Homeowner says solar panel company abandoned job, fabricated approval letters

OKLAHOMA CITY (KFOR) — A metro homeowner isn’t sure where to turn after he says a company failed to finish installing a solar panel system on his house, then fabricated letters from his electric company, causing him to start receiving bills for the non-functional system.  

Oklahoma City homeowner Ryan Jacob told News 4 he thought he was making the smart choice last year when he and his wife had solar panels installed on the home they share with their two young children.

“The idea of using solar made a lot of sense to us,” Jacob said. “Lower your bill long term, you know, better on the environment kind of thing.”

But 12 months later, the panels still aren’t even hooked up to anything.

“It's just turned into a nightmare,” he said. “We’ve been paying since July on the system is not working.”

He first contacted Elite Power Solutions, a local company owned by a family friend, to install the system.

The owner of Elite Power Solutions told News 4 the work on Jacob’s house was a little outside his company’s scope, so he helped contract the job out to a Texas-based company called Solergy.

The owner of Elite Power Solutions said the contract for the work is between Jacob and Solergy, not his company.

Solergy began installation last April.

“They basically came out and used installers that weren't licensed,” Jacob said. “They haven't followed through on getting things completed.”

Jacob said city inspectors won’t sign off on Solergy’s work.

“The city won't come out and approve anything until it's actually properly permitted and done,” Jacob said. “Well, they can't get a permit because they didn't do anything up to code.”

He said he kept trying to call Solergy, but they stopped answering him.

With the panels still not hooked up to anything, Jacob was surprised when the finance company for the project started sending him bills last July.  

“From my understanding, [the bills] are supposed to only kick on which everything is done and approved,” Jacob said. “But it’s $155 a month that we're paying right now. And we're also paying our electric bills still.”

He called the finance company. He said the finance company told him they started billing him because Solergy sent them a letter from Jacob’s electric provider—OG&E—claiming the electric company inspected the work and connected the system to their meter.

There’s a few problems with that. The meter was never installed; a piece of cardboard is still taped in its place on the side of Jacob’s house.

The panels haven’t been connected to OG&E’s grid. They’re not operational at all.

“So somehow Solergy went through the process of fabricating it to look like it was approved when it wasn't,” Jacob said.

He took a closer look at the letter Solergy claimed was sent from OG&E, approving the work.

“When you actually look at the letter, the top logo is a little bit pixelated, it doesn't look clean,” Jacob said. “We're like, well, that looks kind of odd.”

So he called OG&E.

Jacob said OG&E told him they never sent any such letter to his finance company, and never signed off on Solergy’s work at all.

Then, Jacob called his brother-in-law—who had also hired Solergy to do work at his own house.

His brother-in-law called his finance company, who showed him a letter Solergy submitted, also claiming to be from OG&E, signing off on work at his house.

The problem is—the electric provider at his brother-in-law’s house isn’t even OG&E.

“So [Solergy] just fabricated the whole thing,” Jacob said.

Now, after a year of trying to get answers, he’s not sure where to turn.

“It's just beyond ridiculous at this point,” he said.

News 4 reached out to the man Jacob had been working with at Solergy. He did not get back to News 4.  

News 4 also called the owner of Elite Power Solutions, who had connected Jacob with Solergy in the first place.

The owner of Elite Power Solutions said he’s going to cover any costs it will take to get Jacob’s system properly up and running. He said he has also tried to get in touch with Solergy over the past year, but never gets a response.