Sunrun

I’ve only been on Sunrun for two months. It’s evidently working because I got a lower bill from APS. I didn’t realize how much it put APS out of the loop in terms of funding. The purchasing of the loan for the installation was done through APS. I thought they were making a thing on that one. That was one that I never got a discussion about, what the financing cost on that was as opposed to anything else like paying cash. That was information I wanted because sometimes I’ve gotten money to cover a couple of outlays like that. It saves me money.

However, my experience with going solar has been hell. It died six days after they started it up. They didn’t call me and let me know it died. I had just assumed I was on solar the whole time. They didn’t even know it died. I went out there and looked and said, "Wait a minute. Why is my electric bill $300 when I’m supposed to be using solar?” When I called them, the lady on the other line said, “And you didn’t notice? What do you want me to do about it?” Then they sent someone out and said he fixed it. However, it didn't work. He replaced a single part on the system and then that blew up, so then they had to come out with a new system. So the machine was not working and a rep told me that there’s nothing she can do for me and that I have to pay my bill and wait. I love the salespeople but I didn't care for the call center.

I just paid $149 for two months and then I paid another $400 to my regular electric bill. So now I’m out $700 and I never received service from them. I told them I want my money back and they told me that they would give it back on my anniversary. But I would definitely recommend them. We just got a dumb deal on our machine. There's not much we can do about that.

When I turned it on in about February about five months later, my inverter went out and would not produce power anymore. After a couple of days that it was not producing anything, I notified Sunrun about it. It was their equipment and they were the ones that were supposed to be monitoring this. They said they usually let it go three days before they check it out. I told them I needed to get somebody out here to find out what was going on and it was about a week later that somebody came and checked it out, and verified that it was the inverter that was bad. So I figured they’d get one right on there and that it wouldn’t take very long. But it was a month between the time it went out and when they finally got another inverter on there. I was a bit upset about that because I lost all my credits and my bill was higher.

The system got working again but at the end of the year it did not produce as much power that they said it would. Sunrun cut me a check for the difference, so that made me a little happier. Other than that, everything seemed to go pretty smooth. I was happy with the salesman. I called him several times to ask him various questions about what was going on and he got things moving even though it took a long time. The installer and the ones who did the repair was Titan Solar Power and I tried to be understanding because I knew they had a lot of business and they were busy trying to beat APS and their regulations. But it seemed to me that it was an excessive amount of time to get another inverter put on. Surely they had extra inverters if they were putting solar panels on houses.

There was also a design change at the last minute. I had a picture of how they were going to put the panels which covered the entire roof. But when they started putting the panels on, it was not the design that was approved. So I called my salesperson and he found out they didn’t take into account that I had a fireplace exhaust that was causing a little bit of shade. So they had to change the design a little bit which didn’t bother me that much. I have 34 panels up there and I’m overall satisfied with what they did. We haven’t had much rain here to find out whether or not I’ve got any leakage but they’re supposed to fix those if there is any.

My start date was January 24th and the solar panel unit has produced 101% of my estimated electricity usage. So, I’m not dissatisfied with the company. I’m understanding of things that go wrong and so as long as they keep it working, and I have the contract here and they take care of what’s supposed to be taken care of, I’ll be happy.

One of the things the sales people told me was that they were going to get all the tax credits when we file our taxes, but that was false too and I didn’t get any of that. I only got a small portion of it. Not the labor and everything else that they told me and got on the email. So, I had my friend write an email to Sunrun and ask about the tax credit and the same guy responded that he would get 30% tax credit across the board. He responded to him the message that he gave me which was wrong and false. I was lied to and it didn’t meet the expectations that they spoke of. I would never recommend solar to anybody.

I'm making payments on this stuff to purchase it but it doesn’t do what it's expected to do. Also, I refinanced my house and when the appraiser came over, I said that I got solar panels on the house too, but he said that solar panels don’t increase the value of the home. That hit me hard too because I expected that to be a home improvement which would increase the value of my home. So, there's been a lot of negatives that have come my way. I should have spoken with my dad more about it because he knows so much about the industry and he would never get solar panels either. The technology is just not there yet. I'm not satisfied with solar at all. Don't get solar panels.

There's a console outside and a few things that I can access from the menu and it would be nice if Sunrun would send a PDF file on how to access and read the panel that generates electricity. It would be very helpful to have something that shows me what its capabilities are and how to go through the menu. And now, the days are a little bit longer so we generate more solar. And our energy bill is less than what it was before so it's nice. And since we paid cash for the solar panels, we had no outstanding bill, so it's savings for us. Our experience with Sunrun was very good and I'm very pleased.

"Thank you for contacting Sunrun Customer Care in regards to the battery discharge. During winter rates, the battery does not discharge. BrightBox - SDG&E: DR-SES (NEM 1.0). Summer = May 1 - September. Summer weekdays we cycle: Charge from solar production before 11 am. Discharge 11 am - 6 pm. Weekends are all OFF PEAK. So I paid $4,000 for the LG battery to be used May through September, 5 days a week. So 5 months times 5 days per week equals about 110 days of battery usage out of 365 day year."

