I've had two sets of panels installed on my house....

I've had two sets of panels installed on my house. In 2009 I interviewed Sun Power of AZ and TFS. I thought they were both well qualified, but ended up going with the smaller company (Sun Power) to help the "littler" guy. I believe Sun Power did a fine job and have had no issues to date with their equipment or installation.

In 2013 I decided to add 10 more panels to bring my net yearly use to approximately zero. I still wanted to stay local to benefit Tucson and to use a company that used installers that worked just for them. I went with TFS the second time. I couldn't be happier with the entire scope of the TFS job. They were courteous, communicated well, showed up on time, did exactly what was agreed upon and installed a professional looking system. After the job was finished I felt that TFS had given me a quality installation at a fair price. Despite the fact that they continuously monitor the performance of my system (it's not a leased system, so I'm not sure they need to do this), they've checked in on me yearly to see if I had any issues.

Additional point: During the TFS initial site inspection, the estimator quickly noted that a few of the Sun Power panels probably shaded a small portion of 6 other panels in late December. I told him he was correct. I liked the fact that this bugged him, and he wanted to correct it. Although I can't remember what he added to the cost to prevent the shading, I remember it being a minor amount. That small adjustment improved the output of my Sun Power panels 50% in late December/early January! I'm not sure other contractors would've cared about another installation or, if asked to correct the situation, would've charged anywhere near what TFS did. TFS is a for profit company, but I certainly get the feeling that is not their number one priority.

Solar City is making a big push around the country to install leased systems at no up-front out-of-pocket cost. Before going with such a large company that contracts out installations, I would ask that you include TFS in your bids. I believe TFS is trying to work with TEP to provide the same sort of lease system that Solar City would.