What Documents Do You Need to Dispute a Solar Contract?

What solar contract dispute documents do you need?

The solar contract dispute documents that matter most are the signed contracts with every addendum, the financing disclosures, everything the seller showed or sent you, and proof of what happened after installation: utility bills, monitoring data, permits and approval letters, photos, and a log of every contact and complaint. Treasury tells solar customers to get every document “in a form that you can keep,” and the CFPB’s complaint form asks you to “Attach documents that support the facts like account statements and communications with the company.”

Disclosure: Candid Yak works with Titan Advocacy Group, a solar consumer advocacy firm, and may be paid when readers hire it.

A file like this is how a complaint, a written dispute or a case review separates a deal that disappointed you from one that was misrepresented, and an attorney reviewing your case will work from the same papers.

Document	What it can show	Who says to keep or check it
Signed contracts and every addendum	What you agreed to, the cancellation notice, the warranty, any arbitration clause	Treasury: get all documents “in a form that you can keep”
Financing disclosures	APR, finance charge, amount financed, total of payments, payment schedule	Regulation Z defines these as the material disclosures
Proposal and savings estimate	The price, production and savings you were shown	FTC: compare the contract with the company’s “ads, proposals, and salespeople”
Ads, flyers and mailers	Promises made before the visit	FTC, same line
Texts, emails and e-sign messages	What was said, and when documents were sent	CFPB: attach “communications with the company”
Your notes of what was said	Spoken promises, and the language of the pitch	FTC: get a spoken promise “in writing”
Utility bills before and after	Whether the savings promise held	Treasury’s lease guide on combined bills
Monitoring and production data	What the system actually produced	California’s guide: ask how you will monitor the system
Permits, inspections, permission-to-operate letter	Whether the job was finished and approved	California’s guide and DOE on written utility approval
Photos and video	Damage, unfinished work, equipment installed	Your own record
Payment records and statements	What you paid, and when the payment changed	CFPB: attach “account statements”
Communications log and copies of letters	Who said what, and proof of delivery	FTC: certified mail and a kept copy
Complaint confirmations and responses	What each company told regulators	CFPB complaint process

Why do the contract and the financing disclosures come first?

Every claim is measured against the paper. Pull the installation agreement, the loan, lease or PPA, any warranty agreement, and every change order. One homeowner in a federal case signed four arbitration clauses in a single packet: in the installation terms, a subcontractor’s home improvement plan, a loan and security agreement, and a warranty agreement (Pearson v. Sunnova, D.D.C. 2025).

A Truth in Lending disclosure is the box in a loan contract that states the annual percentage rate, finance charge, amount financed, total of payments and payment schedule, which Regulation Z calls the “material disclosures.” Compare the amount financed with the system’s cash price on the proposal. The CFPB found that lenders typically leave hidden fees out of the total costs of credit they present, and that salespeople “often do not explain the difference in the cash price and loan principal.” Treasury tells borrowers to ask: “Is there a lender fee included in your loan?”

While you have the contract open, find three more things: the Holder Rule notice, which lets you raise claims against the seller with the lender but caps recovery so it “SHALL NOT EXCEED AMOUNTS PAID BY THE DEBTOR HEREUNDER”; the cancellation notice and its date; and the language of the contract. The FTC’s Cooling-Off Rule requires the contract to be in the same language as the sales presentation for the sales it covers.

What proves what the salesperson promised?

Proposals, savings estimates, ads, texts and emails do. The FTC tells solar customers to “check that the terms match what the company’s ads, proposals, and salespeople told you.” Treasury tells lease and PPA signers to ask whether savings estimates are “based on assumptions such as my past usage, current electric rates, or something else?” so keep any page that shows the assumptions.

Write down what you remember now: who came to the house, the date, what was promised about savings, tax credits, roof work or cancellation, what language the pitch was in, and whether you saw the full contract or only a signature box. The FTC says that if a salesperson makes a spoken promise of free repairs, “get the promise in writing.” Your notes won’t carry the weight of a document, but they tell a reviewer where to look.

Electronic signing deserves its own folder. New York’s attorney general alleges that one installer’s salespeople pushed consumers to e-sign contracts “often without their knowledge.” That is an allegation. Federal law defines an electronic signature as one “executed or adopted by a person with the intent to sign the record,” so the signing record matters if you dispute a signature.

What shows what happened after installation?

Utility bills. Treasury’s lease guide says that if the company promises savings, your new electricity bill plus your monthly lease payment “should be lower than your current electricity bill.” Keep at least a year of bills from before installation and every bill since.

