Illinois Shines Program

1. The Approved Vendor or Designee must provide a copy of the applicable standard Disclosure Form, with all relevant fields completed, to the customer, including the relevant Informational Brochure attached as the first two pages. The Informational Brochure and Disclosure Form must be provided in their entirety and not be edited or modified. For in-person contract execution, the agent must review the Disclosure Form with the customer and provide the opportunity to ask questions. For online contract execution, the platform must provide a phone number or online chat function for customer questions. The Approved Vendor or Designee must provide the completed standard Disclosure Form, and the customer must sign that Disclosure Form, BEFORE the customer signs a contract. An electronic signature is permitted only if the Approved Vendor or Designee uses a third-party commercially available e-signature platform to collect the signatures. In addition, the platform must require the customer to scroll through the entire document before signing. The signatory on the Disclosure Form must be the holder of the relevant utility account, or, if the account holder is a company or organization, an individual authorized to sign on behalf of the account holder.

a. All customers fall into IPA approved exception categories; and as such, Disclosures should be signed by the person who will sign the contract.

2. For any Illinois Shines distributed generation offer where some, or all, of the REC incentive value is paid to the customer after system energization, the Approved Vendor or Designee must provide a copy of the Going Solar flyer, review it with the customer, and provide the customer with an opportunity to ask questions.

3. After completion of the preceding steps, the Approved Vendor or Designee may present the customer contract for execution.

4. After execution of the customer contract, the Approved Vendor or Designee shall provide to the customer a copy of the signed Disclosure Form, installation or subscription contract, and any other contracts or agreements that the customer signed as part of accepting the offer.

• • For documents signed electronically by the customer, the Approved Vendor or Designee must provide the signed copies by electronic means. At the request of the customer, the Approved Vendor or Designee must also provide hard copies of the signed documents.
  • For documents where the customer signed a hard copy, the Approved Vendor or Designee must give the customer the option of receiving the signed copy electronically or as a hard copy.
  • Electronic copies must be sent or available to the customer within 24 hours of signing. For electronic means, the documents may be provided by email, through an online portal, or through the e-signature platform (as long as the documents can be accessed at any time after they have been signed and are not only accessible during the signing process).
  • Hard-copy documents sent by mail must be sent by United States Postal Service first class (or equivalent) and must be properly addressed, with adequate postage, and postmarked within 2 business days. Hard-copy documents that are hand-delivered must be provided to the customer within 3 business days.
  • All applicable fields in the Disclosure Form must be complete and accurate before presentation to the customer. Required disclosures may not simply refer the customer to their contract or to an attachment. If a variable price or rate is based on the amount of a net-metering or similar bill credit, the Disclosure Form must disclose an explanation of how that calculation will be performed. For example, for a community solar subscription rate that is calculated as a percentage of a customer’s bill credit, that specific percentage must be disclosed.