Alectrona
Commercial solar financeA straight account of which solar grants genuinely exist, who actually qualifies, and why most private commercial sites do not.
These are representative example reviews, not yet-collected customer feedback. They are written to illustrate the kind of feedback Alectrona aims to earn and are shown as design placeholders while we gather and verify reviews from our first commercial clients. Alectrona is the commercial solar trading brand of RVTC LTD.
What set Alectrona apart was the documented design pack. We had quotes from three installers, but only Alectrona handed us a full set of drawings, a single-line diagram and a design referencing BS 7671 and the G99 connection process. The whole thing read like an engineering submission rather than a sales brochure. Our M&E consultant reviewed it and signed it off without a single query. That gave the board the confidence to release the capital.
Other firms priced our roof off a satellite image and a desktop guess. Alectrona flew an in-house drone survey, fully insured and flown by a qualified commercial drone pilot, and built a 3D model of the actual roof. It picked up plant, vents and a parapet line that a flat aerial photo had completely missed, which changed the panel layout. I would rather find that out at design stage than on the day the scaffold goes up. The accuracy of that survey is the reason I trusted everything that followed.
As a finance director I was wary of being oversold a system bigger than we could use. Alectrona modelled the array against our actual half-hourly consumption data rather than an annual total, so it is sized to what we genuinely draw on site during the day. They were honest that exporting surplus is worth far less than self-consumption, and built the design around that. The capital case stacked up because the engineering was honest, not because the numbers were inflated.
We were undecided between buying outright, leasing and a PPA. Alectrona laid out all three side by side with the pros and cons of each against our balance sheet, instead of pushing the one that pays them best. They were clear about where a PPA makes sense and where capex wins, and pointed us at our own accountant for the tax treatment. The survey and design took a little longer than I expected, but the thoroughness was worth the wait. Genuinely consultative.
The install crew were tidy and well run, and worked to a clear CDM 2015 plan with a proper site induction and RAMS. What impressed me most was the handover. We received a full commissioning pack with the IEC 62446-1 test results, certification, O&M documentation and an as-built record for our maintenance team. As the people who have to live with this asset for the next twenty years, having that paperwork in order matters enormously. Nothing was left loose.
I expected the usual hard sell and got the opposite. After surveying our site Alectrona told us one roof section was not worth covering because of shading, and that a smaller, well-sited array was the better investment than filling every square metre. There was no commission-driven upselling and no pressure. For a six-figure capital project, that straight talk is exactly what you want from the people advising you. We will be using them again on our second site.
Grant funding for solar is real, but narrow. The schemes that genuinely exist are aimed at eligible bodies, largely the public sector and specific funded programmes, not at private commercial roofs in general. We would rather tell you that plainly than dangle a grant that is not there for your site.
For the great majority of private commercial buyers, the honest route is still capex. Buying the system outright is the route we recommend wherever the capital is available, because you own a 25-year asset from day one and keep every pound of the saving and the tax relief. Grants do not change that for most sites; they simply do not apply.
The schemes worth knowing about are the Public Sector Decarbonisation Scheme and its delivery body Salix, the Industrial Energy Transformation Fund, and UK Shared Prosperity Fund money. Eligibility, funding windows and competitive rounds are set by each scheme and change over time, so the first question is always whether your organisation is an eligible body and whether a window is open. Where a grant does apply, it offsets part of the capital cost rather than funding a whole installation, and it usually carries conditions on procurement, timing and reporting that shape how the project is delivered.
If your organisation qualifies, we will work to the scheme's requirements and to the survey and design we would produce for any commercial install. If it does not, we will tell you, and point you back to the route that does carry relief for private sites: capital allowances on a bought system. Alectrona is VAT-registered, so VAT is charged at the standard rate on our work, but your VAT recovery is your own position, and your accountant or tax adviser should confirm it.
The honest position is that most private commercial sites do not qualify for any solar grant, and we will not pretend otherwise to win the work. If you are a public-sector body or sit within a specific funded programme, a grant can be worth pursuing, with the caveat that windows open and close and the application carries its own conditions and timeline. For everyone else, the better call is capex, claimed through capital allowances on the bought asset.
Whether a scheme fits, what it would cover and how its conditions interact with your tax position are matters for the scheme rules and a qualified adviser. We will give you a clear read on eligibility and design; the funding and tax decisions you should confirm with your accountant, tax adviser and the scheme itself.
Indicative, not financial or tax advice. Confirm the position with a qualified accountant or tax adviser. Your figure comes from a survey-led PV*SOL model.
We model your half-hourly load against a system sized from an on-site drone survey, then set it against the funding route that suits you. Capex first, because it keeps the most of the return, with leasing and PPA there if the cash flow needs them.