Sunrun Solar

Poor workmanship, bad experience, damaged roof – The experience I had with this company was unpleasant and not as smooth as it should have been. I contacted Solar Quotes to put me in touch with a couple installers in my area. I was contacted by two of the three my contact information was sent to. The first to contact me didn’t really sell me on their service and were very general in how they… Read more

answered my technical questions.

The second to contact me was Sunrun Solar. Their sales guy was exceptional and accommodating. Credit where it is due. He was able to answer all my questions and didn’t shy away from nuanced technical answers and did not treat me poorly when I needed something explained. Great service from him.

For example, the first mob used terms like “battery ready” and didn’t go further than that in discussing what future options could look like. Just that “yeah you can add a battery”. The real answer more nuanced. Sunrun’s sales explained the differences in system requirements and battery types depending on AC or DC batteries. I.e. if there was a preference for a specific battery upfront, then the system design could be flexible and the choices of battery would be greater. If the system was built with the intent of a future battery set up, then depending on how the initial system was chosen (i.e. if price was a factor) then future battery choices may be limited in the type of battery that could be connected later. This type of answer was always explained exceptionally clearly and taking my level of technical understanding into consideration. I had many of these questions and each was answered with an exceptional level of clarity. I have no doubt their salesperson would be able to tailor their level of detail across a wide range of clients. That was the best part of the process.

After discussing and resolving many of my concerns with the salesperson, I signed with Sunrun Solar. Everything leading up to the day of install went smoothly and as expected.

On the day of the install is when things started going poorly.

· Safety rails were installed in such a way that they scratched paint on my colorbond roof.

· Holes were drilled in my brick wall for cable runs where the inverter was to be installed without determining first of there would be any challenges in doing so. Spoiler alert, the cable runs could not be internal as they for some reason couldn’t fit them through the space. This is something I believe could have been determined before drilling into the wall with a basic endoscopic camera. There are now siliconed holes in my brickwork. It’s weather tight, but a constant reminder of the unnecessary damage to the home.

· Where the cable runs were required to be run externally due to the inability to run them through the wall, a roof sheet needed to be lifted. The screws that were removed were put back in without their rubber washers. The washers were left in the gutter.

· A gutter hanger was left bent and damaged, not holding the gutter in that spot.

· Gutter guards were not used for ladders anywhere a ladder was placed, resulting is paint being scratched off to the bare metal.

· While on the roof, the installers caused damage to the paint in several areas visible from the ground. The paint was gouged down to the bare metal.

· Dents were made in multiple places on the roof. These remain and wont be resolved.

· Before shots were not taken of the roof for my records prior to beginning works as per request that was documented on my signed quote.

During the day the main electrician on the job seemed flustered and when asked how things were going said “everything that could go wrong has gone wrong”. In further clarifying what this meant, he advised that things were taking longer than expected, and gave the issue with being unable to run cables internally through the wall to the inverter as an example of what added time to the install. I decided not to worry too much at this point as I took the view that these guys are professionals and know what they’re doing.

As the day progressed, the main electrician told me it was likely the install wouldn’t be finished that day. Ok no problem. Clearly would be scheduled to be done soon afterwards.

The follow up to finish the job was scheduled for the following week in the morning. At lunch time on the day when I hadn’t heard form Sun Run, I contacted them to find out what was happening. They followed up with the electricians who were at another job, got back to me and let me know they would be there later that day.

When the electrician arrived, he and his boys got up on the roof, Installed the panels and finalised the wiring.

During the visit, the main electrician determined that they were missing a piece of equipment they had thought they had left in my garage and turned out they couldn’t finish the job. The part had been taken back to the depot rather than being left the week prior.

It took a third subsequent visit to get the job finalised. A one day install turned into a +3 week saga.

In-between this time I noticed from a normal viewing position in my back yard that there were scratches and dents on my roof. Getting up on a ladder noticed more damage, significant paint scratches down to the metal on the roof and on the gutters.

I raised these issues to Sun Run with photos and their response was poor from the beginning.

