Smart Wave Solar

11/22/2024 latest update. This review spans several incidents of a complete and total lack of professionalism. The most unprofessional part was after agreeing to fix the system, and being paid Smart Wave held my money for several weeks before sending me an email saying that they would just not be fulfilling what they had agreed to in several written statements and had been paid for. So I’ve been stuck waiting for them when I could have had a different more competent company come do the work. I will be seeking remediation for the damage to my inverter, the cost of another company diagnosing what the Smart Wave Solar tech broke, and a daily average cost of the energy my system is designed to generate until this issue is fully resolved. I hate to leave this review. This is the second time I’ve had to leave a negative review for smart wave. We bought solar panels from a company that sadly is no longer in business called gosolar. The SMA Sunny Boy inverter they installed just randomly drops in production. I contacted SMA who gave me the run around, but eventually referred me to smart wave as their local partner to help with warranty issues. The first time I contacted smart wave they also gave me the run around and after weeks of trying to get the system fixed they sent an email wanting to charge nearly $1,000 just to look at the inverter. They also wanted me to pay a few hundred dollars starting the moment their techs left and the entire time they were traveling. I left a review about all of this and a vice president came over to my house with all sorts of promises, and wouldn’t leave until I had changed my review. When he did leave the customer service manager Emma went right back to giving me the run around. I worked with SMA to give smart wave complete access to my solar panels. Once every other week I emailed Emma to see what was going on several times with little to no response. When I did receive a response I was told they are looking into it, and should have a solution shortly. That solution never came. SMA is the big bad of the situation, but smart wave isn’t much better. It has been a nightmare just to get them to come look at my inverter. I am sorry to say that if your looking for a solar power provider look somewhere that doesn’t use SMA, and isn’t smart wave solar. If the execs read this, and would like me to provide a better review do what you should have done 5 months ago and send someone out to troubleshoot the system so it can be replaced if needs be. Your company agreed to do so and was paid. An email a month later simply stating that you will not be following through on your agreement is one of the single most unprofessional actions I have ever witnessed. Update 11/11/2024 Smart wave did send a technician. The tech didn’t ring our doorbell, and only knocked on our screen door. I only know this because my ring doorbell recorded the tech. Additionally there was no reason for the smart wave tech to come inside the house. I had already done all of the troubleshooting regarding the inverter’s connection to the internet the problem is mechanical in nature, and I told your customer service agents that several times. Each time I was ignored. Furthermore the inverter itself displays what network it is connected to, as well as what the signal strength is. The signal from the inverter never goes below 90%. The network and signal strength being displayed on the inverter means that there was no reason your tech couldn’t have contacted SMA to do the electrical troubleshooting that needed to be done. In fact in order to eliminate the network connection as a potential issue I had the inverter hard wired to our router with an Ethernet cord. The tech failed to identify the problem, or do any of the troubleshooting I had requested. Mainly contacting SMA and troubleshooting the electrical systems in the inverter. He did claim to have downloaded the logs. I however doubt this because every attempt to speak with Smart Wave about what the logs showed was ignored. Additionally whatever the tech did changed this from an intermittent reduction in power produced to a completely broken system. I am including screenshots where I can from my inverter that shows on 10/31/2024 when the technician came to our home the inverter was working. Since the tech did whatever he did to the inverter is broken completely stopping any energy from being produced or reported. I’ve reported this to solar wave, and asked that they diagnose what the problem is so that I can hire them to fix it. I did eventually pay and received written confirmation that smart wave would be handwringing the issue. After weeks of waiting I received an email from smart wave informing me that they would not be doing the work they had agreed to in writing several times, and had been paid for. Im very frustrated that smart wave has ignored me and insisted the issue is with the wifi. As I’ve said in order to eliminate that from the list of what could be wrong I have a hardline running from my inverter straight to my router. I’ve also accessed the UI for the inverter and it shows a strong connection. I paid for the repair and have asked that smart wave figure out why the system is having issues, and why it stopped working all together after their tech looked at it. Update 11/21/2024 After speaking to Smart Wave and paying them to come and fix the inverter their technician caused to stop working completely I received an email today saying that they would just not be doing anything. This is one of the most unprofessional acts of a company I have ever had the displeasure of working with. I am adding photos of my inverters production. The tech that Smart Wave sent who instead of ringing our doorbell knocked lightly on our screen door and then waited about a minute with no attempt to knock on our actual door, or ring the doorbell like a professional would broke our inverter completely taking it from having intermittent power reduction to not working at all. The tech came on 10/31/2024 as you can see from the photos included below the inverter was working. The next two photos show that the inverter hasn’t worked since that day. I have asked smart wave to honor their agreement, but should they decide not to I will be seeking a legal remedy for the cost of the inverter, the cost of installation, and the average daily cost of electricity my system should produce. I can honestly say I have never worked with a less professional company. If you are considering solar power go with anyone else. You will be much better off.

Absolutely elated with my experience with Smart Wave Solar. Their sales process was absolutely the best and their implementation team was a 10 out of 10. I absolutely recommend them and our power savings has been outstanding. For summer months we went from $500 to $20 which is the minimum. Two big thumbs up!

Had solar for almost 2 years zero power bill last 3 months no problems at all

Usual saga starting in May, 2021 as our Utility was changing so the Eng. Docs were changing too. Smart wave persevered despite it all and we were ready to go near the end of the year, but the Utility delayed into the end of Feb. 2022. Hailstorm in 2023 forced a detach and restore of panels with the usual "WTF" odd issues. Again, SmartWave stuck with me by reporting their findings, sending out Electricians, and eventually overcoming it all.

Heat Wave Solar has been stellar. They have been true to their estimates and have been very active in making sure I knew what was happening.

The original panel installation in 2022 was on-time and well communicated. Then, 2 yrs later, the temporary removal of the panel for my re-roof project (hail) was quick and painless.