally – it really rocked my world – and what started as great idea and affordable all blew up in my face.”
GC Perfect Solar did not respond to request for comment.
Chased by debt collectors, court action and bankruptcy
Now the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) has announced it’s conducting a review into unsolicited selling and lead generation, and whether harmful conduct is adequately addressed by current laws.
The review comes in response to Consumer Action Law Centre’s (CALC) designated complaint, which argues harmful unsolicited sales practices are commonplace across Australia and need to be stamped out.
It also argued lead generation is a grey area but occurs when a customer is drawn to an advertisement on the web or social media and agrees to further contact.
CALC is one of three groups granted the special power to make a complaint where they can report an urgent issue directly to the ACCC for attention.
It outlined that door-to-door sales and cold calling are a widespread issue causing serious financial and personal harm to individuals, while the use of lead generation marketing on social media is rife, particularly in the rooftop solar industry.
It warns that consumers are being faced with being chased by debt collectors, court action and bankruptcy and even risk losing their homes.
Consumer Action Law Centre CEO Steph Tonkin said unsolicited selling and doorknocking has been a “horrific problem for such a long period of time”. CALC has been campaigning against the practice for the past 20 years.
“It impacts vulnerable consumers such as people with language barriers who don’t say no and more than half of our clients have serious mental health issues and acquired brain injuries,” Ms Tonkin told news.com.au.
“Generally it’s backpackers that companies bus out to regional centres and they see someone who is not 100 per cent with it and they sign them up to $10,000 and $15,000 solar panel contracts and do it because of buy now, pay later. It’s often a dodgy salesperson meets dodgy installer and it’s a hot mess as people are paying off these solar panels when they can’t afford it.”
‘Horrendous stories’
Vulnerable cohorts such as older people, people living in regional areas and those on low incomes, with disabilities or mental health issues, in particular fall victim, according to CALC’s complaint which features 23 cases, including Christine Hirchfield, as examples.
But it’s not only the solar power industry that CALC alleges is problematic, but also the sales of things such as airconditioning units or vacuum cleaners, recliner chairs, roller shutters, photography packages and services like education courses.
The ACCC is calling on the public to make submissions on their experiences of unsolicited selling by July 31.
Ms Tonkin said the organisation had heard “horrendous stories” about high pressure sales tactics applied to people who are often obviously mentally unwell, salespeople crossing out the legal 10 day cooling off period in a contract or walking past a person into their loungeroom even when asked to leave.
“The solar panels of today are the encyclopedias of yesterday,” she noted. “But it’s also recliner chairs that don’t meet the description and don’t work or education courses that don’t exist. It’s full businesses that are shut down and pop up again — it’s this underbelly.”
Spotlight on solar
More than four million Australian households have installed rooftop solar and the use of unsolicited selling is likely to have made a proportion of these households aware of the availability of government subsidies and rebates, the ACCC found a report into the complaint.
But the sectors interaction with government rebates, subsidies and loans is complex and consumers attempting to navigate this area may rely primarily on the information provided by salespeople, the watchdog added.
The CALC complaint asserts that the use of unscrupulous unsolicited selling practices in the rooftop solar industry may have eroded trust and undermined the drive to Net Zero.
A spokesperson for finance company Brighte said it is disappointing when a customer’s experience of a third-party solar retailer does not meet its expectations.
“We expect all third-party solar retailers referring our finance products to uphold the highest standards of integrity and customer care,” they said.
“When concerns are raised with us, we act to protect customers, engage with the retailers and recommend customers contact their relevant state consumer protection authority if the issue cannot be resolved.
“In this case, after considering the customer’s concerns, we took no payments from the customer and they have no further obligations to Brighte. We also ended our relationship with the sales agent.”
Overall, the consumer watchdog notes there some protections for consumers when it comes to unsolicited selling, but CALC said they aren’t enough to prevent the alarming practice.
The ACCC has received approximately 250 consumer reports from January 2024 to March 2025 relating to unsolicited selling across a broad range of industries, although it acknowledged those impacted may not come forward.
CALC also alleges that some businesses are circumventing the requirements for unsolicited consumer agreements by using lead generation tactics to obtain an invitation from consumers to come to their home, or to obtain consent from consumers to be contacted over the phone.
sarah.sharples@news.com.au
Originally published as Aussie screwed by ‘horrendous’ practice to bring bills down
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