Hire a VA · Solar VA
Solar virtual assistant: cost per project, per permit and per month
$8.50–$14.00 an hour · $1,360–$2,240 a month full-time
That's the agency example below for a dedicated solar VA working only for you: no recruitment or setup fee, billed monthly for hours worked. Part-time (80 hours) comes to $680–$1,120 a month.
On this page
- Three receipts for the same project desk
- What the VA handles, what stays with your team
- Price per permit packet, update and survey
- One project, contract to power-on, in VA minutes
- Calculator: your hours and cost per install
- What your installers' paperwork time costs
- The permit and interconnection desk
- The quiet weeks, priced per update
- Rebate and incentive paperwork: admin only
- Leads and site surveys: cost per booked survey
- Three solar companies, worked through
- A full-time week, priced by block
- The first year, both ways
- Numbers to check every Monday
- The software bill and homeowner documents
- How the agency example bills
- A 30-minute test before you hire
- The first month
- Solar office terms, in one line each
- How to hire one here
Three receipts for the same project desk
In most small and mid-size solar companies the paperwork between a signed contract and a working system lands on whoever has a free hour: the owner, a sales rep, the lead installer after a roof day. When owners price help for it, they usually compare an administrative assistant who runs the project files, or a customer service representative (CSR) who keeps homeowners informed. US government pay data has both jobs. Each slip prices a full-time employee at the national median, then adds what an employer pays on top of the wage.
Published by Outsourcing Insider, a VA MASTERS company. The agency slip uses VA MASTERS' published solar VA rates, shown because they're public; other agencies' prices vary. About us
Administrative assistant, US
Full-time, per month
- Median pay ($48,310 a year)a$4,026
- Paid leave1$337
- Supplemental pay (overtime, bonuses)1$179
- Health and other insurance1$342
- Retirement plans1$125
- Payroll taxes and required insurance1$429
Monthly total$5,438
Per year$65,261
- About $31.38 an hour loaded (monthly total ÷ 173 hours). Can sign for a pallet of panels at the warehouse and walk a permit to the counter; a VA can't.
- Benefit costs are the average for private employers with 1–49 workers; your own package may differ.
Customer service rep, US
Full-time, per month
- Median pay ($44,770 a year)a$3,731
- Paid leave1$312
- Supplemental pay (overtime, bonuses)1$166
- Health and other insurance1$317
- Retirement plans1$116
- Payroll taxes and required insurance1$398
Monthly total$5,040
Per year$60,479
- About $29.08 an hour loaded. The national median across all industries, not only solar.
Solar VA, agency example Parent company
VA MASTERS, Solar VA roles
- 160 hours at $8.50–$14.00$1,360–$2,240
- Recruitment or setup fee$0
Monthly total$1,360–$2,240
Per year$16,320–$26,880
- Part-time, 80 hours: $680–$1,120 a month. 40 hours: $340–$560.
- Card or PayPal payments add 4%; USD bank transfer has no fee.
- US Bureau of Labor Statistics, Occupational Outlook Handbook, May 2025 median pay: secretaries and administrative assistants $48,310 a year ($23.23 an hour); customer service representatives $44,770 ($21.53 an hour); solar photovoltaic installers $53,140 ($25.55 an hour). Checked Nov 2026.
- U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Employer Costs for Employee Compensation, June 2026, Table 6. Checked Oct 2026.
- SHRM, 'SHRM Releases 2025 Benchmarking Reports' press release (Oct 15, 2025). Checked Oct 2026.
- Agency example: VA MASTERS solar company virtual assistant page ($8.50–$14.00 an hour), checked Nov 2026; terms from the VA MASTERS pricing page, checked Oct 2026.
The admin slip is the fair comparison when the job is mostly permit packets, utility forms and keeping the project tracker right. The CSR slip fits a job that is mostly homeowner calls, survey bookings and status questions. In a small company one remote assistant does both. Someone who only books surveys sits near the bottom of the rate range; someone who already knows permit portals and utility forms sits near the top.