This limitation is not in my Sunrun contract, nor was this limitation mentioned or documented in the sales and installation discussion. The Sunrun web page states only (my emphasis): "Depending on your neighborhood’s electricity rate structure, Brightbox can offset energy costs when electricity rates are at their peak. And in a blackout, your Brightbox offers a sustainable source of energy so you don’t have to spend on unruly and expensive generators. Maximum savings? We’ll take that any day."

Brightbox is the Sunrun term for solar panels with the LG battery attached. Note Sunrun does not state any details about the actual usage of the battery. The irony is that the SolarEdge Inverter is programmable through a simple user interface to allow any time any day battery usage. Of course Sunrun controls the battery usage and will not change the scheduled usage. Why? I believe it is to extend the life of the LG battery to 20 years. So, if you are considering a Sunrun solar system, skip the battery and save yourself a few thousand dollars.

The salesperson visited me 2 years prior and I told them it doesn’t make sense to me to install solar. The second time around I asked why does it make sense now? Well, he lied his way through, oh, said salesperson was fired shortly after my deal. I’m only now complaining because I was just going to deal with the crap, but now that my roof leaks and I have to pay, that’s just wrong and I was stupid, lesson learned. We are now stuck with this for 11 more years, it has changed our lives financially while they rip us off. I asked for them to take them down, $39,000, what a joke.

When I emailed my representative, she said they cannot do anything about this and that we can pay up to $3000 to get snow guards installed; they even recommended a company who they use for this issue because it’s common. WHY DID THEY lie to us when all the SNOW RELATED QUESTIONS WERE ASKED - instead, we were told there are no issues! I replied to the email, every week for 3 weeks I sent the same email and NO ONE to date has replied to my email. I called my representative and she was unbelievably rude on the phone and even hung up; I was told to avoid those areas in the house when it snows! I called the individual who introduced us to the system and to date he is avoiding all our calls/texts and emails. This company just wants your money. If you have any issues at all, they will ignore you and not take your complaints serious.

The stress we have gone through with this company is not worth anyone’s time; their employees are not reliable and trustworthy. Please at all costs, please avoid them. I wish I read reviews before signing up with them. If the company falsified reports of their sales and was investigated by The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission and has lawsuits against false marketing - IT IS NOT a COMPANY to GO WITH. Now I am stuck with the panels and no one from the company to returns calls or reply to emails. AVOID! Another issue - my contract on the app still says I will be paying $80, when I got a new contract that says I will be paying $72 due to adjustments needed upon further review by the inspectors prior to installation; so far the system is not turned on by Sunrun so let’s see what other issues I face.

It has been worry free since they mounted the system up and I look at the app that tells me it's working and making energy. It would reduce my bi-physical electrical company bill, which was my objective with going solar, and I'm sure my daughters will react about it and we tell them that we're helping do a part in energy consumption. My experience with Sunrun was very good and I have recommended them to my friends. Anyone interested should go ahead and use them as well because they make things simple.

I liked the fact that Sunrun has been in business and that they have their warranties on your roof. They were very personable and very accommodating. They answered all my questions and there wasn’t a hesitation like thinking about an answer to come up with for a question. They knew their stuff and that made me feel comfortable with them.

Genevieve has been my contact at Sunrun and we’ve spoken a couple times. We had to change a couple of inspection dates because of my days off and she was very accommodating. She had to contact Edison and the City to get the inspectors come out on a different date. The days that they didn’t need access to the house weren’t a problem. But the days that they did, we had to change twice. It was well within a reasonable time limit. It was only around seven to ten days difference, so it worked out really well.

We just got to turn on our system at the end of March, so we really haven’t had a bill yet. But from what they told me and the fact that they gave me the figures, I’m sure the bill is going to be a lot less than the hundred-dollar bills that we’ve been getting. Being a single person with my youngest son living with me still, we needed to find something that we could count on every month that this would be the bill so we could manage our systems and our budget. There are no surprises, so that helps as well. We know exactly what we’re going to be paying.

My son has friends that have purchased solar systems and have regretted not getting the Brightbox Battery simply because we experience quite a few power outages during the summertime. So, with having that as a backup, we feel more confident that the freezer won’t go out and all the food get spoiled on that. However, the one thing that I don’t really like is the fact that Sunrun wants me to sign up for autopay so they don’t charge me a service charge. I hate being forced into doing that to save money. That should just be an option and it bothered me a little. In the grand scheme of things, it’s got to get paid anyway. They let me choose my payment date and they offer me that option. It’s not a big deal but I don’t like having that as part of saving money. They should offer that to their client as a matter of convenience. Other than that, I’m hoping that when we get our bill, we’ll still be happy.

For the most part up until the installation, everything went great. Then the installation came and it didn’t pass inspection. The inspector came back and said there was a bunch of stuff that they had to do, so they came back and did that. Then another inspector came and wanted to do different stuff. It was a nightmare. They finished the installation initially in the first part of November and didn’t actually turn on the system until February. They said that it was because the City changed the regulations.