Monitoring data. Download or screenshot production history from the app or portal regularly, with dates. California’s guide tells buyers to ask, “Will I be able to monitor the performance of the system once it’s installed?”

Permits and approval. California’s 2022 consumer guide says to “turn on system only after receiving written approval from electricity provider,” and DOE describes the utility issuing a “permission to operate letter.” Keep the permit, the final inspection, and that letter. In Texas, contracts signed on or after September 1, 2025 must say who obtains permits and utility approval.

Photos. Date-stamped photos of the array, roof attachments, the inverter display, interior damage and any unfinished work.

How do you get missing copies?

1. Ask the installer and the lender in writing. List what you want: the signed contracts, every addendum, the disclosures, the payment history, and the e-signature certificate or audit trail. Keep a copy of the request.
2. Ask for the signing record. In GoodLeap v. Garza (Tex. App. 2025), the lender’s DocuSign certificate showed a loan agreement emailed at 6:35 p.m., viewed at 6:36 and signed at 6:38. In Solcius and GoodLeap v. Meraz (Tex. App. 2023), the installer and lender filed DocuSign certificates of completion, and the court found conclusive evidence that the homeowner had e-signed. If those records exist for your contract, you want to see them before anyone else relies on them.
3. If you never applied, treat it as possible identity theft. The CFPB’s summary of rights says a creditor “must give you copies of applications and other business records” for accounts opened through identity theft, if you ask in writing, and IdentityTheft.gov suggests asking for “the application and the applicant’s signature.”
4. Ask the utility for your interconnection and permission-to-operate records, and the city or county building department for permit and inspection records.
5. Pull your credit reports and the county property records for any filing against your home.

Some homeowners never get a copy at the kitchen table. In Cabatit v. Sunnova, the opinion recounts a homeowner’s declaration that she signed on a salesperson’s electronic device and that the couple received no copy until the dispute arose and their daughter obtained one. Treasury’s guides say to get the transaction details and “a paper copy of your contract” in writing, and that if you get neither, “that’s probably a scam.”

How should you keep the file?

Keep originals unaltered and work from copies. Save emails and texts with dates and senders visible, and back the file up in two places. Keep a running log of every call, visit and letter with the date, the person and what was said; IdentityTheft.gov’s recovery steps repeat the same instruction: “Write down who you contacted and when.” Send important letters by certified mail; the FTC says a return receipt gives you “proof of when you mailed it and when it was delivered.” California’s contractor board asks whether you formally notified the contractor and says to save the letter for your complaint.

What should you do with the file?

1. Inside a cancellation window? Use the file to send a written cancellation by the method the contract and the law require, with a copy to the lender the same day. Cancellation is never automatic; it turns on the contract type, the dates, your state and the facts, and windows vary by state; see the state table and the deadline tool.
2. Identify your contract and every company. The file tells you whether you have cash, a loan, a lease, a PPA or PACE, and who the installer, lender, servicer and warranty provider are.
3. Ask in writing, and complain for free. For a system you bought, the FTC says: “If you have a problem with a system you bought, try to resolve it with the company first.” On a lease or PPA, Treasury, the CFPB and the FTC jointly encourage complaints “with CFPB, FTC, or their relevant state consumer protection office.” Attach copies, never originals, to complaints with your state attorney general, the CFPB for a loan, and your contractor licensing board. The CFPB says companies generally respond in 15 days. See filing a complaint.
4. If they refuse, and the file shows a gap between what you were promised and what you signed, get a free case review from an attorney-backed firm. Not every bad outcome is misrepresentation, and a case-specific review is how the documents get sorted into what supports a claim and what doesn’t. A firm that offers a free case review should read the file before quoting any fee, tell you if a free route is still open, name the attorney licensed in your state who would take it, put its fee and what happens to that fee if the lender refuses in writing, never tell you to stop paying, and never promise a result or claim a tie to your installer or lender.
5. Other routes: a buyout or transfer at sale for a lease or PPA, or a payoff or refinance for a loan, on the contract’s terms. The main exit guide covers each, and disputing a solar contract covers the written dispute itself.

Keep paying while you build the file unless an attorney licensed in your state has reviewed it and advised otherwise.

Disclosure: Candid Yak works with Titan Advocacy Group, a solar consumer advocacy firm, and may be paid when readers hire it. This page’s author, Kira Fairbank, is a manager at Vacation Ownership Consultants, a timeshare exit firm.

This is general information, not legal advice. Which documents carry weight depends on your contract, your state’s law and the claim, so put the file in front of an attorney licensed in your state before you send a notice, sign a release, or change any payment.