What the VA handles, what stays with your team
Solar paperwork sits next to work that needs a license, a stamp or a tax adviser. Put this table in the VA's first-day guide so the line is clear before the first homeowner call.
| The VA does | Your team (or the customer's adviser) decides |
|---|---|
| Assembles permit and interconnection packets from the plan set your designer produced | The design, the drawings, any engineering letter and every stamp or signature: your designer, engineer or licensed electrician |
| Sends homeowners the production estimate exactly as your proposal software and designer produced it | Any savings or payback figure; the VA promises none and gives no guarantee |
| Collects the documents an incentive or rebate program asks for and fills the forms for your sign-off | Whether a customer qualifies for anything. Tax credits are the customer's question for their tax adviser; the VA quotes no percentages or amounts |
| Sends the utility's own published page on billing for solar customers when a homeowner asks | Net metering explanations: rules vary by utility and state, so the homeowner checks with the utility |
| Books installs and inspections, tells the homeowner the window and how to prepare | Anything on the roof or in the panel, and anything a homeowner reports about safety: straight to your crew lead |
| Tracks lender application status in the lender's portal and chases missing documents | Loan terms and credit questions: the lender and your sales rep |
| Calls and texts leads who asked to hear from you, under your consent and scrub rules | Any outbound list and its compliance rules: check with counsel |
The rule that saves the most trouble is the template rule. A homeowner who asks "so how much will I save?" or "do I get the tax credit?" gets the reply you approved: the proposal shows the designer's estimate, and tax questions go to their own tax adviser.
Price per permit packet, update and survey
The VA's cost is the rate times the minutes. The minutes below are example assumptions for a VA who already knows your CRM and the jurisdictions you file in; a new jurisdiction takes longer the first few times. Time your own first month and replace them.
| Task | What's in it | Minutes (example) | Cost each |
|---|---|---|---|
| New lead answered | Call, text or email back; your intake questions (owner or renter, roof age, recent utility bill, shade, HOA); CRM record created | 10 | $1.42–$2.33 |
| Site survey booked | Slot from the surveyor's calendar, what-to-expect message, access notes, reminder the day before | 8 | $1.13–$1.87 |
| Proposal followed up | One touch on a proposal your designer or rep sent, questions logged and passed on, price unchanged | 5 | $0.71–$1.17 |
| Homeowner documents collected | Utility bill, HOA approval letter, photos of the main panel, chased until complete and filed on the project | 12 | $1.70–$2.80 |
| Permit packet assembled | Plan set and spec sheets from your designer, the jurisdiction's forms filled, uploaded to the portal or sent by the AHJ's method | 45 | $6.38–$10.50 |
| Permit status check | Portal checked or the permit office called, status and any correction notes logged | 5 | $0.71–$1.17 |
| Correction routed and resubmitted | Correction notice read, sent to your designer, revised sheets uploaded, homeowner told | 20 | $2.83–$4.67 |
| Interconnection application filed | Utility's forms filled from your system specs and diagrams, documents attached, fee paid with your approved card | 40 | $5.67–$9.33 |
| Homeowner status update | Templated message: where the project stands, what happens next, nothing promised beyond your template | 4 | $0.57–$0.93 |
| Install or inspection booked | Crew calendar, homeowner availability, prep instructions, confirmation | 10 | $1.42–$2.33 |
| Rebate or incentive packet | Program form filled from the project file, documents attached, deadline logged, sent for your sign-off | 30 | $4.25–$7.00 |
| Review request | Short message after permission to operate with your review link | 2 | $0.28–$0.47 |
One project, contract to power-on, in VA minutes
Add the tasks up for one residential project and the VA cost per job becomes a single number you can put next to your margin. One example project, from first call to permission to operate, with one permit correction and one incentive packet:
One residential project, VA time
Example: one correction cycle, one incentive packet
- Lead answered and qualified10 min
- Site survey booked and confirmed8 min
- Three proposal follow-ups15 min
- Contract signature chased, CRM staged8 min
- Homeowner documents collected12 min
- Permit packet assembled and submitted45 min
- Six weekly permit checks30 min
- One correction cycle20 min
- Interconnection application filed40 min
- Four interconnection status checks20 min
- Install day booked, prep instructions sent10 min
- Inspection booked, homeowner told10 min
- Eight homeowner status updates32 min
- Permission-to-operate notice, monitoring app invite, review request10 min
- One rebate or incentive packet, where a program applies30 min
VA time5 hours
Cost per project$42.50–$70.00
- Leads that never sign aren't in this slip; the calculator below adds them. Permit fees, utility fees and software are separate lines on your side, whoever does the paperwork.
