Harmon Solar Podcast
The solar energy sector in Arizona is currently oversaturated, which has led to a scarcity of transparency. In response, we've created a podcast to provide an honest perspective on going solar in the state. Join us as we explore the intricacies of utilities, equipment, processes, and more. Our primary objective is to educate and empower you to make informed decisions on your solar journey.
Harmon Solar Podcast
Let's Talk Solar Service and Maintenance
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Discover the unsung heroes behind your solar system's longevity! With the expert guidance of our service manager, Larry Aegerter, we peel back the layers on how we help you keep your solar panels at peak performance. Prepare to have the veil lifted on the critical, yet often overlooked, world of solar maintenance. Tune in and arm yourself with the info you need to keep your solar investment shining bright for years to come.
Welcome to another edition of the Harman Solar podcast . My name is Ron Fremonto , vp of Sales and Marketing at Harman Solar , and with me is my co-host , as always , ben Woslager . You guys also know him as Mr Everything . That's right , mr Everything , how are you ?
Speaker 2I'm great , how are you ? I'm good . I haven't seen you in a while . It's been a few days .
Speaker 1It's been a couple days . It's been a few days . I noticed you have a little noggin on your head .
Speaker 2Yeah , I know it's helping someone move and cut my head . So if you need help , Harman Solar can help you move .
Speaker 1No , we can't . You made it . That's good . Hopefully we'll see how your consciousness is today . We'll find out . Yeah , I know what are we talking about today .
Speaker 2Going back to the whole timeline of events , your research , solar , and you think okay , I think it's for me . You picked out a couple of companies , you had your sales consultation , you found a company , you got it installed and now your system is up and running . Everything's great . But then what happens ? It's an electrical device on your roof . It's going to break it is it's something can happen , it can happen .
Speaker 2I always tell people like my customers you know , you have this big , big , big , big , big , big , big , big , big , big , big , big , big , big , big , big , big , big , big , big big . But you know , you have this big electric device on your roof . It could break day one or it could break day one million , yeah , but sometime during that period it might break , so you just need to be prepared .
Speaker 1Okay , so what do we do ? I mean , we had a… you could call someone else , I don't know , got it .
Speaker 2So Harman has a service department ? We do , and that's interesting , because not a lot of . I mean , there are companies that have service departments , but there are some solar companies that don't have service departments .
Speaker 1That's true .
Speaker 1I found this out Like wow we talked about in the last podcast . Right , there are some companies that are just sales companies , and then there's us and we're a full service CPC , which means not only do we sell , not only do we install , but we also service and help maintain , so that we're the full boat , right . So with that , we have a service department and we wanted to bring in the head of our service department . Our service manager , larry Egeter is who we're gonna bring on the show today , so let's go ahead and bring him in and there
Introducing Larry
Speaker 1he is .
Speaker 3Hello Larry , hello Ben , it's actually Ogeter , not Egeter .
Speaker 1Okay , you said it Just joking . Oh my gosh .
Speaker 2This whole time , all these years ? How do you say it ? How do you ?
Speaker 3say it .
Speaker 1I don't know , egeter , yeah , anyway .
Speaker 2On that note . Yeah , and that's our show . Speaking of names .
Speaker 3I have a question , oh wow .
Speaker 1Get asked . That's cool , yeah , real quick .
Speaker 2He's the host of the show now .
Speaker 3Mr Everything .
Speaker 2Yeah , speaking of wide brushes .
Speaker 3How ?
Speaker 2did you get that title ? I don't . I think it was kind of given to me . I guess I didn't choose it . It's not on my business card .
Speaker 3Okay , I think it's because by who ? Anybody with credentials ?
Speaker 1I mean wow Well when we started this podcast last year , he came in here saying he did everything .
Speaker 3Yeah .
Speaker 2And you talk about how he did this and he did that and he did this .
Speaker 1So it became Mr Everything .
Speaker 2Because you know how some people like in their careers , like they'll move to a different apartment . I've moved to different apartments but at the same time I'm still doing a lot of the other things that I was doing before .
Speaker 3So I got you .
Speaker 1What I'm hearing is so this is very interesting . Can I call ?
Speaker 3him , mr . Some Stuff , some Stuff . This could be a better podcast than we thought .
Speaker 1Yeah , something , keep it up , I'll take you You're somebody that's internal , that actually knows Ben , so maybe he's not Mr Everything .
Speaker 3He's a nice guy . Yeah , nice guy .