After they turned it on, we got a call that it’s not communicating with Sunrun, so they sent somebody out to take a look at it. My daughter was there and they told her something. Apparently, the box thing inside of the house wasn’t working so they took it, turned it off and didn’t tell us. I didn’t even know they had been there until I noticed when I checked the outlet that there was no generation. I called them and they told me I needed a new box because mine was not working properly. They said it would take two weeks. Fortunately, it took about eight days until they came back and put the new box on and it’s been fine since.

The system started working properly in the middle of February. We just paid our very first bill for the whole month and it was $13. Before it was a $100 to $200. At this point, though, I’m a little concerned because we don’t have the build up. The way it works in Nevada is, in the winter time we build up the credits because in the summer time, it’s so hot here that sometimes our air conditioning bill in the summer reaches $600. I hope that they’re never that high again but I think we’re going to still end up paying some bills in the summertime. But other than that and the guy turning it off and not telling me, I would recommend Sunrun because everything went smooth. They were also always very nice and very courteous.

I have asked for that report and have not received a reply. Then they tried to tell me in an email that the warranty is void because I put a hot tub in that was not there before. They lie. I have the paperwork that my hot tub has been in since 2008 and shows on the panel I sent them the bill of sales and the copy of the electrical hook up back from 2008. You guessed it. No response. I have a claim which they are failing to pay now using every excuse in the book. I would not recommend them to anyone. Plus I have the paperwork that they never told the building inspector that they upgraded the breaker box. It is not on the permit or the COC which is against the law. The letter I received and answered without a response once again $1000.00 for $6500 worth of damage and repair. I think not.

Everything about enrolling with Sunrun was super. They were really on it and I've been trying to get it moved. I got my neighbor and he has finally got hooks on it. He's been coming over to my house and he asked me to tell him about Sunrun because he wanted it before but didn’t know what he did wrong and nobody ever came back. They come, they zero in on you and then they leave you alone too long. I kept it up because I was fascinated with the men and they were really cordial and super fun people.

We love going solar and it has somewhat changed our life because our local light company got some approval so that we all have to pay more now. That was when we jumped for it but other than that, it's fine. When my light bill went from 300 to 200, I was a little happy. And then it jumped to one and a half and it was even better. We got more people in our house and there are 13 of us now. I just wish that Sunrun had come earlier. I was so excited but we just hung in there. And because they didn’t come for quite a while, we thought that it was like Vivint. Vivint was a really bad experience. I wish that Sunrun would put Undercover Boss in because they will get many more people.

The other company told me to not worry and that they were going to give me a $1,000,000.00 insurance for my roof. That was impractical and it was overselling. And there were things that Ryan was able to explain to me that the other company did not. For example, I have a mid-century house and the other company did not point out to me about upgrading my electrical panel. They did all the measuring and all the initial assessment but they never mentioned anything about my electrical panel not being within the standard and needed to be replaced. That was the big expense which Sunrun covered and I'm grateful for it. And whatever things that they did on the wall and on the siding, they fixed it, so I'm happy with that.

I'm also happy knowing that my bills in my gas and electric have to be separated now because I'm on that metering system, but when I checked my bill for the electricity, even though it's been winter here in California or it snowed up where the sun doesn’t sun as much, my bill is $9 for electric for the last two months. I still have to pay for the panel but it's just like what I used to pay for my gas or for my electric. It's a good thing considering that my house is a mid-century home, so the insulation is not as good as the current homes right now. If I have to turn on my A/C this summer, I will enjoy it and I'm not going to be a tightwad.

I'm going to have that peace of mind. Now I could sleep with the A/C on. Or as soon as I come home, I could schedule my A/C to come on an hour before I get home so that it's nice and cool by the time I get home and not to worry about a big electricity payment that I have to endure. And that was one of the reasons why I went to do solar. If the A/C is going, even though I don’t have a good insulation because I have solar, it balances out

I didn’t have to be there during the installation. By the time I got home, I cannot really tell that they were at home at all. And then everything was up and all we had to do was wait for the city to get their approval. Once they were approved, all we had to do was turn it on and Ryan was always there. I had a problem opening the panel, but he came and opened it for me and turned it on. It could let you enjoy your summer and not be stingy about electricity. You could leave the lights on and don’t have to turn off the light to save on electricity. I could also leave the TV on for my dogs.

My wife was telling me something about the issues with the billing. One month, instead of 83, it came back as 140 something. So I told her to pick up the phone and call up. Also, I'm going to call Matt, the field guy from this area, if they can give me more panels because I'm only getting 45% of my electricity from the solar. If you're using less than 6,000 kilowatts per year, you will get 100% solar energy from Sunrun. I'm using 9,000 and over and I only could get 50%. I was standing in front of my house the other day and I was pressing Matt to give me more panels. I need more than 50. I wanted 100 because my house uses too much electricity when the year is up.

Matt said according to the guys who are in charge of that, they install this only on one side of my roof. I said okay. They haven't done a survey. So, I was standing in front my yard, I went to pick up the kids two o'clock in the afternoon, the sun was so bright and the sun was beating down on the other half of the roof that had no solar. My house is crowded and people are home all day. Electricity is being used 24/7. The heat is on, everything is on. But I recommend Sunrun based on the service. Hands down to anybody.