The biggest lines are the permit packet and the interconnection application, and both shrink once the VA has a written procedure for each jurisdiction and utility you work with. The most variable line is the correction cycle: three corrections add another hour of VA time, and the delay costs more than the hour. Missing-document corrections a checklist can stop; design questions only your designer can fix.
Calculator: your hours and cost per install
Solar volume is easy to count: installs a month and new leads a month come straight out of your CRM. Put in your numbers to see how many VA hours the office side takes and what that comes to per install.
- VA hours a month–
- Suggested block–
- VA cost a month for those hours (agency example)–
- Per install–
- Same hours at the admin slip's loaded hour–
With the defaults, 10 installs and 80 leads come to about 74 hours a month: $629–$1,036, or $62.90–$103.60 per install, leads included. That fits an 80-hour part-time block. Billing is for hours worked, so a month with few new contracts costs less than the block.
What your installers' paperwork time costs
In many solar companies the paperwork isn't left undone. It is done by the lead installer or project manager in the evening: the permit upload, the photo set for the utility, the reply to the homeowner who wants to know when the meter gets swapped. Here is what that time costs a month per person at a loaded $34.52 an hour (the BLS median for solar photovoltaic installers, $25.55 an hour, plus employer costs from the slips), against the same hours from a VA. Minutes a day are examples; 21.7 working days a month.
| Paperwork per person a day | Hours a month | At the installer's hour | Same hours from a VA |
|---|---|---|---|
| 20 minutes | 7.2 | $250 | $61–$101 |
| 45 minutes | 16.3 | $562 | $138–$228 |
| 90 minutes | 32.5 | $1,124 | $277–$456 |
The direct cost is the smaller half. An installer filling forms is not on a roof, and forms done tired at night come back as permit corrections.
The permit and interconnection desk
This is the part of the job that most separates a solar VA from a general assistant. Each authority having jurisdiction (AHJ) has its own forms, portal and correction habits, and each utility its own interconnection process. Who owns each step:
| Step | The VA | Your team |
|---|---|---|
| Permit packet | Fills the jurisdiction's forms, attaches the plan set and spec sheets, uploads or sends by the AHJ's method, logs the submission | Produces and signs the plan set; any engineering letter or stamp |
| Status | Checks the portal or calls the permit office on the schedule you set, logs every answer on the project | Nothing, unless something is stuck |
| Corrections | Reads the notice, fixes missing-document items from your checklist, routes design items to the designer, resubmits | Every change to the design or drawings |
| Interconnection | Fills the utility's application from your system specs and diagrams, pays fees with the card and approval rule you set, tracks status | The single-line diagram and any technical answer to the utility |
| Inspection | Books the inspection, tells the homeowner the window and access needs, logs the result | Being on site; fixing anything the inspector flags |
| Permission to operate | Watches for the utility's approval, tells the homeowner, sends your monitoring-app instructions | Turning the system on, by your licensed crew's process |
The setup cost worth budgeting is one written procedure per jurisdiction and per utility: forms, portal, fees, typical correction notes and contact details. A VA can draft each one from your last few permits in about three hours of example time, $25.50–$42.00 each, for you to check. For a company filing in 8 jurisdictions and 2 utilities that is about 30 hours once, $255–$420, and the procedures stay yours if the VA ever leaves. Companies doing commercial work or general building alongside solar may also want our page on construction admin VA costs, which covers RFIs, submittals and lien-waiver tracking.
