Sunergy

I started working here in April 2018. I was hired as an inspection tech for $20/hourly. I thought this was great given my install and inspection experience. On day 1 I already found myself butting heads with my “supervisor” (not my hiring manager). This girl would add additional calls to my schedule with no knowledge or care of what jobs truly needed. She only demanded miracles out of me as she would say: “it HAS to be done today!”

At our monthly meetings, the CEO of the company and my actual manager would tell me that this girl was not a supervisor and we didn’t need to listen to her. At the same time, this girl would make false reports about the workers being incompetent and disrespectful to her. I had to put her in check by letting her know that I’ve been pushed around by people in her position before and I wouldn’t allow it. Things were absolutely fine from then until the manager was replaced roughly 9 months after I had been there.

Briefly in between that time where they sought a replacement manager, the muscle bound Sales Manager was in charge. This guy was alright except for the fact that he started hiring his friends and giving them special treatment, like taking them on vacations with him suddenly while the rest of us relied on the extra hands only to have them hardly there. I was selected to train these new hires in their jobs which I had no experience in: site surveys. I had always been told surveys were easy so I just lead these new guys, with confidence after quick reviews of other surveys, and they learned well. I’m suddenly also expected to take on more service calls so naturally, I asked for a raise and got it. I moved up to $23.50 by June 2019. I forgot to mention that Muscles constantly sexually harassed the women I worked with and 2 of them confided in me his actions. They reported him to HR but HR did not protect them. Instead, these women were terminated. Eventually, Muscles “quit”, but not before he was generously compensated. Another person who had snob goggles was let go because he was allegedly stealing money from the company, but since the company relied on his contractor license he was awarded more money and they made a contract with him to keep using his license.

New manager is hired in approximately June 2019. In comes a very adult moron with giant diamonds in his ears and a new baseball cap every day. This man believed he was made of money and looked down upon us workers. We were his slaves and our jobs suddenly became more demanding. What’s more is he brought in an assistant who did his job more than he did; so here are 2 salaries (at least 100k) wasted on 2 people who are doing the job of 1 person. Seriously, what did the guy ever do? I mean, I only ever spoke to his assistant while he just locked himself in his office. I did get calls from him sometimes to take on extra jobs like roof leaks (which I have absolutely no experience with roofing or interior work, nor did I care to have any). I despised this because I would already be home with my family when suddenly at dinner time I’m demanded to take a spoon out of my child’s mouth and leave them without a father to tuck into bed; yes, I exaggerate but this manager did not care at all about the wellness of others. He could only be spoken to in the language of money. To capture his genuine interest, one would need to rub 2 pennies together as they speak to him. This guy even sent me to work in San Francisco TWICE on just an hours notice! I would be gone for a week at a time and finding home arrangements on such short notice is hard but Money Man does not care. If I wasn’t in San Francisco immediately then my job would be held over my head. This is when I realized this company seems to hire bullies to be managers. I understand, management and leadership based on past experience. Money Man was neither leader or manager, he was a bully. I even found out later that many sudden calls he sent me to after hours were for personal friends of his, which explains why I was going crazy trying to find them in our project database only to discover they weren’t in there. They weren’t customers of ours. Money Man was taking advantage of me and the company for free labor.

When COVID came upon us, this company showed its true colors. Like others, Money Man quit because in February 2020 this company cut pay by 25% for absolutely everyone. Many were even laid off, which was upsetting because it left people like me to do extra work for less pay. I hung in there and continued my work, having faith this company would be up on its feet again. The CEO applied for Work Share Program so that the government would give us funds to reinstate our normal pay rates. I found out from the warehouse manager that the state awarded the money to the company; however, the company informed the managers that this money would be kept as an investment to open a new office in Florida. Also, a close friend of the company’s president revealed to us workers that the president kept a remainder of that money in order to pay for a luxurious fishing trip. When this friend confronted the president about this, the president said: “It’s MY company so it’s MY money.” I’m just upset about this because of the fact that HR said the money would be used solely to gives us our pay rates back. It’s not surprising though because I have read the president’s criminal record, and based on the arrest reports, money goes up his nose in large amounts.

Some work, mainly breaker panel upgrades, had to be contracted out to another company. One day I get a call from Money Man’s assistant and she wants me to work for her and Money Man at the place that receives my company’s contracts for the breaker panel upgrades! I despise Money Man and his very poor offer so I told on him to my CEO. The CEO and I had become well acquainted by this time and so I had no trouble confronting him. I even had hopes that he could make me into a manager.

My CEO was pleased with me telling on Money Man and so the contracts were revoked from Money Man and eventually reinstated to our own workers, who for long needed the work.

My CEO and I had collaborated on many projects and he told me that if I noticed any more managers behaving unjustly then I could let him know. This would later be just empty words since the next manager they brought in was the biggest bully I had ever met and the CEO bent over backwards for her.