The owner tried to minimise the issue of the damage caused as if it was unavoidable.

In contrast, the entire roof was installed by a team of roofers who walked around on a roof all day, had safety rails and managed to not damage the roof with their equipment or by walking on it.

Is the damage really unavoidable? No, it’s not, as evidenced by the fact the roof was able to be installed without damage and many solar installs which are done without damage to the roof. Due care and skill exercised prevents such damage. The first red flag should have been when there were no gutter guards for the ladders in sight for the entire day.

While the owner acknowledged the damage he was looking for me to suggest a solution to him. Really? I told them to come back to me with a proposal.

In the end, Sun run offered to spray the damaged sections with a colour matched repair paint. Initially I was open to this, however after some research on the product, I learned that it was not meant for solving the type of deep paint damage that was present on my roof. The manufacturer of the roof material recommends a replacement of sections with damage exceeding small surface scratches, especially where the damage is down to the bare metal.

After spotting additional damage and screws replaced without the crush washers on another section of the roof, I advised Sun Run that it was unacceptable, and I asked for a replacement of the damaged sections of the steel as the warranty on those sections was now void. Sun Run refused and instead persisted to offer only the respray with touch up paint.

I went back and forth with the owner who didn’t initially seem to want to take on the warranty of the sections repaired for the length of the original warranty they voided.

I had to contact Solar Quotes to raise the issue of the damage and the poor aftercare around the damage. After the second call to Solar Quotes to advise them of the still unacceptable outcome, the owner changed their tune and provided me confirmation that they would finally provide the same warranty on the repair.

I paid half of the outstanding amount and agreed to pay the remaining after the repairs were finalised and the warranty in writing was received.

Some time later, the owner and some roofers came to inspect and conduct repairs. They completed the fix of the paint issues, but the screw washers weren’t replaced, or the bent gutter hanger fixed and gutter reattached.

During his visit the owner was pleasant to deal with, was profusely apologetic, which was in contrast to the minimisation I received prior to contacting Solar Quotes to deal with the issue. He’d advised me that the electrician that worked on the job had been let go after some of the conversations they’d had about the job didn’t meet the owner’s expectations. Not overly relevant to me, though I guess a sign of the owner finally having taken the issues raised with the weight that they were due. The owner however had the nerve to suggest that once this was all done and dusted that I might leave a 5 star review. Like anything about this experience was worth 5 stars.

The owner arranged for another person to come and replace the screws.

The guy that came to replace the screws and washers also did not use a gutter guard and scratched paint on the gutter down to the bare metal. While the screws and washers were sorted, after all that had transpired, I simply can’t believe that a gutter guard wasn’t present yet again. How are trades not carrying one in their vehicles at all times?

After some time of no response from the owner around the warranty I followed up with a proposal to waive the remaining cost in lieu of the warranty, the new damage, unresolved gutter hanger and an opportunity for this experience to stay between us.

I based this proposal on the fact that there seemed to be no urgency in getting the warranty to me (which gives me concern that any warranty claim would similarly be treated with little urgency), the cost of replacing the damaged sections should they fail and the remaining repair work. The owner did not like this proposal and advised that he would rather get paid and would have the warranty to me by end of day, which was received well before the end of the day.

He advised that my proposal was “unbalanced” and unfair given that they had completed everything that was discussed. While they had completed MOST of what was discussed, further damage occurred and there is incomplete work (gutter hanger) remained. The owner claimed that what I had mentioned had not come up in discussion before, to which I directed him to the email, date and time stamped with the relevant photographic evidence and the conversation.

The owner seemed to be of the belief that by doing what was agreed after the whole debacle, somehow precluded me from sharing my experience.

The owner further claimed that if it were some other retailers, they’d not have gone so far to resolve the issues caused. Like some how this put him in better standing than other retailers. This statement had no basis as its unknown what other retailers would have done. Similarly, I could claim other retailers would not have caused the damage in the first place. Without any basis for such a claim, I advised him of that and that by saying that actually cast him in even less positive light as a business’ reputation is built by their actions and not by denigrating other businesses.