The quiet weeks, priced per update
Between a signed contract and a working system there are weeks when nothing visible happens to the homeowner: the permit sits with the jurisdiction, the utility reviews the application, equipment is on order. Homeowners call the sales rep, who is out selling. A short scheduled update from a template ("your permit was submitted on Tuesday; the next step is the city's review; we'll write again next week") answers the call before it is made. At an example 4 minutes per update and one update a week for every open project, here is the monthly cost:
| Open projects | Updates a month | VA hours a month | VA cost a month |
|---|---|---|---|
| 10 | 43 | 2.9 | $24–$40 |
| 25 | 108 | 7.2 | $61–$101 |
| 50 | 217 | 14.5 | $123–$203 |
| 100 | 433 | 28.9 | $245–$404 |
This page quotes no figures on how updates change refunds or reviews; nobody publishes honest ones for solar. What you can count is the "what's happening with my project?" calls to your sales reps, for two weeks before the VA starts and two weeks after. A good template set covers at least: welcome after contract, documents needed, permit submitted, permit approved, install date, install done, inspection booked, utility review, permission to operate, and the review request.
Rebate and incentive paperwork: admin only
Incentive programs are where solar admin most easily turns into advice nobody should give. The VA's job is the paperwork, not the promise:
- Program tracker: a sheet of the state, utility and local programs you offer, each with its official source page, application window, required documents and the date someone last checked it. The VA re-checks the official pages on a schedule you set and flags changes to you; it doesn't interpret them for customers.
- Packets: forms filled from the project file, homeowner documents attached, sent for your sign-off before submission, deadline logged, follow-ups with the program administrator until the status is final.
- Renewable energy certificate programs: where a state runs one and you offer to handle enrollment, the VA does the registration paperwork the program lists. Prices and payments are the program's business; the VA quotes none.
- Federal tax credits: federal rules for solar credits changed in 2025, and what any customer can claim depends on their own situation. The VA gives no tax-credit figures or eligibility answers: the customer's tax adviser decides, and the VA's template says so.
At the example 30 minutes, one packet costs $4.25–$7.00 in VA time. A company filing 10 packets a month spends about 5 hours, $42.50–$70.00. The real value is the deadline log: a missed program window can't be fixed afterwards, and a Monday check of the log is cheap.
Leads and site surveys: cost per booked survey
The front of the pipeline is the work most solar owners hand over first: reply to new leads quickly, ask your intake questions, book the site survey or consultation, and follow up on proposals that went quiet. The cost per booked survey depends on how many leads it takes to book one, which only your CRM knows. At an example 12 minutes of VA time per lead (reply, questions, one or two follow-ups):
| Leads per booked survey (your CRM's number) | VA minutes per booked survey | VA cost per booked survey |
|---|---|---|
| 1 in 3 | 36 | $5.10–$8.40 |
| 1 in 5 | 60 | $8.50–$14.00 |
| 1 in 8 | 96 | $13.60–$22.40 |
If you buy leads, the VA's minutes are a small addition to a cost you have already paid; the expensive outcome is a bought lead nobody called back. Multiply your own unanswered leads by your own booking rate and job value to price that.
Phone and text rules: calling or texting people who asked for a quote is different from working a bought or cold list. Outbound calls and texts in the US fall under the Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA) and the National Do Not Call Registry, and many states add their own rules. The VA follows your consent records, your scrub process and your calling hours; what those rules are is a question for your counsel, not the VA. If outbound calling is most of the job, our page on cold calling VA costs prices that role on its own.
