Connected Solutions Real-World Experiences (MA - National Grid / EverSource)

[jsurpless]

Hey everyone

I was hoping that folks in Massachusetts could share their real-world experiences with Connected Solutions so far this year.

Asking because my mom lives in SE MA and has EverSource - her experience so far this year has been a bit disappointing. She's had overwhelming 3-hr events (18/20) with EverSource calling events almost every weekday for the last 3 weeks even when it was cool weather and/or cloudy out. This has resulted in only a 6.6 average kW discharge for the season which is a good deal lower than the relatively conservative estimates I'd made. Perhaps my estimates were too optimistic but also perhaps it has something to do with my estimates being based on National Grid events, as opposed to EverSource. Of course, they were also based on last summer so there's that possibility too.

So... could anyone share how their events are so far this year? I live in Bellingham and have National Grid - anyone out this way? I ask predominantly because I was counting on CS as a major offset to the cost of the PWs and this is weakening that offset.

Many thanks in advance!

 

[jakestgermain]

After 6 months of waiting for my 2023 payout, Tesla has the nerve to email me tonight, telling me my payout is ready, but somehow they couldn't upload it to THEIR OWN APP, so they have to send a check in the mail. Are you frigging kidding me right now! What an absolute bunch of Muppets! My 16 year old son, who is wise beyond his years, commented I should get my check within 3 to 500 business days.

That sucks. I am still waiting for my payout in RI. I put in a ticket every week on the app and try to message them. It’s mostly crickets. They get back to me thru the support ticket like a week later but never respond to emails. I can’t believe a corporation this size can be run so poorly. At this point it’s basically stealing. I was told RI Energy sent payments back in November.

 

[qnzkrew]

6 month? for 2023, i don' think people get their payouts until at lease jan 2024. But they are really slow this year for sure.

Well, originally Tesla said the payouts would be in the 4th quarter. First year was like January 3rd then February and this year was March

 

[masam]

After 6 months of waiting for my 2023 payout, Tesla has the nerve to email me tonight, telling me my payout is ready, but somehow they couldn't upload it to THEIR OWN APP, so they have to send a check in the mail. Are you frigging kidding me right now! What an absolute bunch of Muppets! My 16 year old son, who is wise beyond his years, commented I should get my check within 3 to 500 business days.

Did you ever receive the check ? I'm in the same boat - multiple customer service reps have said the same thing about not being able to use the app for the payment and the check is in the mail. Still no sign of it though.

 

[jakestgermain]

Did you ever receive the check ? I'm in the same boat - multiple customer service reps have said the same thing about not being able to use the app for the payment and the check is in the mail. Still no sign of it though.

I am still waiting for my payment as well. Everytime I talk to a CS rep I get different information and they absolutely do not follow-up on getting information. They ping the one woman working in Connected Solutions with mixed results. Last Friday they told me they were down to the last 500 customers that didn't get payments but couldn't give me answers on when I was getting paid or how much. This is BEYOND frustrating!!!

 

[masam]

I am still waiting for my payment as well. Everytime I talk to a CS rep I get different information and they absolutely do not follow-up on getting information. They ping the one woman working in Connected Solutions with mixed results. Last Friday they told me they were down to the last 500 customers that didn't get payments but couldn't give me answers on when I was getting paid or how much. This is BEYOND frustrating!!!

Yeah, shockingly, I've had a couple of CS reps reach out and tell me that they are going to resolve this, but nothing concrete. I'm just planning to follow up again until the check shows up. This is the worst it's been since the beginning of the program.

 

[83girl]

Nothing yet here. I am giving them until May 1st and then calling the state attorney General. Enough is enough with these clowns. Almost 8 months to process a payment is ridiculous.

 

[jakestgermain]

Nothing yet here. I am giving them until May 1st and then calling the state attorney General. Enough is enough with these clowns. Almost 8 months to process a payment is ridiculous.

Did you end up getting your payment or did you have to contact the AG?

 

[Blueaudi18]

it june 13th and i haven't had any events yet. Has it not started this year?

 

[Tdreamer]

I've been fighting this battle myself since mid-March for my missing 2023 payout. Never got an alert to set anything up in the app (and in fact lost the VPP option in the app altogether), no e-mail that a payout credit was ready to be processed, nothing. I did two things on or about 5/28 that seemed to have moved things forward - I broadened my e-mail distribution list to Tesla to include the utility e-mail addresses I had on file (Eversource for me) from the original connected solutions program enrollment, and filed a complaint with the Better Business Bureau at the same time. I suspect adding the utility was the primary reason things moved forward - I got an almost immediate response from them saying they had initiated an escalation to Tesla on their end on my behalf. Over the course of the past few weeks I was somehow connected with Tesla folks that demonstrated an interest in getting my case resolved and worked the issue through to the point where I have just received my payment in the past few days (even though the now-working app still shows the payment as pending... go figure).

