How to sell STCs

Who can sell STCs

The right to create STCs belongs to the owner of the system on the day it is installed. Almost every owner signs it over on an STC assignment form to a registered agent, in exchange for a discount on the system or a cash payment later. From then on the right moves down a chain:

• The system owner can keep the right and create the certificates with a registered person account, which is rare.
• The retailer or installer takes the assignment as part of the sale and passes it to a trader or creates the certificates through its own agent.
• A registered agent creates the certificates in the REC Registry. Many traders are agents; so are we.
• A trader or aggregator buys the right, creates the certificates and sells them in bulk to the electricity retailers that have to surrender them.

Whoever creates the certificates must do it within 12 months of the install and carries the regulator's audit. How the whole chain works.

The three ways to sell

Most retailers and installers use the first route, because it keeps cash moving and keeps the audit with someone else. The regulator's own guide is that validation usually takes 4 to 6 weeks, longer when documents are incomplete, so creating certificates yourself means carrying every job for that long.

Selling to a trader, step by step

1. Open an account. The trader checks your business and connects you in its software. With us that takes one call and a form, and your jobs run in BridgeSelect.
2. Enter the job and install it. The customer signs the assignment form, and the installer captures serial numbers, geotagged photos and the written statements on site.
3. Submit the claim. The trader checks it against the regulator's requirements before it pays, because it is the one who will be audited.
4. Get paid. At the trader's published price, on its published timing. Check both before you start, and get the terms in writing. What to check in any STC trader, including us.

You can use more than one trader. BridgeSelect says one login can work with several, so trying a new one on a few jobs costs nothing. How a job runs with us.

Selling them yourself

To create certificates you need a REC Registry account: a registered agent account to create them for other people's systems, or a registered person account for your own. Becoming a registered agent means applying to the regulator, completing its online program and remaining a fit and proper person.

• Fees. $0.47 per certificate for small generation units once you pass your first 250 certificates, and then on all of them.
• Audit. The regulator checks every claim and can fail one that is incomplete, incorrect or ineligible. It can ask for the documents for up to five years.
• Selling. Registered certificates sell on the open market, where buyers and sellers agree a price and settle outside the registry, or in the clearing house at $40 before GST, when a buyer comes along.
• GST. Selling or transferring a certificate is a taxable supply if you are registered for GST. The clearing house price and market prices are quoted before it. GST on STCs.
• Deadline. Within 12 months of the installation date. If you are within 8 weeks of it, the regulator recommends using a registered agent rather than setting up your own account.

If you own the system

A homeowner can sell STCs, but almost nobody does it directly. A 6.6 kW system in Sydney installed in 2026 earns 45 certificates, and creating them yourself means a registered person account, the audit, the fees and finding a buyer, for a few thousand dollars. Assigning the right to your retailer's agent gets the same value taken off the price of the system on the day you sign.

Two things are worth checking before you sign the assignment form: that the registered agent named on it is a business you have actually dealt with or your retailer has named to you, and that the form states the discount you are getting for the right. You can only assign the right once. The STC assignment form, explained.

We buy from retailers and installers rather than from homeowners. If you are buying a system from Get Solar, we handle the STCs for you: rebates for your home.

What you need before you can sell

Whichever route you take, the regulator's requirements are the same, and a trader will check them before it pays:

• The signed STC assignment form, naming the right registered agent and the financial incentive.
• The written statements from the accredited designer, the accredited installer and the retailer. A battery needs its own.
• The state's electrical safety certificate from the licensed electrician. Each state names it differently, and WA also needs a Notice of Completion: see your state below.
• Serial numbers for the panels, inverter and battery, and time-stamped, geotagged photos, including the installer on site.
• Approved components, an accredited installer, and the install within the last 12 months.

Panel validation on site, which the BridgeSelect app does, checks the serial numbers against manufacturer data as they are scanned, and the regulator says it can process those claims faster when it finds no other risk. What each claim needs, in one list.

What you will get

Three numbers frame every STC price. The clearing house pays $40 before GST, which is a ceiling because any buyer can get certificates there for that. The open market traded at about $39.65 to $39.85 before GST in the last week of October 2026. And traders publish what they pay for the right to create certificates: on 3 November 2026 the prices we found on other traders' websites ran from about $38.20 to $39.50.

We pay $41 per STC incl GST on a home system as at 3 November 2026, with no fees taken off and paid within 1 business day of approval. That is above the $40 cap, and the regulator advises caution with prices above it, so check us as you would any trader: the main risk in selling STCs is not being paid, and fast payment keeps the amount you have at risk small. How STC prices work, and what your job is worth.

Selling STCs in your state

The price is the same everywhere in Australia. What changes is the zone, which sets how many certificates a panel job earns, and the electrical paperwork each state asks for. Installed in 2026, a 6.6 kW system earns:

Capital city postcodes. The zones do not follow state lines, so check the postcode of the job: every postcode range and its zone.