SolarCleaningBossPro Blog — Recurring Cleanings

Adding an Inspection Every Other Visit to a Solar Panel Maintenance Plan

A cleaning plan keeps the glass clear. A maintenance plan gives the customer a reason to feel someone is keeping an eye on the whole system. One of the simplest ways to turn the first into the second is to add a visual inspection every other visit. It costs the crew a few minutes on the roof, and it gives the customer something more than clean panels.

Why Add an Inspection

Skipped Visits on a Recurring Solar Cleaning Plan: Rain, Locked Gates and Nobody Home was about keeping visits on track. An inspection is about making each visit worth more to the customer.

Your techs are already on the roof, already looking at every panel up close. Homeowners almost never see their own arrays from that angle. A short, structured look at what is up there, with photos, is valuable to them and turns your crew into the people they call when something looks wrong.

It also gives you a way to make plans more attractive without cutting the price, as discussed in Pricing Plan Visits vs One-Time Solar Panel Cleanings.

Why Every Other Visit

Inspecting on every visit is fine for some commercial accounts, but for most homes it is more than needed and adds time to every stop. Every other visit is a good middle ground:

• A twice-a-year customer gets an inspection once a year.
• A quarterly commercial array gets one twice a year.
• A yearly customer can get one every visit, since visits are a year apart.

Pick a rhythm that suits your area and your crews, and stick to it so customers know what to expect.

What a Visual Inspection Covers

Keep it practical and visual. Your crew are cleaners, not electricians, and the inspection should stay within what can be seen safely from where they already work. A typical checklist:

• Cracked, chipped or discolored panels
• Loose or damaged bird proofing and critter guards
• Signs of nesting or droppings under the array
• Debris trapped under or between panels
• Visible wiring hanging loose or chewed
• Loose racking or mounting hardware that can be seen without touching anything
• Roof condition right around the array, such as lifted shingles

Photograph anything worth mentioning. Do not open junction boxes, touch electrical parts or walk on panels. Point concerns out to the customer and suggest they contact their installer for anything electrical or structural. Check the panel maker's cleaning guidance so your cleaning methods do not cause warranty questions.

Tracking It in SolarCleaningBossPro

Inspection is one of the extras that can sit on a job alongside bird proofing and critter guards, and it shows on the tech's card with the panel details. For an every-other-visit rhythm, a simple approach works:

• Note the rhythm in the job notes: “Inspection every other visit. Last done fall.”
• When the inspection is due, add the inspection line item to that visit.
• The tech sees it on the card, does the inspection, adds photos and notes, and taps Complete.
• Update the note so the next visit knows it is a cleaning-only visit.

Before-and-after photos and inspection photos stay with the job, building a history of the array over the years.

Billing the Inspection

Two common approaches. Some operators include the inspection in the plan price as a reason to stay on the plan, and list it on the invoice at no extra charge so the customer sees it. Others bill it as its own line item from the service list. Either way, list it on the invoice so the customer knows it happened.

If an inspection finds bird activity, it is a natural moment to quote bird proofing or critter guards. See Bird Proofing and Critter Guards for Solar Panel Maintenance Plan Customers.

Report Back to the Customer

An inspection nobody hears about is wasted. After the visit, send a short text from the office: “Panels cleaned and inspected. Everything looks good, one critter guard loose on the east side. We have photos if you want to see them.” That one message tells the customer they are getting more than a rinse.

Keep the inspection consistent from tech to tech. A short written checklist in the truck, or in the job notes, means every inspection covers the same ground. Over the years, the photos and notes build a history of each array that is useful to the customer, to their installer and to you.

Inspections also give your techs a reason to slow down for a moment and look, which tends to catch small problems like a loose critter guard before they turn into big ones.

More Than Clean Glass

An inspection every other visit turns a cleaning plan into a maintenance plan without adding much time. For how plans, extras and billing fit together, see the recurring solar cleaning software page.