I was told that this can be flush mounted onto the ceiling and that's the reason why I bought this product. The electrician said it cannot be done; you need the rod to install with it. My house was pre-wired for electric ceiling fan with 3 switches on the wall. You have to manually pull the chain to turn off the fan. There's only 1 switch to turn on/off the light and fan at the same time. That means the other two switches are irrelevant.