Speaker 1That's what his wife says when I talk about him . He's a great personality and she stops .
Speaker 2Yeah , that's about it . Set the bar low .
Speaker 3We have hallway conversations . How about that ? Yeah , wow .
Speaker 2Allway conversations I've got people coming in my office all the time . Larry's not one of them Just passes by the hallway .
Speaker 3Oh , just walking by , yeah , yeah , all right so .
Speaker 2So we are going to talk about service . Let's get back on track . Yeah , what ?
Speaker 1do you got ? So , larry , besides what you know about Ben , how long you've been at Herman ? 14 , this is my 14th year , so he's actually been no longer than me .
Speaker 2Yeah .
Speaker 1On his 14th year . I'm on my 12th year , so wow . Yeah , 2010. , 2010 .
Speaker 3Wow , the math checks out . Couldn't find anything else .
Speaker 1What's that ? Couldn't find anything else .
Speaker 3Not at the time , no , no , that was right after that whole economy dump .
Speaker 2Let's go into history because that was before you , it was before me . What was Herman like back in 2010 ?
Speaker 3We were in a different spot , that's for sure . It was interesting . We were over on 15th Avenue .
Speaker 1That's right , you guys were in a different location , yeah .
Speaker 3Yeah , it was a lot smaller warehouses and it was a big move where we are now . I like it .
Speaker 1Yeah , nice , and your team was a lot smaller , but we'll talk about that .
Speaker 3We didn't have a team you didn't have a team . That was a lot smaller .
Speaker 1So they were zero .
Speaker 3We'd do anything better than zero is good yeah .
Speaker 1Well depending .
Speaker 3All right , so unless you're playing golf .
Speaker 1So what did you do before ? Look so go back to 2009 and 2008 . What were you doing ?
Speaker 3Oh , I was a land surveyor so I already kind of worked in the sun a lot . So I was out there mapping out grid lines and stuff , property corners and stuff . And then when that work stopped and people weren't hiring surveyors anymore , Steve Thomas brought me on to Harmon . He already worked here and he's the one that taught me everything I know . And since then I just started installing . I was part time for a long time , Then I became full time , started installing and just moved my ranks up from there installing to quality assurance manager and then I went to commercial project managing for a little bit and then QAQC and then into the service department . We kind of are a service department without actually having a service department for a long time . So you were a commercial PM , yeah Wow .
Speaker 2That's my job .
Speaker 3That's why I know you don't do much there it is I just kind of ?
Speaker 1scooped back .
Speaker 2Yeah , so you've done a lot yeah .
Speaker 1That's crazy .
Speaker 2You're everything 2.0 over here . Yeah , you might be 1.0 .
Speaker 1Yeah , that's true . You might be 2.0 . 2.0 is better , is it ?
Speaker 2Yeah , that's true 1.0 is always flawed . All right , all right , you're 0.5 . Thank you .
Speaker 1So your role today you're the service manager . Yes , what does that mean ? Tell us about your job .
Speaker 3I'm actually a co-service manager with Beth Butts in the office . I am like the manager with the technicians for all the knowledge of how to do the fixes in the field and what we need to do out there .
Speaker 1OK .
Speaker 3So I've got six , seven guys . Right now I'm losing a good one . He's moving back to New Mexico . But yeah , we have a bunch of guys out there , a bunch of trucks , and we're busy all the time .
Speaker 1Yeah , so this may be the dumbest question in the world Sounds about right , so why don't you ask it ? Well , before we get to that dumb question . So you said you and Beth , you guys kind of both run the department . Yeah , okay , so I'm assuming that she kind of handles all the inside business and you handle all the outside .
Speaker 3Yeah , they bring the intake any calls , call ins or um lease and company call ins , work orders . They get them . They process all of them , just like if someone were to call in . If someone has something wrong , it's not even our install call in . They'll talk to any of those three people we have Jonathan , ellen and Yvonne and then they will work , make a work order , hand it off to Beth and then Beth actually schedules it for me and my teams . Okay .
Speaker 1So we actually get calls from customers . We get calls from different companies , leasing companies , like you just mentioned , other companies , other installers yeah , make major national , national installers , yeah , yeah .
Speaker 3Yeah , we get calls for people that buy houses that don't they never had solar just to kind of go over and inspect it , which is a good thing , because they don't know and , by the if , they never had solar before . This gives us an opportunity to like educate them on how it works and tell them , like this is what it's going to do and you know , it's all about how you live with your energy and your bill and stuff .
