Selling through the Clearing House is the do-it-yourself route to the fixed $40 price. It works, but it asks more of you than selling to a trader, and it does not promise a date.
What you need before you start
You need a REC Registry account that has Clearing House access, and you need the certificates sitting in that account. For an installer that normally means your customer has assigned their STC rights to you, and you have created and registered the certificates. If you are not set up to create them yourself, an agent or trader does that step for you. Our guide to selling your own STCs walks through registration, and whether self-registering is worth it puts the admin load in perspective.
The steps
- Create the STCs in the registry after the system is registered with the Clean Energy Regulator and the certificates pass validation.
- List the certificates for sale on the Clearing House transfer list, which holds them until a buyer is available.
- Wait. Certificates sell first in, first out as buyers purchase, at $40 excluding GST.
- Receive payment through your Clearing House account in the registry.
You can read how long step three takes in how long the Clearing House takes.
What it costs
The price you receive is $40 ex GST, which is the maximum. What it costs you is time and admin. The regulator’s guidance does not describe a transaction fee, but check its fee information before you list because schedules change. You will also carry GST obligations if you are registered. Our GST explainer shows how the figure behaves.
The larger cost is invisible: waiting. A long queue ties up cash you may need for suppliers, and a rejected claim ahead of it can add days. Compare that to a trader’s published rate and settlement time on the pricing page.
When it makes sense
The Clearing House suits a small installer with a few systems a month, a comfortable cash buffer, and no wish to deal with a trader. It also works as a fallback when the spot price falls well below $40 and a trader’s rate looks poor. It makes less sense for an installer running dozens of jobs a month, where one stalled week of settlements can break a payroll.
What this means for installers
Decide on cash flow before price. If you can wait, use the Clearing House and treat $40 as the target. If you cannot, a trader gives a date, and how STC trading works and our guide to choosing a certificate trader help you compare. When you are ready, start trading.