Last updated 11/5/24
This document is the “brief” summary of our Sunnova Energy, Houston BBB and Docusign experience. I know, it’s still long, but we needed a summary to provide to the County Attorney’s office as we finally got the sheriff’s Incident Report about the forgery of Sunnova’s likely fraudulent Amendment, lowering the Guaranteed Production resulting in lower refunds for the chronically underperforming Sunnova solar system.
This page includes the links to my communications with the Houston BBB and Docusign and other noteworthy pages in this Sunnova Knowledgebase.
I’m still working on a comprehensive page about the Sunnova review fraud and I will document how the many review sites like Trustpilot.com enable scummy corporations to increase their rating by PAYING them. Nothing is what it appears to be! Google may be a notable exception to the rampant review fraud as Sunnova no longer links to its Google reviews.
After we submit our complaint to the County Attorney’s office we’ll start contacting the media and the many journalists who wrote about Sunnova’s horrible business practices, and we’ll submit our complaint to various regulators such as the FTC, CFPB, DOE, state AGs, etc.
I wish I had more time and money, but I have to earn a living because I can’t survive on $298 Social Security and I can’t be my client’s full-time employee.
Please be patient!
SUMMARY #
The 2014 Sunnova solar system was not designed to produce the Guaranteed Production. In 2017 I assisted my client with her BBB complaint as she received $3000+ power bills every year instead of the promised utility refund check.
In the 2018 BBB Mediation, Sunnova agreed to install four additional solar panels. While production improved, it was still less than guaranteed, and as per the Sunnova production records the system broke on 8/20/2023 and it either was down entirely or produced 50%:
Sunnova refused to repair and my client finally retained my services again.
On 12/8/23 the House Energy and Commerce Committee Chair Cathy McMorris Rodgers (R-WA) and Senate Energy and Natural Resources Ranking Member John Barrasso (R-WY) issued a press release regarding its investigation of Sunnova’s deplorable business practices:
https://sunnova-solar-fraud.org/kb/the-3-billion-energy-department-loan-guarantee/2023-12-8-house-energy-committee-press-release-demanding-documents-and-communications-from-doe/
I found the Facebook Sunnova Complaints group, unfortunately, damage control for Sunnova and infiltrated by countless Sunnova and other solar companies employees spewing false information.
As I reviewed the Sunnova email regarding underproduction from the previous year and its refund, I noticed that the Guaranteed Production referenced in Sunnova’s email was LOWER than in the contract.
We asked Sunnova countless times why it used lower Guaranteed Production figures than in the contract to calculate the amounts of refunds.
After Sunnova accepted our Power of Attorney they failed to provide answers and mostly ignored my emails. In June we finally filed another complaint with the Houston BBB:
https://sunnova-solar-fraud.org/kb/bbb/2024-6-12-sunnova-bbb-complaint-failure-to-repair-and-using-incorrect-lower-guaranteed-production-schedule/
Sunnova REFUSED to answer a single question in our BBB complaint and the BBB falsely classified it as “answered” while not a single question was answered.
The Sunnova BBB rating was F in December 2023, Sunnova was no longer accredited, then it was not rated and only a few weeks later the BBB rating magically improved to C+ — despite countless Sunnova customer complaints at the BBB site and on Facebook:
https://sunnova-solar-fraud.org/kb/bbb/2024-3-24-all-bbb-complaints-about-sunnova/
I received no response to my subsequent questions regarding the BBB’s ratings fraud:
https://sunnova-solar-fraud.org/kb/bbb/2024-9-18-questions-to-houston-bbb-regarding-its-false-sunnova-energy-rating/
Clearly, the BBB is either paid by Sunnova or expects to be paid by Sunnova to fraudulently improve its rating:
RACKETEERING
I found the likely forged 5/19/14 Sunnova Amendment when I logged into my client’s account at the Sunnova site. #
We were shocked when we discovered this Amendment. This Amendment was not at the Sunnova site when we filed our first BBB complaint in 2017 and we have never seen this document before.