Speaker 2Yeah , cause 99% of the time you know the real estate agent selling the home he's like they have no idea . Yeah , that's a solar system and I have no idea what it is , what it's doing , what's working .
Speaker 1I was going to go into that later , because you're saying new owners that don't have . They just bought a home that had solar Right , right , so we actually that's a service that we actually have . I was going to wait till later , but you're jumped into it , so let's go there . I mean , just run this , okay .
Speaker 3No .
Speaker 1So
Solar System Inspections for Home Buyers and Sellers
Speaker 1I mean we actually just like , when you buy a home and you get a home inspection , we actually offer a solar inspection to the real estate agencies , to the homeowner , to the person buying the home , where we will go out there and completely inspect the place and then we'll give you a full on report about how the system's performing .
Speaker 3Yeah , if there's any deficiencies like stuff that we really absolutely need to fix right now , like it's not working a hundred percent and so like actually a lot of times they call us and then they need this inspection , like right now , cause they're going to close in like two days and it's very hard . We always try to move things around and try to make it work for them . But if we get out there and inspect it and say one string is down on a system and they don't even know and we'll put it in a report , and if our guy can tech , if you can fix it on site , I tell them to fix it and we'll worry about the money later because they have to get that fixed for the sale within like a day or two to close . So that's how we do it .
Speaker 1So this is a good point . If you're a real estate agent , you're watching if you're selling a home . If you're buying a home and there's solar involved , you can actually call us and we can provide you really good report that you could then use through the escrow process , because these are going to become more and more needed now as we get into more and more homes having a solar . This is a big deal and there's not really any companies that I know of a couple of companies that are doing it , but we've been doing it for a little while now .
Speaker 2Yeah , you do the same thing with all the other items in your home . If you're buying a home that has a pool , you're going to get that pool inspected , make sure the pump's running , make sure the AC is running , and if it's not , then you know who to call and what to do . So if you have a solar system on the home that you're buying , you better know what it is , if it's working , how it's working , and one of our guys up there .
Speaker 3He can also identify if anything like the roof or mist , like we see broken tiles , we can put that into our report and everything .
Speaker 1And even if you're not buying a home or selling a home and you just want to know how your system is doing maybe you feel like I'm not sure if it's working a hundred percent , you could actually give Larry a call .
Speaker 2We can call the service department not .
Speaker 1Larry .
Speaker 3Don't call me directly . Put his number up . We'll put his number . Yeah , let's put Ralph's number up there .
Speaker 1But we can . You can call our service department and we actually will do that for you . So that's a great service to have that . I don't think that's really out there that much .
Speaker 3And if you call in right now , get your number up there . Yeah , the next 10 callers .
Speaker 1All right , so you kind of totally threw me to the back of the okay , but anyway . So we kind of talked about how you're set up . You're handling the outside , beth is handling the inside , so that's her team is basically a customer . Let's say we have somebody and I
Calls that Come In
Speaker 1know we get a lot of calls from people that we've didn't install Right . We get a lot . So I want to go back to that real quick . People that we didn't install call us a lot for work . National companies that have customers that have issues give us a call to handle work for them as well .
Speaker 3Well , a lot of people they have systems that their installers not even around anymore . Yeah , that's true , that too , so yeah , so there's that also .
Speaker 1Yeah .
Speaker 2I've seen those emails , the out of business installers but the in business , national installers , the big ones .
Speaker 1we work with them . So we're not just handling Carmen customers , we're handling a ton of different people .
Speaker 3Yeah , we even get it on the commercial side . People buy a new commercial buildings and they're solar on it and they have no idea how it's working , if it's working or anything . We do commercial and everything . Okay , I'm usually the one on the commercial ones . Okay , that's the fun one . And Ben , because he knows everything , he knows everything .
Speaker 2So I'm just gonna go ahead and just do this whole podcast myself , yeah .
Speaker 3You're doing a lot . This is going in a totally different direction . I don't even know he's here . I'm talking to you .
Speaker 2That's fine , I'll just sit here and wait .
Speaker 3That'll never happen . This is the best podcast ever .
Speaker 1So what I want to do ?
Speaker 2I don't even want you to talk , that's okay . We're doing it all this out .
Speaker 1Geez , I don't want to edit this out , I'm not editing any of this Good . So one other thing , what we've done , like Ben was saying before , is we've basically shared the process with people from beginning to end , from the point where they're looking from solar to the point where it gets turned on . We've gone through that entire process in about 13 episodes .
Speaker 3Yeah .
