Solar subsidy: who pays whom, and when

You pay the installer the full price of the system, in the milestones written into your quote, or the bank pays the installer if you take the PM Surya Ghar: Muft Bijli Yojana loan. Your electricity board (the DISCOM) then inspects the installation and fits the net meter. Only after that does the government transfer the subsidy, straight into the bank account you gave on the portal: "within 30 days" of the claim; about 15 days on average. The installer never receives the subsidy and never deducts it from the invoice.

That order surprises people. A buyer on a public forum in September 2026 asked whether you have to pay everything at once, or whether the installer collects the money from the government and the rest from you, and nobody answered. This page is the answer: who pays whom, in what order, what a loan changes, and how long the transfer takes, with the official figure and the reported one side by side.

The four parties and what each one moves

You. You choose a registered vendor on pmsuryaghar.gov.in, pay that vendor against the written quote, upload your bank details after commissioning, and receive the subsidy. The applicant must be an Indian citizen who owns a house with a suitable roof, has a valid electricity connection and has not taken an earlier solar subsidy.

The installer. The rule is that the installer must be a vendor registered on the national portal, and you choose the vendor on pmsuryaghar.gov.in. The vendor surveys, quotes, installs, uploads the plant details and follows the net meter through. It is paid by you, in full, and by nobody else. Verde Solaire is a registered PM Surya Ghar vendor in both Delhi and Uttar Pradesh.

The electricity board. BSES Rajdhani, BSES Yamuna or Tata Power-DDL in Delhi; PVVNL, NPCL or PUVVNL in the Uttar Pradesh cities we serve. The board approves feasibility, inspects the installation, installs the net meter and triggers the commissioning certificate. It moves no money at this stage; in Delhi it later credits the generation-based incentive against your bill. The net-metering hub identifies your board from the bill.

The government. The central subsidy is ₹30,000 per kW for the first 2 kW and ₹18,000 for the third, so ₹78,000 for 3 kW or more, paid by direct transfer to the consumer's account. The state top-up, ₹30,000 per consumer, on top of the central subsidy in Uttar Pradesh and ₹30,000 (3 kW) in Delhi, comes on top; how it arrives differs by state, and that is covered below.

The timeline: every payment and every event, in order

1. 01

   The written quoteNo money moves

   After the free survey. It names every component and shows three figures: the gross price, the subsidy you will receive, and the net you will have spent once it arrives. Keep it; every later payment refers to it.
2. 02

   Portal registration and applicationNo money moves

   Your consumer number, electricity board and mobile number on pmsuryaghar.gov.in, then the vendor choice. Verde Solaire does this with you on the survey visit.
3. 03

   DISCOM feasibility approvalDISCOM acts

   The board checks the sanctioned load and the transformer. Nothing to pay.
4. 04

   Booking paymentYou pay the installer

   The first milestone in the quote. It secures the material. The exact share is in your written quote, not on this page.
5. 05

   Delivery and installationYou pay the installer

   Panels, inverter and structure arrive, and a second milestone usually falls here. Installation itself takes a few days once material is on site.
6. 06

   Commissioning paymentYou pay the installer

   The balance, as the quote sets it out. At this point you have paid the full gross price and the government has paid nothing yet.
7. 07

   Net-meter application and inspectionDISCOM acts

   The installer uploads the plant details and applies for the net meter; the board inspects and fits it. In Delhi the rule is a connection within 10 days for systems up to 10 kW.
8. 08

   Commissioning certificate, bank details, cancelled chequeYou upload

   The certificate is generated on the portal once the meter is in. You enter the account the subsidy should go to and upload a cancelled cheque. This is the claim, and the official clock starts here.
9. 09

   Subsidy creditedGovernment pays you

   Direct transfer to the account you gave. Officially within 30 days of the claim, about 15 on average; 30 to 45 days is what news and trade reports describe in practice.

Two things stand out. First, all three payments to the installer happen before the government pays anything; by step six you have spent the gross price. Second, the subsidy clock does not start at installation. It starts at the claim, the claim needs the commissioning certificate, and the certificate needs the net meter. In Delhi the DERC guidelines of July 2026 require the connection within 10 days for systems up to 10 kW, with no application fee for domestic connections. We have not found an equivalent deadline in the Uttar Pradesh rules.

Verde Solaire's customers describe this stage in their own words. Arun Sibal wrote that the company "was able to install solar plant at my New Delhi house within few days of receiving their payment", and added: "The only issue was the time taken in installing the net meter from BSES, which was actually not in control of Verde." Navin Verma, with 10 kW in Janakpuri, wrote that the installation was quick but the net-metering process was delayed by the electricity board. On the other side of the ledger, L. R. Singh, with 6 kW in Noida: "I was also able to get solar subsidy in record time because of the follow up of the team of Verde Solaire." Brij Lal Bhardwaj, with 4 kW in Sector 25, Noida, wrote that the team handled the documentation and the liaison for the net meter and got the subsidy processed. The pattern is consistent: the installer's part is fast, the board's part is the wait, and the follow-up decides how long the wait lasts.

