Do you need an account?

No. You can get a full estimate, see all four numbers, look at the monthly payment plan and send your details to the installer without ever having an account.

An account is a convenience, and it becomes useful later rather than now.

What an account gives you

• Your estimates, kept. Every estimate you have had from that installer, in one list, including any you started and did not finish. No hunting for the link.
• Written quotations. When the installer sends you a formal quotation, it appears here, with its line items, its total and the date it expires. Every version they have sent stays visible.
• Accepting a quotation online. One button, with a clear confirmation, rather than an email exchange.
• Messages. A thread with the installer about your job, so questions and answers stay in one place instead of scattered across texts and voicemail.
• Documents. Somewhere to send them a photo of your fuse box, and somewhere they can share a document with you.

Without an account you still get your estimate, and the installer still gets your enquiry and still contacts you. You simply do all of the above by email and telephone instead.

How to get one

Two ways, and both are easy.

• Tick the box at step 6. It is ticked by default. Leaving it ticked creates the account as your enquiry is sent, and lands you straight in it.
• Ask for a sign-in link later. Go to your installer’s web address with /account/sign-in on the end, put in the same email address you used, and a link is emailed to you.

There is no password to choose, and nothing to verify before you get your estimate. Signing in without a password explains how that works.

Accounts belong to one installer

This is the part worth understanding, because it surprises people.

Your account is with that installer, not with Solar Desk. If you get estimates from two different companies that both use Solar Desk, you end up with two separate accounts, each reached at that company’s own web address, each with its own sign-in link, even though you used the same email address for both.

That is deliberate. A single shared account would mean one installer could tell that you are also talking to another one, or at the very least that you exist in the system already. Whose customer you are is your business, and keeping the accounts entirely separate is the only way to keep it that way.

The practical effect: sign in at the address where you got that particular estimate, and expect each installer’s account to show only their own work.

Before you can do everything

An account created from the calculator can see its own estimate straight away. Sending a message, uploading a document and accepting a quotation all need you to have used a sign-in link at least once, which proves the email address is really yours. It takes about thirty seconds and you only do it once.

Next: signing in without a password.