Our pay rates were reinstated in May 2020. I had missed out on a management opportunity when the president hired another personal friend of his to oversee projects for loose ends before they are scheduled for inspection. I wanted out of the field since it was becoming more physically tiresome. Had I known the company wanted to create a position like this, it would have been perfect and well earned for me.

Then another manager was hired to fill in for Money Man. This woman was hectic to work with. When she was hired, she tried to pick on me in the office on her first day.

“What do you do here?” She asked.

This question was complicated for me because by this point I was an inspection guy/service tech/site surveyor/office helper. When I explained this to her, she replied with a sense of judgement: “Oh.....you’re a FIELD worker.”

Just before she could try to size me up further, in walked the CEO who immediately boasted about me to the woman. If it hadn’t been for that, I’m sure the Queen would have continued to talk down to me about how I was unworthy to set foot in the office. From this moment she was suddenly my best friend with the condition of being allowed to override my schedule with urgent service calls, yet I was expected to still continue with my regular schedule afterwards no matter how late it was or how far apart the jobs were. This was annoying because I’d be finished with my day around 9pm and I’d have a 2 hour drive home on average, yet I’m still expected to show up for work at 6am. It’s a wonder to me how I had never fallen asleep at the wheel.

She did allow me to earn $26 hourly but of course that came with expectations at work. This was when I really began working constant late hours. The result in paycheck was nice but not at the cost of never being home with my family. I was being taken advantage of. People started quitting, expressing that Queen was the reason. She definitely made everyone’s job more difficult with her overbearing behavior of a smug nosed dictator with authoritative fingers spearing at everyone’s morale. Just talking to her in person made my heart choke itself out of fear that she’d suddenly demand more unrealistic results for the day. My mind was anxious in the field, knowing that Queen could call at any second to pile on a world of work for me to survive. I quit because of Queen. The last week of December 2020, I was already hired by another company and I intended to leave without notice. My last day was so ridiculous though because it was another typical heavy schedule that Queen gracefully disorganized for me. To her it was just another “will you do this one extra thing for me, sweetie? Thank you”. Oh yeah, I was constantly called Sweetie and Hun. It was strange to me because today’s American culture has taught me that this sort of talk is now sexual harassment even coming from females. I didn’t let it bother me but I know that I shouldn’t accept condescending terms of endearment from people like Queen.

Speaking of culture, Queen has a habit of allowing Latino workers get away with unprofessional habits because according to her “it’s a culture thing”. I first heard her say this when she had me collect a check from a customer who suddenly didn’t understand English when I arrived at his house. After I set Queen on him over the phone, he coughed up a check for me and smiled innocently. She described his behavior as a “culture thing”, which is to imply that the majority of Mexicans will pretend not to know what you’re talking about if they owe you money. Queen isn’t from any Hispanic background at all, but I am noticeably Hispanic, however these “cultural norms” did not apply to me and so I feel a bit offended but also I don’t know if I have the right to be. Queen’s husband is Mexican so it appears that this is her token to make assertions about any Latino background and categorize them all together as one. As I write this I cannot help but to be continuously offended but also I am sorry for being offended for some reason.

Anyways, Queen also lets Latino workers call in sick if they are hungover from nights of celebration because this is a “culture thing”. So it doesn’t matter if this doubles work for everyone else for the day because certain culture prevails over the company. They can also challenge her authority or speak against her because those actions are also a “culture thing”. Any persons of other racial background that has behaved the exact same way was quickly terminated. So I’m sorry to say this but when it comes to Queen, being any other race than Latino will already put you at risk of termination. Last I heard, she’s still there.

Beware this company, the CEO and president pose as a Christian based company and yet they work on subcontract with shady companies that are known for causing seniors to lose their homes. They do not discipline poor workmanship, but rather they make service techs like me spend days fixing mistakes that require many hands, such as reinstalling an entire job. They openly discriminate homosexuality and other alternate lifestyles. They say they can’t can’t afford to pay workers top wage like other companies, who start solar workers at $30, because it’s “unrealistic” and could run the company broke; however, the company persists on hiring more workers and opening new branches. If that makes sense then I certainly don’t know left from right anymore.

I gave this company nearly 3 years of my life and the end result was that I was too good at my job to promote so they squeezed every bit of work they could get out of me. No one communicated the needs of unfinished jobs and so when I showed up for inspections to find jobs incomplete, it would fail and then Queen would treat me like I was supposed to finish an entire install job in an hour before the inspector showed up. For someone who claimed to have so many years of solar experience, she didn’t act like it.

Anyways, I hated that place and they held everyone’s job over their head. So if you have no family and are desperate for anything then this is probably the place for you. Visit their church every once in a while and that will score you some points. Beware the president of the company, he’s on drugs. I read his police report so he cannot deny it. He’s rich though so of course he didn’t stay behind bars.