The shine’s been taken off a solar power company after customers were left waiting more than a year for products or refunds.
Chand Ram paid Supercharged Energy New Zealand $10,000 to install solar panels on his roof and an extra $3000 for a battery.
That was back in August 2020. Since then, he’s been left waiting for his battery to be installed.
“You sort of get sucked into it, thinking 'okay it’s gonna happen tomorrow or the next day or next month,’" explains Chand.
When he asked the company to refund him instead, he never heard back.
Several people have contacted Fair Go about Supercharged Energy, complaining of waiting months for a solar panel or battery installation; or wanting a refund.
And they weren't all customers.
A contractor says his company was hired for a couple of solar installs at the end of January 2021. After a month, Supercharged Energy still hadn't paid for the work, owing nearly four thousand dollars.
Lei Chen told Fair Go he decided to post a review of Supercharged Energy on Google. He was then contacted by the company director, Richard Homewood, asking Lei to remove the review in order to get paid.
Fair Go asked Richard for an interview but instead was issued a statement from the company.
Supercharged Energy said its worked successfully with thousands of customers over the past five years.
It said orders had taken longer than expected to fulfil as due to the impact of Covid-19, affecting “global supply chains and the importation of hardware which we rely on as well as installer capacity."
The company says it has a “commercial dispute” with Lei Chen which its hoping to resolve. But Lei says the problem is simply that the invoice hasn’t been paid.
Supercharged Energy has apologised to affected customers and has now installed batteries or issued full refunds.
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