What a loan changes, and what it does not

With the scheme's loan, the bank pays the installer instead of you, and you repay the bank in monthly instalments. The loan is collateral-free, from nationalised banks, priced at repo rate plus 0.5 percentage points, which came to 5.75% on 28 July 2026, over 10 years. Many pages still quote around 7% (February 2024 figure, superseded).

What does not change is the subsidy. It is still paid to you, into your own account, after commissioning. It is not paid to the bank and nobody nets it off the loan except you. Putting it against the principal is the obvious use; whether a part-prepayment carries a charge is in the bank's loan terms, so ask before you sign.

A loan is a choice, not a condition. The subsidy does not depend on how you paid the installer. An agent who steers you towards finance before you have seen a written quote is selling the loan, not the system; one of the forum posts behind this page described exactly that. Verde Solaire has tie-ups with SIDBI, SBI and other NBFCs for collateral-free solar loans and prepares the paperwork with you. The solar loan page has the bank-by-bank detail and the EMI calculator nets the subsidy off the amount borrowed.

Official timeline versus reported practice

The official figure is the ministry's own: "within 30 days" of the claim; about 15 days on average. Trade and news reports describe 30–45 days after verification in practice.

Not yet official. Reported by trade and news sources; the official figure is within 30 days.

Both clocks start after the net meter is in and the claim is filed. Neither includes the board's own time, which is where most of the waiting happens, as the customers above describe. Plan on the reported figure and treat the official one as the target. If a portal stage stalls, the portal help page explains what each status means and who acts next.

Delhi and Uttar Pradesh pay their share differently

In Uttar Pradesh, September 2026 news reports describe combined central-plus-state totals of ₹45,000, ₹90,000 and ₹1.08 lakh for 1, 2 and 3 kW, paid by direct bank transfer 30–45 days after verification. In other words, one transfer, both shares.

Not yet official. Confirmed by news reports in September 2026; UPNEDA's site did not load when we checked, so there is no official 2026 confirmation.

In Delhi, subsidised systems: apply on the PM Surya Ghar portal and claim the Delhi subsidy and GBI on solar.delhi.gov.in; unsubsidised systems: the DISCOM portal. The capital subsidy of ₹10,000 per kW, capped at ₹30,000 (3 kW), is a one-off. The generation-based incentive (GBI) of ₹3 per unit for homes up to 3 kW is different money altogether: 5 years from commissioning, paid monthly against the bill; any excess to the bank account. A Delhi household therefore has three inflows: the central transfer, the state transfer, and a monthly credit for five years. The Delhi subsidy page works the incentive out, and the Cabinet decision of 1 September 2026 on a zero-upfront scheme has its own page, because it had not been notified when we checked.

Why the quote must show gross, subsidy and net separately

Because the subsidy is a transfer to you, the invoice has to carry the full price. A quote that gives you only an "after-subsidy price" hides one of two numbers: the gross you are actually being charged, or the subsidy you are actually entitled to. The entitlement is fixed by capacity, so you can check it yourself: ₹78,000 central for 3 kW or more, plus ₹30,000 per consumer, on top of the central subsidy in Uttar Pradesh or ₹30,000 (3 kW) in Delhi. If the subsidy on the quote is a different figure, ask why before you pay anything.

The red flags, in the order we meet them:

• The subsidy shown as "deducted" on an invoice that does not state the gross price, so you cannot check either number against the published slabs.
• Cash-only demands, or a request to pay part of the price without an invoice. GST on solar equipment is 5% (since 22 September 2025, down from 12%) and belongs on the invoice.
• A request to hand the subsidy over to the vendor once it lands, or to share the portal OTP.
• A vendor you cannot find on the portal's registered list. The vendor check takes five minutes.
• A loan pushed before the written quote.

The advance-payment checklist covers the same ground in printable form, and the scam calls page covers the offers that start with "free".

A worked example: 3 kW in Noida

On Verde Solaire's published July 2025 price list, 3 kW costs ₹1,99,000 to ₹2,10,000. That is what you pay the installer, in the quote's milestones, and what the invoice shows. The central subsidy is ₹78,000 and the Uttar Pradesh top-up is ₹30,000, together ₹1,08,000. After PVVNL fits the net meter and you file the claim, that total is transferred to your account, and your net outlay settles at ₹91,000 to ₹1,02,000. The system generates about 338 units a month.

With the loan, the bank pays the installer the gross, you start EMIs at 5.75% over 10 years, and the same subsidy still lands in your account after commissioning. Put it against the principal and either the EMI or the tenure falls. The Noida pricing page has the other capacities, and the calculator does the same arithmetic for any city and size.

Sources and dates

• Official payout timeline and the portal steps: PIB backgrounder, 13 March 2025.
• Loan rate, formula and tenure: PIB Rajya Sabha reply, 28 July 2026.
• Subsidy slabs and the Delhi process: BSES Rajdhani FAQ, September 2025; Delhi connection timeline from the DERC guidelines of 16 July 2026.
• Reported practice and the Uttar Pradesh combined transfer: Business Today, 9 September 2026, and Aaj Tak, 10 September 2026.
• Prices: Verde Solaire's July 2025 posts. The split of payment milestones is not published; the written quote is the document.
• Customer quotes: Verde Solaire's testimonials pages, verbatim; the forum question is from the September 2026 study behind this site.