Review for LA Solar Group

03/26/2023
Jon Singh Canyon Country, CA

Nearly 6 months in, still not installed.

Last year I reached out to Enphase directly to ask for installers and they recommended LA Solar Group. The Enphase support rep really guided me and highly recommended this company so after some additional bids I went with them. The job: update existing solar system (22 panels) to IQ8 inverters and add additional 18 panels also with IQ8 inverters and unify into one system, 40 inverters total with 40 panels. Working with LA Solar Group has been an absolute nightmare. I signed loan paperwork to lock in a good interest rate, and was finalizing with the HOA (and so not yet approved) when out of nowhere a week before thanksgiving materials just showed up and blocked my driveway with a bunch of panels and inverter boxes, tubing pipes and loose hardware materials. I couldn't get ahold of anyone for nearly two days until someone got back to me and said they dont know what happened and if they could leave the materials. I told them that was fine, HOA approval was imminent, but materials had to be moved to the backyard, the HOA would throw a fit if sat out in the driveway more than a few days, as HOA's do. No shows, no call backs, thanksgiving comes around and after many frustrated conversations and more complaining some crew shows up close to midnight and manages to move stuff the backyard. I get approval right after thanksgiving and I inform them. I don't hear much for weeks even with insistent complaining on my end, one of my toddlers decks herself on the stacked up panels. After this incident I tell them if the panels don't go up in the next few days the entire project will be cancelled. The next day someone shows up for about 3 hours and they start updating the inverters. They leave, then again nothing, a few more days later another crew shows up and updates more inverters and then they leave. Rinse and repeat for about 2 to 3 weeks until the existing panels are updated. The new panels are still hanging out on the ground, now there's metal shrapnel everywhere, screws, materials strewn about my backyard, kids arent going back there. More complaints on my end. Guys randomly show up, say its not their job to install the panels and leave. One guy literally shows up and tells me they told him to show up so I wouldn't get pissed off when no one came!! Basically this story goes on and on, eventually enough complaints happen, some guys finally show up a few weeks later and they put up the new 18 panels and they tell me now the electrician needs to show up and take care of plugging everything in. Another week or so goes by, its been raining, I give it a pass, finally an electrician shows up at some random morning at 7am. Tells my wife he looked and didn't need to do ANYTHING and left. They scheduled an inspection about a week later and of course, it failed. First its, 'Oh only a few breakers need to be changed" and then later "oh we need to majorly redo the plan and resubmit to the city". About a month goes by, nothing is happening. I ask for evidence they submitted plan revisions or evidence of coorespondance with my city. Nothing, silence. I reached out to my city hall and they have no record of any recent correspondence. I make more calls, more complaints, ask for evidence of site plan submissions, threaten to call a lawyer and issue complains to contracting board and some other areas where Southern California. Finally they send another crew out, its now mid-end of February. They come by spend a whole day here and completely redo work that other people have done, put in a combiner box and tell me everything is good to go. These guys seem significantly more seasoned and I do feel better. I am told I have to wait for Edison to approve something and it could take 3 weeks or so with the NEM changes. Thats fine. Someone came over the weekend and provisioned the new boxes and I go and look at the system website and it looks like they never plugged in the NEW 18 panels, only reconnected my old panels AND out of the 22 panels that already existed only 11 are producing energy. So at this point I've now lost 4 to 5 months of energy generation from my old panel system, have been paying a loan for a panel system that is not installed and I am continuing to get the run around. I have informed enphase of this since they recommended them, have posted to reddit and yelp. I plan to contact my local newspaper and news agencies in the coming week to warn others. Do not do business with LA Solar Group.