Three solar companies, worked through
Example businesses with example volumes, priced with the agency example's rate:
Owner-led residential installer
About 5 installs a month, one crew
- 40 hours a month$340–$560
Per install$68–$112
- Permit packets, utility forms, inspection bookings and weekly homeowner updates. The owner stops uploading plan sets at midnight.
Regional residential installer
About 20 installs a month, four crews, 6 jurisdictions
- 160 hours a month$1,360–$2,240
Per install$68–$112
- Lead replies and survey booking in the morning, permit and utility desk in the afternoon, CRM kept current, Monday report to the owner.
Residential and commercial
Two seats: homeowner side and commercial projects
- Leads, surveys and homeowners, 160 hours$1,360–$2,240
- Commercial project admin, 80 hours$680–$1,120
Monthly total$2,040–$3,360
- Commercial jobs carry longer document lists and utility reviews; the engineering and utility studies stay with your engineers.
Companies that also install heat pumps or run a service board will find more on what an HVAC VA costs.
A full-time week, priced by block
Where 40 hours of a full-time solar VA typically go, and what each block costs at $8.50–$14.00 an hour. Illustrative split; your volume decides the real one.
| Block | Hours a week | Cost a week | Output |
|---|---|---|---|
| Leads and survey bookings | 8 | $68.00–$112 | New leads answered and qualified, surveys and consultations booked and confirmed |
| Proposals, contracts, documents | 6 | $51.00–$84.00 | Proposal follow-ups, signatures chased, utility bills and HOA papers collected |
| Permits and interconnection | 10 | $85.00–$140 | Packets submitted, status checked, corrections routed, utility applications filed |
| Homeowner updates and questions | 7 | $59.50–$98.00 | Weekly updates sent, questions answered from templates, the rest passed on |
| Install and inspection scheduling | 5 | $42.50–$70.00 | Crew calendar, prep instructions, inspections booked, results logged |
| CRM, incentive packets, Monday report | 4 | $34.00–$56.00 | Stages correct, duplicates merged, deadline log checked, numbers sent |
The first year, both ways
| Line | In-house admin assistant | Full-time VA (agency example) |
|---|---|---|
| Twelve months of pay and payroll costs | $65,261 | $16,320–$26,880 |
| Average cost per hire2 | $5,475 | $0 recruitment fee |
| Desk, computer, headset | Your purchase | The VA's own |
| Procedures per jurisdiction | Your time either way | Drafted by the VA, checked by you |
| Part-time option | Hard to hire for 20 hours | 80 hours: $8,160–$13,440 a year |
Numbers to check every Monday
Your CRM and project tracker already count most of this. Ask for a one-page weekly report. You set the targets; there are no honest industry benchmarks to copy.
| Number | How it's counted | What it tells you |
|---|---|---|
| Lead reply time in the VA's hours | Time from lead to first reply, from your CRM | Whether leads hear back while they're still comparing installers |
| Leads to booked surveys | Surveys booked ÷ new leads | How well the intake questions and follow-ups work |
| Contract to permit submitted | Days, per project, from your tracker | Whether packets wait on documents or on the desk |
| Corrections per permit, by cause | Missing documents vs design questions | Which ones a checklist can stop, and which go to your designer |
| Install to permission to operate | Days, per project and per utility | Which utility or inspection step is slow |
| Homeowners without an update | Open projects with no message in 7 days | Whether the quiet weeks stay covered |
| Incentive deadlines in the next 30 days | From the deadline log | What can't slip this month |
The software bill and homeowner documents
The hourly rate covers the person, not the software. Solar CRMs and project tools (JobNimbus, HubSpot, Salesforce, Scoop), design and proposal software (Aurora Solar, OpenSolar), e-signature (DocuSign, PandaDoc), permit portals, utility portals, lender portals and your phone and texting system bill you per plan, per user or per transaction, whoever does the work. Check whether your plan charges for an extra office user before you compare totals.
