Review for Artisan Electric

01/24/2015
Anonymous

Pre-planning and communication were lacking

We're very happy to have our professionally installed solar system, its up and running and providing energy to write this review. Hooray!<br /><br />We did have some issues with our install however, having to do with some mistakes that Artisan employees made with preplanning & communication. The initial consult and design, as well as the pre-install walk through, didn't catch the fact that our electric mast and meter needed to be relocated for our install. This added cost to our system last minute, though Artisan did agree to cover most of the cost, after I argued that this was not our responsibility. The placement of the inverter suddenly changed from the east to north side of our house without any notice to us, and the design of the system (initially one panel was to be located on our porch roof to avoid shading from a small tree) was not implemented, so now we must see about pruning a tree to avoid shading our panels. Also, the interior mounting of the eguage box was sloppy, and it's now installed in a rather uneven looking way with considerable damage to our drywall that they have said they will repair, but has not been addressed yet. I think it's possible that with the number of installations this company has gotten through the Solarize Seattle program, the quality of communication and experience level of some of the new Artisan employees is creating some problems.

Sales process
Price charged as quoted
On schedule
Installation quality

Artisan Electric reply 01/26/2015
Wow, Artisan's first "three sun" review deserves an explanation. My recommendation to homeowners reading this is that if you change your home's electrical setup from the time you choose to go solar to the time the solar system is installed, it's a good idea to communicate that change with the installer. If the installer is trying to deal with the issue on site, it's also a good idea to make yourself available to the installer if you are home. In this case, the homeowners had their service mast moved from the side of the house to the area where the solar was to be installed. We found this out on the first day of installation and engaged the homeowner immediately. Our goal is to install the best systems possible, and we were not about to continue with the installation plan because the system would have performed poorly. Instead, Artisan actually paid to have the service moved away from the solar side of the house at no cost to the homeowner. How many electrical contractors do you know that would actually do that? The only added cost to the homeowner was from the utility for hooking the service back up, not Artisan. Second, the existing meter and panel were located over a half-demolished deck that was supposed to be fully removed before we started. It was physically unsafe to install equipment in the area that the homeowner had chosen. The homeowner was not available to discuss the change before it happened, but agreed that the equipment was in a better place after the fact. In summary, it's hard to preplan when circumstances change without our knowledge, and it's hard to communicate when the homeowner does not make themselves available. <br />There are definitely some lessons to be learned here by Artisan, however.<br />Usually, the salesperson at Artisan is also the project manager on our projects, but this was not the case for this project, which led to miscommunication when things were not as they seemed. The project manager did not notice that the mast was removed during his prejob walk, whereas the salesperson would have most definitely caught that the change had happened, because he knew what the electrical service looked like prior to the change. The second area for improvement is to engage the customer on every decision, whether it seems like they care or are make themselves readily available is irrelevant. The project manager for this project is still fairly new to the position, and is still learning how much to communicate and what to look out for. It's clear he needed more support to take on a project this complicated, and will get that support moving forward. Lesson learned on our end.