Speaker 1Right , so we've done that . And to his point , now I've got solar and something's going on . They're going to call your department , they're going to call Beth , best team , the best team , yeah . And they're going to say well , talk to Jonathan . Jonathan's great , jonathan's just got a great voice . He should be on the radio .
Speaker 3Right , he's a good guy , yeah , as soon as I come in the warehouse I can hear Jonathan .
Speaker 2Yeah , he looks like Jason Kelsey , by the way .
Speaker 1Yeah , oh yeah .
Speaker 2Yeah , next time in the office .
Speaker 3That's a sports reference .
Speaker 2Yeah .
Speaker 1Okay .
Speaker 3No idea .
Speaker 1So we're going to call our team . You know you give us , our team a call and they're going to get the information from you . They're going to figure out , try to help you If it's something they can talk through and try to figure out . They're going to typically it's not going to happen . They're going to need to go ahead and send a truck out .
Speaker 3Right , right .
Speaker 1Yeah , right . So that team , I assume , would then put something into the system that says , hey , we need to have a truck roll out to this address , and that goes to you and your team .
Speaker 3Yes , yes , yes , comes with our guys . Yeah , we get calls . We have like five , six calls a day , depending on how long each call is . And yeah , we just have it on our phone apps . It tells us where to go and everything .
Speaker 1And your guys are .
Speaker 3you're going out there right and you're meeting the customer and a lot of times the customer sometimes won't be home A lot of times . Sometimes Do they need to be home ? They don't if the all the equipment is accessible . I thought you were laughing . No Like if , if like the equipment's in the garage . That's a problem , because we need to get to the equipment . Yeah , I mean we can look at stuff on the roof , but that doesn't get as much Majority of the installs .
Speaker 2Now you know we have all the equipment outside . We don't necessarily have to go inside for most parts of them , but there's there's a lot of millions of installs .
Speaker 1There's a lot of inverters in the garage .
Speaker 2That's true , though . A lot of minor ones , yeah , the older ones yeah .
Speaker 1So that we're most likely gonna have to be home .
Speaker 2It's probably they're on Ralph's house right now .
Speaker 1My in the garage . Where was I going with this ? I don't know , okay . So yeah , I know where I was going . I want you to give me an idea of what are the most common things that you
Most Common Issues People Call About
Speaker 1typically go on a call on . What kind of things do you get called about ?
Speaker 3a lot of it's monitoring . That goes into just if someone has their system hooked up through Wi-Fi . If people forget , if they get a new router or they change their Wi-Fi password , that the equipment is on Wi-Fi so it needs to be reprogrammed to Whenever we fix it , I try to walk them through like if this gives up , put , make a note for yourself . Like if you change Wi-Fi change , make sure you got a change your inverter .
Speaker 1I feel like , just from looking at your face , that this is like the number one issue . Oh , it's a lot of the time , yeah yeah , I mean it's equal .
Speaker 3I mean we still get like a lot of string down the equipment failures because we have so many inverters out there that are out of Warranty and they're just dying now . So we got to get a another inverter Manufacturer because they all the ones aren't available anymore . So we got to get newer stuff like Fronius , sma , tygo , all the , all the new inverters we put in . We just got to size it according to the system they have and then put in a new so we can put a newer type inverter on an older system .
Speaker 1Yeah , string inverters yeah .
Speaker 2And then when we say monitoring that's separate from actual production this is kind of a we all know it , but it customers they kind of link the two together and they're actually not really that much linked together . I always tell people monitoring is like your speedometer in your car . If you're driving down the freeway and your speedometer is broken and it reads zero doesn't mean your car is going zero . It's just a monitoring aspect of your car is reading zero . So a lot of times people call in they'll say oh , my system's down , it's broken and we just know . Just your monitoring is down , your system's still producing , just the monitoring aspect .
Speaker 3Yeah , they think it's not going to the equipment or the utility company .
Speaker 2I think there's no production being like no monitoring , production or separate .
Speaker 3I usually tell people it's like just a window to what your system uses , like . It's like it gives you a window online Just to show you what it's doing . It's still working electrically .
Speaker 2Yeah , yeah , yeah . So a lot of times it's just the monitoring that just goes down , because because , like you said it was they changed their Wifi . But it is important , though , because monitoring if something happens .
Speaker 3It's supposed to be set up to actually send you an alert right and , some cases , solar edge . If it's not online , sometimes they won't warranty their equipment until they can see it , and phases is very similar to that too . Unless they can see what it's actually doing , they won't warranty it . So it's very important on some aspects .