My client is a senior citizen with health issues and lost her husband in 2023. She spent countless hours searching for emails or anything relating to this Amendment in her and her husband’s email accounts and she repeatedly searched her computer and paper files. She could not locate this Amendment or any reference to it. She is terribly stressed by this fraud and our inability to get assistance from Docusign.
The likely fraudulent Sunnova Energy 5/16/14 Amendment with Guaranteed Production lower than in the contract #
[Click on the images to zoom in]
Since July I have been attempting to have this document authenticated by Docusign.
I’ve wasted well over 50 hours emailing to Docusign “Security”, posting at the Docusign forum, emailing, and reading countless web pages on validating digital signatures.
“Security” sent only automated responses resulting in so much stress and frustration for both of us. I requested assistance in the DocuSign community forum but received no useful assistance until I posted that nobody should ever sign digitally because Docusign refuses to assist with validating documents. Finally, I got an email from Maria at Docusign, resulting in much more frustration and stress. Docusign would not release ANY information about the document’s signatures to us to protect the privacy of the criminals running Sunnova, and of course, paying Docusign.
My failed attempts to validate the signatures on the Amendment #
On 8/26/24 I attempted to validate the signatures on the Amendment in Acrobat Reader and the options to validate or certify were greyed out:
Tried the original contract and all signatures were validated:
On 10/30/24 I once again searched for e-signature info and found updated instructions (completely different) at Adobe:
https://helpx.adobe.com/acrobat/using/validating-digital-signatures.html
The Amendment shows “nothing”. No error. NOTHING.
Why can’t Adobe add a message such as “no valid signatures”? Protecting the criminals.
The original contract shows detailed signature information:
The countless emails since July, documenting DocuSign’s corruption:
https://sunnova-solar-fraud.org/kb/docusign-digital-signature-fraud/2024-9-27-docusign-refused-to-examine-the-apparently-photo-shopped-docusign-digital-signatures-on-sunnova-energys-amendment/
My client finally submitted her complaint to the sheriff — twice. The first time they gave her a Victims’ Rights brochure and did nothing. UNBELIEVABLE. I called them. My client went back and they wrote up an Incident Report far removed from reality.
But at least we have a report to provide to the County Attorney’s office. I am currently preparing the complaint.
Since Docusign won’t assist, we can only hope that the County Attorney’s office will do whatever it takes to determine who signed this Amendment.
Docusign’s paying customers can easily create fraudulent documents.
Docusign account holders can send documents to a different email address and digitally sign anyone’s name. Those signatures will likely be validated in Adobe Acrobat.
As I documented, Docusign will not assist you and protect the fraudsters unless you get law enforcement to investigate or you’re wealthy enough to pay a competent attorney to file a lawsuit against Docusign get information through discovery, or serve Docusign with a subpoena.
Consumers and their estates have to pay THOUSANDS of dollars to determine whether a document is authentic!
I don’t know anyone else with enough tech knowledge to attempt to validate signatures with Adobe Acrobat. I don’t live in Silicon Valley. During my many hours of research, I didn’t find any paid service to assist.
NEVER EVER sign important documents digitally.
- Corporations can easily fake contracts, amendments, disclosures, etc. many years after you signed.
- As this fraud investigation documents, corporations like Docusign and the BBB are much more concerned with PROFITS than INTEGRITY.
- We have been unable to retain an attorney because the Sunnova contract requires mandatory arbitration.
Other issues invalidating this Sunnova Amendment #
- The wife is NOT mentioned as one of the parties.
- The wife’s signature appears twice.
- The husband’s signature is missing.
- No page numbers on the document.
Additionally, my client has been unable to locate:
- Any notification regarding the material changes in the Amendment.
- Notification of their right to cancel the contract due to the material changes.
Sunnova should have notified the customers of the reasons for these changes and informed them of the right to cancel the contract due to these material changes.