Solar files hold personal documents: utility bills with account numbers, signed contracts, lender paperwork, photos of the house. Keep them in your CRM or project tool, not in email threads or chat. Give the VA a named login with only the permissions the role needs, two-factor login where offered, and no access to bank accounts or payroll; let the VA pay permit and utility fees only with a card and spending rule you set. Our guide on giving a VA access to accounts walks through it. Remove access the day the role ends; the records stay in your systems.
How the agency example bills
- Billed monthly after the work, for hours worked only
- Nothing to pay before you choose your hire
- 30-day trial with each new hire: end it right away, no notice
- After the trial, 30 days' written notice
- Replacement at no extra cost
- A one-time advance payment once you choose your hire, credited against your first invoices and refundable
- Recruitment, placement or setup fee: None
- Bank transfer in USD: No processing fee
- Credit card or PayPal: 4% processing fee
A 30-minute test before you hire
What you are testing is accuracy on forms and discipline about what not to promise; the jurisdictions you can teach.
- Permit packet (10 minutes): hand over a one-page jurisdiction procedure, a sample plan set cover sheet and a blank permit form. Do they fill it accurately, and do they spot the document the procedure asks for that isn't in the folder?
- Correction notice (6 minutes): a notice with two items, one a missing spec sheet and one a question about conductor sizing. The right answer fixes the first from the folder and sends the second to your designer without trying to answer it.
- Homeowner question (6 minutes): "Will I get the full tax credit, and how much will I save each month?" Look for a warm reply that points to the proposal's estimate and to the customer's tax adviser, with no figures of their own.
- Status update (8 minutes): a project tracker screenshot and your template; write this week's update for a homeowner whose permit is in its third week. Short, plain sentences, nothing promised beyond the template.
Our interview questions template has more to ask, and the job description templates are a starting point for the brief.
The first month
| Week | Solar VA | You |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Learns the CRM and tracker, reads past permits and homeowner messages, sends updates with you checking | Logins, the "VA does vs your team" table, update templates, pipeline stage definitions |
| 2 | Drafts a procedure for each jurisdiction and utility; takes lead replies and survey bookings | Check the procedures; answer what the past files didn't show |
| 3 | Submits permit packets and runs status checks; first interconnection applications | Review each packet before it goes, until the corrections settle |
| 4 | Incentive deadline log, CRM cleanup, first Monday report | Agree the weekly numbers and targets above |
Solar office terms, in one line each
Useful for the job description and for checking a candidate knows the work.
- AHJ (authority having jurisdiction)
- The city, county or other office that issues the building or electrical permit and inspects the work.
- Plan set
- The drawings and documents your designer prepares for the permit; the VA submits it, never changes it.
- Single-line diagram
- A simplified electrical drawing of the system that permits and utilities usually ask for; drawn by your design team.
- Interconnection application
- The utility's process for approving a system to connect to its grid.
- PTO (permission to operate)
- The utility's approval to switch the system on.
- SolarAPP+
- An online permitting tool that some jurisdictions use to approve standard residential systems automatically.
How to hire a solar VA here
Requests from this site go to our recruiting partner, the agency in the example above, at $8.50–$14.00 an hour for solar office roles:
- Tell us the job: residential, commercial or both, installs a month, your CRM and proposal software, the jurisdictions and utilities you file with, and the hours you need covered.
- Meet a shortlist: candidates with project coordination, permitting, construction admin or customer service backgrounds, usually in about 2 business days.
- Choose and start: nothing is paid before you choose; billing is monthly, after the work, for hours worked.
The trade-offs: an agency costs more per hour than hiring a freelancer yourself, in exchange for screening, payroll handling and free replacement; the first weeks need your time for the jurisdiction procedures, the templates and checking packets.
More: part-time vs full-time VA cost, outsourcing vs hiring in-house and what customer support costs by country.
Questions people ask about the cost
How much does a solar virtual assistant cost?