Speaker 1So make sure , if you're changing your router To make sure that it's this , whatever you type , monitoring is updated .
Speaker 3Yeah , I do . All depends on the equipment . There's a big wide range . I mean , some of it uses Wi-Fi , some of his hard line depends on how it's set up . But yeah , it's a good anything that kind of newer . Yeah , absolutely Isn't most of the newer stuff set up Wi-Fi .
Speaker 1Yeah right , and the older there's a lot of older stuff that we did hardwiring . I remember that we used to do that a lot .
Speaker 3Oh yeah , the SMA web boxes and everything right , but everything typically today is Wi-Fi okay , and it also has to be on a 2.4 gigahertz Signal because it doesn't work . All 5g almost everything inverter Related is 2.4 .
Speaker 2Do you have to have Wi-Fi to get solar ? No , okay , you do not need Wi-Fi .
Speaker 3Okay , it will work without like being on the monitoring site . Electrically , the solar will still work . It's just some aspects of it you need . The manufacturer needs to see what it's doing before they warrant any up any parts specific parts .
Speaker 2It just needs to be able to communicate .
Speaker 3Yeah , and it's . It's helpful for the customer because everything's app based to now , Especially any newer systems , but yeah , okay what if I live up north somewhere where there's no Wi-Fi ? Yeah , you can get cellular plugins for certain things . Yes , and face has cellular options . Yes , I Believe SMA does , but it's limited because it depends on the carrier , so okay but it is an option .
Speaker 1Besides monitoring , what other things do you actually typically see calls come in for like one of the most common things ?
Speaker 3A lot of people can call in if they think the system is not
Calls About Bills Being Too High
Speaker 3working right , because , in accidents , if they don't know what it should be producing and they're just getting a higher bill . Sometimes They'll ask us to look at their bill form right , which we can do so .
Speaker 1Let's talk about that .
Speaker 2So that used to be Ben's role as I can see , so that used to be Ben's role you guys took that on like about about a couple months ago .
Speaker 1Yeah now that you've taken that roll on , yes , what , what ? What are you seeing with people ? So is it ? Are there some typical things that always happen like well , no , the system's working , you're just using more power . I mean , are you seeing different ?
Speaker 3things . That's the majority of it . Just so people aren't aware that they're using more power . If they get new equipment , maybe they get a spa and they didn't realize how much good it's gonna pull .
Speaker 2Nothing's changed in my lifestyle other than 10 people now live here .
Speaker 3Are you walking our customers ?
Speaker 2Just saying this is from yeah , but you gave more voice .
Speaker 1Yeah , I mean when you guys are doing song and talk , both you . When you guys do this for customers , mm-hmm , what percentage of max ? They come back where there's actually a system issue .
Speaker 3I actually haven't had one where I calculated where I had a like an actual system yes , issue .
Speaker 2yet yeah , what ? When it does happen ? It's , it's usually very minor , we'll notice . Oh , you know , because we looked into it . Yeah , your production is a little bit lower than the guarantee that you know was on your contract and we spotted the issue . It's , you know , this panel's down and we have to , you know , swap it out or we have to do whatever service does to get it up and running . But it's , it's very rare that it's something mechanical that has happened . Okay , how ?
Speaker 1That's a great question . People always ask this about panels . How often you've been doing this forever ? How many times have you actually seen a panel on a house ? Go down .
Speaker 3We're seeing a lot more of the older stuff and unfortunately , like Connergy's not around anymore . We try to . If we find any old mods that aren't working right , we'll try to find if we can get the original manufacturer's information and try to process through warranty if they're still under warranty , cause I don't remember exactly the year but you got to call the manufacturer because it changes on all of them but it has not in warranty and it's just a burn through or something . It's just not letting you bolted through . We can just get a new module , newer modules , as long as we can have our design team look at it , and we'll make sure it matches with the system and we can add mods to the system and it all still work as good or better .
Speaker 1So you're seeing more of that now with the older stuff .
Speaker 3Yeah .
Speaker 1Because now the world where 2024 people started this around 2008 was when it really started going 20 warranties .
Speaker 2It's getting to the end of that warranty and a lot of those back in the day they only had , you know , 10 year warranty or 12 year warranty .
Speaker 1So that's why you're saying a lot of matter warranty . Now everything's about 25 .
Speaker 3So if it's a least system , a 20 year lease . So yeah , they're still under warranty . And if we can't get that facilitated , we'll either the leasing company well , actually , I just have to replace the equipment or they'll just tell us to buy new mods and design it .