So, while I have my warranty in hand, the process I have had to endure to get to here should not have occurred in the first instance. People with less conviction may have ended up with a lesser outcome.

My expectation was that the guys would come, do the job, not damage the place and that would be it. Instead, I got a damaged roof, damaged bricks, a couple weeks of back and forth fighting for my right to be made whole, having to escalate the issue to a third party that refers business to Sun Run and then still follow had to up for the warranty.

In all, this was a very unpleasant experience. Should this not have occurred, the business would have received a 5 star review off the sales process alone. That sales guy is an asset to the business. However, the fight I had to get the issue of the damage to be initially recognised in the seriousness it deserved by the owner, the fight to get a comparable warranty to the original product and needing to escalate to Solar Quotes twice has left me extremely dissatisfied with the whole process.

The system installed was inspected and commissioned and appears to be operating normally.

Do you research, read reviews better options out ther – Order Dec.2020 only just now fully operational 11/5/2021.there service is very slow, dont respond to messages either phone or email..Only ph.no we had was a mobile left message after message, no reply only way i could contact them was thru Solar Vic who gave me 1300 phone no..I requested final paperwork be sent as a hard copy as u dint own… Read more

computer or printer, nor could i sign documents on phone..i repeatedly got messages telling me how ti sign on.phine...finally i was told hard copy had been sent, in.mean time found old phone n was able to sign...once they had that i informed them hard copy had not arrived to be told it had NOT been sent at all..so cant trust a word they say... Cheaper/free offers out there look into them, and make sure they have a landline...return calls and most of all just aren't telling you what they think you want to hear..

.

Sun run solar installation shows poor workmanship – Used sunrun solar only on proviso that they not use subcontractors. Communication from office was good, however after they completed install I was left with 2 badly broken tiles which they should have replaced with my spares. Luckily I spotted it that afternoon before any rain got in, and immediately fixed them myself. I also needed to clean off a… Read more

lot of screws and brackets left lying on roof and in gutters. 1 bracket poorly installed so the tiles will not sit flat anymore. At least it seems to be working fine.

Disgraceful rude – Spoke with a very rude and disgusting saresh or something like that that has threatened my family, he was rude going so far as blaming me because an electrician say our solar cannot be put because of no roof access we have a flat roof, next i get a phone call from this rude person telling me we will install on 19th dec not where i want them but… Read more

where they want to put them, i said no you wont and he started getting nasty, i told him he was in breach of his contract with me and i have a law degree and he told me to shove my law degree up my A, disgusting needs to be sacked and charged for threatening my family. Do not do business with this lot this is how they roll, i will be seeking to deal with this company for this .

Lack of knowledge when replacing a old solar inverter with a new one – Spoke to Sunrun re placing the old inverter with a new one. Explain what the old one was and he said a Fronuis Galvo would be suitable . A 2kw unit would work. But the day it was installed there was a problem with it and was not working correctly we were told to contact them if there were problems. As it was installed just prior to Christmas we… Read more

waited to the first full week of January but had to wait until the 23rd of January for them to try and fix the problem. As of this afternoon we are still have issues with them. The problems seem to be everybody else and not them. DUCKING THE PROBLEM. Even after we spoke to Fronuis Australia.

February 13th 2018 Update: Lack of knowledge when replacing a old solar inverter with a new one

Sunrun Solar replaced our old inverter which the above machine. When installed the inverter showed error 307.

The installer said if we had any problems to ring him. He has been once and we are still having problems with the machine. Now he is saying that we will need to pay for him to come back and look at the system. After many phone calls and emails he is saying it is not his problem BUT Powercor and our panels. Powercor say the power voltage is within the range. All we are getting from the company is pasting the buck. As well as the above we do not have a certificate of installation.

This company is great in doing their job – I installed 3.0kw solar system through Sunrun Solar. My solar system is producing more than CEC guidelines and it shows the panels are Tier 1 panels. Sunrun solar's price are very affordable. I would recommend this company 100%. Installers did very clear and tidy job, nothing was left behind.