In the agency example on this page (our parent company's published rates), a dedicated solar VA costs $8.50–$14 an hour: $340–$560 a month for 40 hours, $680–$1,120 for 80 hours and $1,360–$2,240 for 160 hours, with no recruitment or setup fee. Survey booking sits lower in the range; permit and utility paperwork experience sits higher.
How does that compare with an in-house admin assistant?
The US median pay for secretaries and administrative assistants was $48,310 a year ($23.23 an hour) in May 2025, and for customer service representatives $44,770 ($21.53 an hour), according to the BLS Occupational Outlook Handbook. Payroll taxes and benefits come on top; the slips on this page add them line by line from BLS employer cost data. A full-time VA in the agency example costs $16,320–$26,880 for 1,920 hours a year.
What does a solar VA cost per installed project?
At this page's example times, one residential project from first call to permission to operate (permit packet, one correction, interconnection application, scheduling, eight homeowner updates and one incentive packet) takes about 300 minutes of VA time, or $42.50–$70.00. Add the leads that never sign and the calculator on this page puts 10 installs and 80 leads a month at about $63–$104 per install.
Can a solar VA handle permit applications and interconnection?
Yes, the paperwork: filling each jurisdiction's and utility's forms, attaching the plan set and diagrams your designer produced, submitting through the portal, checking status on your schedule, routing correction notices and booking inspections. The VA never signs or stamps drawings, does no engineering or electrical work and never changes the design; those stay with your designer, engineer and licensed electricians.
Can a VA tell customers how much they'll save or what tax credit they get?
No. The VA sends the production estimate exactly as your proposal software and designer produced it and promises no savings or payback. Federal rules for solar tax credits changed in 2025, and what a customer can claim depends on their situation: the customer's tax adviser decides. The VA's approved reply says so and quotes no percentages or amounts.
Can a VA explain net metering to homeowners?
Only by sending the utility's own published information or the explanation you approved. Net metering and solar billing rules vary by utility and state and change from time to time, so the homeowner checks the details with their utility. The VA makes no claims about credits or bill amounts.
Can a VA call leads and book site surveys?
Yes: replying to new leads, asking your intake questions, booking surveys or consultations and following up on proposals. Calling or texting people who asked for a quote is different from working a bought or cold list; outbound calls and texts fall under the TCPA, the National Do Not Call Registry and state rules. The VA follows your consent records and scrub process; check with counsel on what those should be.
What does a VA do with rebate and incentive paperwork?
The admin: a tracker of the programs you offer with their official source pages, windows and required documents, packets filled from the project file for your sign-off, deadlines logged and follow-ups with the program administrator. At the example 30 minutes a packet that is $4.25–$7.00 each. The VA doesn't decide who qualifies and doesn't interpret program rules for customers.
Does a solar VA work for commercial projects too?
Yes, on the admin side: longer document lists, utility review steps, lender and owner paperwork, and more parties to update. Engineering, utility studies and anything technical stay with your engineers.
How do I keep homeowner documents and fees safe?
Keep utility bills, contracts and lender papers in your CRM or project tool, not in email or chat. Give the VA a named login with only the permissions the role needs and two-factor login where offered, and let it pay permit and utility fees only with a card and spending rule you set. Remove access the day the role ends.
Does the hourly rate include Aurora, JobNimbus or our other software?
No. Your CRM, design and proposal software, e-signature tool, permit and utility portals and phone system bill you per plan, per user or per transaction, whoever does the work. Permit and utility fees are yours too.
Are there extra fees, when do I pay, and can I cancel?
In the agency example there is no recruitment, placement or setup fee and no fee for USD bank transfers; card or PayPal payments carry a 4% processing fee. A one-time advance payment is due once you choose your hire, credited against your first invoices and refundable. Billing is monthly after the work, for hours worked only. Each new hire has a 30-day trial you can end right away; after that, 30 days' written notice applies, and a replacement is provided at no extra cost.