Speaker 1The good thing about the mods today is they all come with a 25 year pretty much , and there are some leasing companies that don't even exist anymore . So I could think of a couple of off the bat but okay , that's interesting . So when something is under
Dealing With Manufacturer's Warranty
Speaker 1managed , so you go out to the house and you find something that's under manufacturer warranty , what do you have to do ? Do you have to stop , then contact the manufacturer ? Yeah , we call them on site and everything .
Speaker 3Yeah , we'll call whatever it is , fronius , sma and phase on site , start the warranty claim , get a case started and then we pass all this information onto our office and they follow up with that case constantly until we get the equipment in and then we'll schedule it and cut back out .
Speaker 1So at that point we can't do anything else . We have to wait for them to send us a new piece .
Speaker 3Maybe they tell us five to 10 business days , but it can be longer . Specific manufacturers like ABB , they're like a couple months backlogged on their equipment . It's a good thing we don't use ABB anymore .
Speaker 1We haven't used ABB in years , but I remember this stuff , but this is warranty stuff . They can't even get their equipment to us . Wow yeah , I don't think we're seeing that with like N phase or the bigger companies now . But that's , you're bringing up the old , the old industry .
Speaker 3That's how it was , that's why it's kind of hard , for my department too is hiring guys . I can't just get somebody that barely knows how to install Like you have to actually know how to install before you can actually know how a system is not working right .
Speaker 3Yeah , that's the only way I know . I've been doing it for so long . I got great guys . They I'm teaching them stuff that I know and they're teaching me stuff that they find out with all some of the new stuff . But , yeah , I got a great group of guys out there that take care of all that , yeah .
Speaker 2So that's something else to consider . When you are shopping for solar , you know not only the equipment and the warranties you might want to ask , you know your sales rep that has the service department that . What's it gonna be like if something goes down ? Am I gonna be my system's gonna be down for a week , two weeks , three weeks , a month ? Well , by the time , a lot of times we get people that call us and it's already been broken .
Speaker 3They didn't know until they get a big bill . And then they call us , unfortunately . If it's like a cold call , it's fine . We can get out there pretty quickly , but a lot of times we're forced to . If it's a lease , they have to call their leasing company , and so then the leasing company has to send us a work order because the leasing company owns it . So we can't just go for the customer .
Speaker 1So that's a really good point we need to hit on . So if you have a lease , you don't own that system . You obviously , hopefully know that and we can't do anything without the owner of that system giving us the okay to do that , and that could take time .
Speaker 3Yeah , very rarely we'll have a good enough relationship with a leasing company where we're like , yeah , we can just dispatch , we know we can get a work order later if it's like something that's severe I mean obviously a safety issue , absolutely . But if it's something that we know we've been to this house before for some reason and something happened and , yeah , we can get back out knowing we have history with that leasing company , it's good to know .
Solar Warranty and Inspection Services
Speaker 1Do you guys offer any type of extended warranty plans or anything like that from your department ?
Speaker 3Yeah , we've been talking about that for a while . If we could like especially a lot of our old installs from OA in whenever we started , we could come out and inspect the system , bring it up to date , torque everything back down , make sure you got voltage on all the system . Everything's working right . But yeah , we can come out , inspect it and then we can actually provide a warranty for that inspection , for what we installed way back in the day .
Speaker 1Oh .
Speaker 2I did not know that . So if you're getting towards the end of your warranty and you wanna well , a lot of them are gonna be out especially a workmanship warranty .
Speaker 3We don't have that for 10 years , it's a five year workmanship warranty .
Speaker 1We have 10 now , 10 way yeah .
Speaker 3Wow , they changed it on me yeah they changed it . Well , I mean , yeah , anybody that was back then it's still . It was a five . Yeah , no , it's gone .
Speaker 1Yeah , so we could actually go out there and do that kind of inspection . So you guys offered an inspection service , different from what we were talking about before , where you guys can do what you needed . Like you just said torque stuff down , do whatever it is you do , and then offer us some kind of an extended warranty on that . Yeah absolutely I would . If you've had solar on your house for a while , I would absolutely recommend doing that , yeah .
Speaker 2I think I need to do that Check on your warranty . I just still need to do mine too .
Speaker 1I didn't even think I didn't even know we had that Mine's been up for like six years .
Speaker 3We've been working on it with Dan for a while , I should call .
