And just like that, they were gone. As of today, Level Solar’s website is offline, their phone has an out-of-hours message in the middle of the day, and former employees are stating that everyone has been let go.
Unlike companies traded on stock exchanges, there isn’t a lot of public information available on private companies – even mid-sized ones. And Level Solar was not small. Even today the residential and commercial and industrial (C&I) solar installer’s LinkedIn account was reporting 130 employee accounts in New York and Massachusetts, and in 2015 Level Solar had reached a deal to borrow $25 million from New York’s Green Bank.
However in June CEO Richard Keiser was let go, which is described by a former employee of a Level competitor as precipitating a “rocky” time for the company. An anonymous former Level employee reported that company management informed employees by email last Friday that they had “forgotten” to pay their worker’s compensation insurance, leading to a suspension of all employees.
This was followed by another former employee stating yesterday on LinkedIn that he, along with the rest of the staff, had been laid off. This has been confirmed by other posts on LinkedIn and other employment-related websites.
It goes without saying to no one from Level Solar has responded to pv magazine request for information, there is no record of a WARN Act notice on the New York State website, and there is no bankruptcy court filing on record. Regardless, we plan to update this article as more information becomes available.
This content is protected by copyright and may not be reused. If you want to cooperate with us and would like to reuse some of our content, please contact: editors@pv-magazine.com.
Kinda sad isn’t.
Saw this coming a mile away when you have the 2 Steven’s running the show and they have absolutely no clue how to manage. Their egos were the only thing that was going up. Loved training daily like a 2 year old because these guys were making $150k a year each and only knew how to quote some motivational speaker. Idiots
SUNation Solar Systems based in Ronkonkoma, NY is equipped to assist all Level Solar Long Island customers with all service and/or maintenance on their systems moving forward. Please contact us at 631-750-9454 or email us directly at service@sunationsolarsystems.com.
Take your shameless advertising elsewhere
I agree, this isn’t an appropriate place to Plug your father’s company. Have you no humility? There are families now having to deal with their loss and you are here peddling for potential customersshamelessly.
So your taking over there agreements they had no equity investors so how so ? People like you with your deceptive practices make my job harder because customer find it hard to trust
Hi
Is SunNation be assigned to take the over the accounts of prior lS customers?
My sister was just laid off a couple days ago from level solar. With no warnings, not a word said about a possible lay off. None the less, she and every other employee of the company was laid off via Email. Very disturbing how a company so large could be so careless about their employees, that work hard day and night to make the success of that company what it was. Their were people with children, people with families, people with homes, people struggling to support themselves as it is, and they just lay off hundreds of people. Disgusting. And this should be looked into
Hi Lisa.
Sorry to hear about your sister if she lives in the city or LI or if any other former employees of LS would kite to explore new opportunities we are currently hiring at coast2coast a sunpower direct dealer if she would like more info she can send her resume to jstrat@c2ccorp.com
Best
Hello All,
I never like hearing news like this, its very sad to hear that everyone was laid off via email. If anyone from Level Solar is looking for work in this amazing industry please email me (contacts below), Harvest Power is a family owned & operated company that has been in business for over 45 years! I hope every employee makes it though this unscathed.
info@harvestpower.net
Just so everyone knows the above post was not me. If anyone wants to know my feelings they can ask me personally.
Interesting to see how quickly the buzzards come to feed.
The employment law firm of Outten & Golden LLP filed a class action suit today on behalf of the Level Solar employees terminated with no notice in alleged violation of the New York WARN Act.
Maybe they would like to file one on behalf of all the customers level solar has been ripping off since they started. I had them install solar panels for me and its been a financial drain rather than savings. I complained multiple times to no avail. Screw them. Im broke because i went with their system. My electric bills were higher than ever plus i had to pay them monthly. I hope the ceo’s get to experience what its like to be broke.
We were able to offer a few Level employees roles here at SUNation. Hoping to bring on a few more as well. Felt good to give people a soft landing. Can’t tell you how many people told us stories about first time home purchases or just having a baby. Can’t believe a company could be so mismanaged that they couldn’t even give their employees a days notice….Crazy. And in all fairness to Jess, if a company wasn’t doing the right thing by their own employees…we’re sure their customers won’t be left in any better of a situation. When Jess said we can assist, that’s what we mean…we just want to help. Didn’t mean for it to come off as a plug : /
What about the customers. What effect will happen to us. Can I contact another solar company, I am beside myself.
I’m a mortgage lender, and we are in the process of transferring a solar agreement to a purchase of a home with Level Solar leased panels. Now that the company is closed, we have no way of transferring the agreement, getting required paperwork, etc…. we have no clue where to go from here.
What’s is going to happen moving forward? What do I do with the solar panels now? Who do I pay my electric bill? I am in the state of MA
Can anyone provide information to customers ?
My question too-we did direct deposit to Level Solar. I’m guessing we should call the bank and stop future payments ASAP? I would hope a payment would be rejected but there is no one to call to see where to go from here. So sad :/
Wow… I’ll be looking to see what this means now for LS customers… do we just go back to being LIPA customers… or does our contract hold any ground in any manner. Wow, just wow. Of course that is sad for the employees, especially to receive shocking sudden news like that… but it does make me wish I had dragged my feet a bit more before signing up.
If you have a leased solar system with Level Solar, and you’ve been paying them — I would expect that you should just stop making payments (since the entity no longer exists) and keep the system. It will keep producing energy, and will work as long as the equipment holds up. Who else has a claim on it?
We were Level Solar customers as well. We also would like information on what this means for us because we signed that contract. How do we find out more information going forward? On another note, I want to commend each and every employee that we had met from Level Solar. They were wonderful, diligent, informative , and would be an asset to any company that hires them. So if any company is looking for employees, the group that we had contact with were impressive !! I wish them the best of luck and it is horrible what Level Solar did to you.
Do customer get free solar energy because the company is out of business
My mom said she hasn’t gotten a bill last month and just told me today that they went out of business. I would assume you get free solar as long as its still working.
I just had my solar system installed In August. They connect their system to your Router to collect information, should we be disconnecting it from the router?
If MA customers want to get together and maybe speak with an attorney, email me at viviansiegel@gmail.com. I’m a customer too and trying to figure out what to do!
Wth. I just got the panels installed in the spring. I live in Haverhill, MA.
I’m a level solar customer in Staten Island since January 2017 and I’ve been paying for almost double the amount of kilowatts since the system started up. I’ve complained to level solar from day one. I’ve taken it up with Con Ed as well. Both parties swear that “nothing is wrong with the systems “. Bullshit!! Someone is ripping me off and no one wants to help me. I’ve turned off the solar breakers and have cancelled my checking account. I need Con Ed to install a new net meter and refund my overpaid energy. I’ll probably have better luck winning the lottery.
glad i left that dump. i saw it coming a mile away. on a side note im glad i got to install with those guys. good luck fellas .
Bill & Carrie Frey the owners of Level Solar are cowards they scammed thousands of people both customers and employees out of significant sums of money and should go to Jail for this crime they have committed and have to pay whoever is owed money.