Not sure who Shawna P./S. is but, based on her Yelp history, she has a lot of bad experiences with electrical people, leading me to believe she isn't really knowledgeable about such systems and likely has an older one in her house (since her wires melted and since the AC guy she used awhile ago said she needed upgrades). Also, 68 panels at 65 grand is astoundingly cheap. Anyway...
Don, Julio and all the crew at Pav are 5 star people who give a 5 star experience from sales pitch to system monitoring and maintenance tutorial. I am nothing but impressed and joyous with the entire process and I am a picky, IT geek who asks way too many questions.
It took me a long time to make up my mind about what panels I wanted and, after deciding, it took a miracle from Pav Solar to get them due to financing. At first I wanted LG or Q-Cell panels and asked Don for a quote with those. After 2 weeks I decided I wanted Sun Power and started looking at the Sunpower dealers in the area e.g. Sun Solar. Through them I discovered that Sunpower wanted a credit score that was not possible for me through their credit system (Mosaic, which factors in more things than Credit Karma scores to lower it by more than 50 points) and that they would not take a cash payment. That made me think I could not get Sunpower. However, when Don found out I was looking for Sunpower he informed me that he was a Sunpower dealer and could get Sunpower panels. He redid his bid with Sunpower panels which, while not the top of the line Maxeon panels (which, tbh, were really expensive), were still better than most other panels and had the Sunpower warranty and integrated system, a major factor in my choice of Sunpower. Furthermore, Pav Solar accepted cash for the system- something no one else would do. So I got everything I wanted- badass E series panels, 20% over my yearly usage (at Don's suggestion, which was dead on), the sweet Sunpower/Pav Solar warranties- and the price was significantly lower than getting it through other Sunpower dealers. I'm talking 3000 dollars less at the minimum. And there were no price changes after we signed the contract- Don and Julio did a thorough walk-through of the house before they drew up the official bid to make sure there were no surprises. Attic and everything. The sales/survey process was very easy, there was lots of contact and emails were thorough. Waiting for the install to begin was the hardest part as the permits and such (which Pav also handled perfectly) take time for the state to process. But once they are installing, they get going.
It took no more than 2 days to install 21 panels on my tile roof and it was done in an incredibly professional manner. They got the framing up on the first day and all 21 panels up and linked together on the second day. On the third day they were tested by 25mph winds and rain without so much as a groan (sunpower also has very resilient mounts). The crew was prompt- at the house on the edge of town at 8am both days- as well as very nice and knowledgable if you had any questions. No tiles were broken and there are no cables or pipes showing. The design of the system- all panels facing south- makes my system look bigger than anyone else's on the street since I have all 21 panels very visible but looking clean from the street. I had debated putting panels on the east or west sides just to get extra direct sunlight in the morning or night but Don, who has a lot of experience, said that I would be better off with them all on one side for both installation and generation purposes and he was absolutely right. All electrical breaker boxes have been properly labelled and the wiring gauge is very healthy going between the panels and the boxes (twice the diameter of what I have in my house for other systems). After the system was activated and PGE had connected it into the grid Don and Julio personally came by and got the system on my wifi, checked the system for any problems, registered it with Sunpower and povided a tutorial on how to check the power generation through the website and app They also went over maintenance, pge bill and tax questions with us (as Don had in the initial sales process in great detail but in an understandable way, at least to me) and took a post-install photo for memories.
It has been 3 days since I got my system activated and on my wifi and now I am loving watching as I obliterate my power bill. The first 2 days were mostly cloudy yet I only used 12kWh of 37 total from the grid, the rest came from my panels. Today, a sunny day, is showing what the system can do- it is producing at twice the rate of the past two days (and exactly at the max rate described in the bid) and has produced more in 4 hours than it did in either of the past 2 days in their entirety. I'm just waiting for the moment my power to the grid from solar outproduces my usage from the grid on overall so I can celebrate my power independence. Can't wait to get a battery from Pav in the future! read more