Speaker 1Harman . I should call Harman . All right , well , good to know . So you said that you also do some commercial stuff as well in service .
Speaker 3Oh , absolutely yeah , there's a lot of old systems out there . I mean buildings also changed hands a lot .
Speaker 1Right .
Speaker 3So yeah , even some of our old installs we still do O&Ms for . But yeah , we do commercial stuff .
Speaker 1So that's true , right . So some of the commercial stuff they get a few year O&M . Typically it's a one year O&M summer if we go longer or they could be year to year O&M .
Speaker 3Yeah , absolutely .
Speaker 1So yeah , what does an O&M mean ?
Speaker 3Operations and maintenance . Yeah , maintenance . So just come out , check everything .
Speaker 1So kind of the stuff we were just talking about on the residential side , but we actually do sell that on the commercial side . That's part of the deals typically .
Speaker 3We're only going to be able to access stuff that's accessible to us . Anything APS locked out , we can't get in and torque and everything obviously . But yeah , we'll go through the whole system , make sure everything's good and working . Do you do any work for the utility ? Yeah , we do work for the utility all the time . We service a lot of their plants in Gila Bend . That's actually where Steve Thomas is , so he's the guy that trained me .
Speaker 1Do you ever work on solar farms ?
Speaker 3Yeah , that's the ones we were working on out there in Gila Bend . We do the maintenance for that for some of their tracking systems , Anything they need anywhere . We do residential and commercial for APS all the time .
Speaker 2Nice .
Speaker 1So you mentioned when you first got here that Steve Thomas was the guy that taught you everything that you know .
Speaker 3Yes , yes , steve was the guy that brought me in and showed me everything that works and he actually was one of the first guys that watching him with the customers actually instilled it on me to act like when I go to a house , it's I'm taking care of it , like if I was the homeowner , and what my service manager or not manager , but service tech wanted to , was going to do and what he found in everything . And I tried , instilled that with a lot of my guys and my guys are great . It's like I had a guy a couple of years ago came in , his name was Nick Bucky and he didn't know anything . I had to start from scratch with him , like he didn't even know how electricity , like in the panel , worked . It was great .
Speaker 1But he came a long way and he's out there with Steve too , so he went from not knowing what a service panel is or what electricity is , except maybe something you plug in the wall right to now he's actually working on this stuff .
Speaker 3Yeah , I taught him everything and he moved up and actually he got moved on and he's out there working in the plants with . So he always has career to you . Oh yeah , oh yeah , big time .
Speaker 1Well , Nick , you should be thankful to him .
Speaker 2I want to give him a call .
Speaker 3Yeah .
Dealing with Bad Installs
Speaker 1With all the jobs that you've gone out on . I know you do a lot of . You go out on a lot of work that we don't do as Harman that's other installers that are doing it and we've talked in this podcast multiple times about the inferior equipment Some of these companies use , like tile hooks and things like that . Oh yeah , do you see . Do you see a lot where tile hooks fail , the panels go flying , just bad installs that we run into and go . Oh my gosh , I cannot believe this happened . But we fix it .
Speaker 3Oh yeah , we've had systems that homeowners actually have built on their houses . Yeah , and it was at the time . It lasted as long as it could and it flipped all the way over and we had to get out there and dispatch and dismantle the whole thing . And they ran it through a homeowners insurance something or other . But yeah , dismantle it , make it safe , get it all down . Then we to put it all back up . We have to have design , redesign the system properly and put all the right equipment .
Speaker 1So we've had to fix things for homeowner installs for other companies that have done bad installs . And that's part of what you guys are doing on a daily basis . Oh , all the time .
Speaker 2I know we always get the bad news . Yeah , that goes back to the . You know the saying like oh , I got a guy that can do it for me much cheaper . Yeah .
Speaker 1Another thing that I know we've done a lot of work on lately and we were kind of talking about this before the podcast is we get a lot of R&R work . Yeah , removal , reinstalls . So yeah , what I mean by that is people that are going to do re-roofs , right . And then you guys go out there and take all the panels off , take all the stuff off . Then the roofer comes and they do the roof work and then you come back and do it all right .
Speaker 3We reinstall it with the right stuff . How long does it take you to take that stuff out ? It depends on the size of the system , but our guys , we could take it down in probably two to three hours , if not even faster , when we put it back on whatever you .
Speaker 1What are you putting new ? What are your ?
Speaker 3replacements . We're doing new stanchions because we can verify that it's not going to leak . It actually is going to like keep the roofers warranty too , with our roofers doing it , and then we could do new stanchions . Most of the time we can reuse the rail . Beth always sends it to me if the rail's reusable . But if we can't , we'll just get new rail and then all new mids and ends and get it all secured .
Speaker 1Okay , so that's one of the bigger services that we offer . I'd say you probably do that . A lot from what I'm hearing from you , yeah , and then a lot of you know .
Speaker 2A lot of it too is troubleshooting things that you know the homeowner will call or email in and say , like I think my system is down . We take a look and we're like no , it's not down . Or you know , if it's just a monitoring issue , it's a quick fix .
Speaker 3It could be shade A lot of times . The tree will get bigger and someone doesn't realize it or like , yeah , that's your problem .
Speaker 2I can think of a recent one where it was kind of , you know , baffling us because we're like , yeah , these panels aren't producing as much anymore . We're looking at the plans , like the proposal was sold , there was no tree before . And then we're like let's take a look at recent Google images and see like , oh , your neighbor planted a tree . Yeah , Like okay , so everything's working fine . Your neighbor just decided to plant a 20 foot tree and now that's shading your panels .
Speaker 3Yeah , I mean to the older systems . I mean I say older , I don't know how to gauge that , but a lot of the older ones are string inverters and the idea is if you put the shadow of a business card on one module in that string , that whole string sees it , so it drops . Just like one panel in a string getting shade , will drop current and production on that string .
Speaker 1And you'd say you probably get called out a lot on things , or were shades an issue ?
Speaker 3Oh yeah .
Speaker 1Well , not a lot , but yeah , trees , trees and issues . Trees grow .
Speaker 3Yeah , trees too grow For you know a green company we hate trees yeah .
Speaker 2It's an edit that way .
Speaker 1That one's coming out .
Speaker 2Come on , could we get shirts that say green company ? We hate trees , we do Shades bad Shade is bad .
Speaker 1So , yes , we are a renewables company , yeah , but now we're a landscaping company Trees can also be our enemy . Yeah , as you so Elegantly , elegantly sad On the service team . So on your team , not the team in house . What's the average length of service ? How long you guys been there ? I know you've been there 14 years . How about your team ? Are they pretty experienced , been there on a long ?
Speaker 3time . Yeah , they were in different departments when I brought them over , but yeah , they're very experienced and they I mean I would say my guys probably know a lot more than any of the installers . Well we know what goes , what do we know what breaks . It's a different skill set . Yeah , you have to .
Speaker 1Yeah , exactly , yeah , okay , so it sounds . It sounds like we've gone over everything in the service department all the offers , all the things that you offer our residential customers . You work for our commercial customers . You do a lot of work for other companies that are not here anymore , or national companies , so you guys are a full service service company . The fact that you I think the one thing that people need to look into is the fact that you basically offer O and M stuff for residential as well . So , yeah , the one thing I did forget to bring up .
Speaker 3A lot of people call us with off-grid systems were not well versed on off-grid . Yeah , we really like old , yeah old systems . They have , like a lot of times , someone themselves built it . We went to one and it was way north and my guy gets up and he's like I don't even know what I'm looking at dude .
Speaker 2I'm like just go around there's car boundaries everywhere .
Speaker 1You can just come back , dude , have fun . Yeah , yeah . So that'd be a good point is we don't ? We don't sell off-grid and we don't service off-grid .
Speaker 3So no , they've set me on a couple . I've been able to get , like some , a sunny islands working on trailers or something , but that was the last one I said no more .
Speaker 1Okay , so good to know , all right . Well , very enlightening .
Speaker 2That was fun .
Speaker 3Yeah , it was , that was that was interesting .
Speaker 1We've taught each other's things .
Speaker 2We have .
Speaker 1So thanks , larry , for joining us . I appreciate it . Thank you . What's next ?
Speaker 2Ralph .
Speaker 1We'll see .
Speaker 2We'll see Viewers if you are watching this , make sure you like and subscribe , and if you have other ideas for podcasts , let us know .
Speaker 1And we do have some good ideas of some stuff that we can bring up here soon .
Speaker 3So we'll , we'll , we'll look at doing something different here , and if you want to get somebody better than Ben , I'll do this . That's fine .
Speaker 1So we might be looking for a new Mr Everything .
Speaker 3I'm putting in my two weeks I think .
Speaker 2I would fit the title a little bit better . Yeah , well , yeah , debatable .
Speaker 1Anyway . So thanks for spending time with us and joining us , and we'll see you next time .
Speaker 2Thank you .