The steps that seem to have been followed to fix the situation for me (with help at Tesla at each step of the way to monitor and move things forward to the next step on their end) were...

1) establish the ability to sign up for the VPP program in the Tesla app. This was missing in March, but re-appeared at some point in the past few months for me - likely when I uninstalled the Tesla App from my phone and re-installed it. I hesitated signing up as a new VPP program member from the day it re-appeared, not wanting to F anything up given I was an existing VPP program member.
2) with Tesla's insistence and supervision on the back end two weeks ago, use the app to sign up for the VPP program again. I was told that was either necessary, or perhaps the fastest path to resolution of the data issues on the back end that got me (and likely others) into this mess.
3) once I signed up again in the app, it showed as application pending or under review. Tesla then did their magic on the back end to get the application approved and VPP program membership re-instated.
4) once that VPP program membership was re-instated, Tesla worked internally and with the third party VPP program administrator (EnergyHub) to reconnect the account to the outstanding credit - that took a few additional days.
5) once the credit was reconnected with the account, the e-mail that I had a credit available to payout showed up in my inbox, as well as in the Tesla app.
6) at that point, you do what all other VPP program members had to do when this appeared - enter required info to enable Tesla access to EFT the payment to your bank account of choice.

I would probably guide against just signing up for the VPP program again yourself as noted in step 2 above without working with Tesla - I don't know what they needed to do on the back end to potentially avoid issues with you becoming a new VPP member vs. re-establishing an existing approved program membership.

Doesn't help that Tesla laid off who knows how many of the people that worked to setup this new process this year. I know of at least one person locally that helped work on implementing this process that was going to help work out the issue for me back in early April that got the boot.

 

[Blueaudi18]

I've been fighting this battle myself since mid-March for my missing 2023 payout. Never got an alert to set anything up in the app (and in fact lost the VPP option in the app altogether), no e-mail that a payout credit was ready to be processed, nothing. I did two things on or about 5/28 that seemed to have moved things forward - I broadened my e-mail distribution list to Tesla to include the utility e-mail addresses I had on file (Eversource for me) from the original connected solutions program enrollment, and filed a complaint with the Better Business Bureau at the same time. I suspect adding the utility was the primary reason things moved forward - I got an almost immediate response from them saying they had initiated an escalation to Tesla on their end on my behalf. Over the course of the past few weeks I was somehow connected with Tesla folks that demonstrated an interest in getting my case resolved and worked the issue through to the point where I have just received my payment in the past few days (even though the now-working app still shows the payment as pending... go figure).

The steps that seem to have been followed to fix the situation for me (with help at Tesla at each step of the way to monitor and move things forward to the next step on their end) were...

1) establish the ability to sign up for the VPP program in the Tesla app. This was missing in March, but re-appeared at some point in the past few months for me - likely when I uninstalled the Tesla App from my phone and re-installed it. I hesitated signing up as a new VPP program member from the day it re-appeared, not wanting to F anything up given I was an existing VPP program member.
2) with Tesla's insistence and supervision on the back end two weeks ago, use the app to sign up for the VPP program again. I was told that was either necessary, or perhaps the fastest path to resolution of the data issues on the back end that got me (and likely others) into this mess.
3) once I signed up again in the app, it showed as application pending or under review. Tesla then did their magic on the back end to get the application approved and VPP program membership re-instated.
4) once that VPP program membership was re-instated, Tesla worked internally and with the third party VPP program administrator (EnergyHub) to reconnect the account to the outstanding credit - that took a few additional days.
5) once the credit was reconnected with the account, the e-mail that I had a credit available to payout showed up in my inbox, as well as in the Tesla app.
6) at that point, you do what all other VPP program members had to do when this appeared - enter required info to enable Tesla access to EFT the payment to your bank account of choice.

I would probably guide against just signing up for the VPP program again yourself as noted in step 2 above without working with Tesla - I don't know what they needed to do on the back end to potentially avoid issues with you becoming a new VPP member vs. re-establishing an existing approved program membership.

Doesn't help that Tesla laid off who knows how many of the people that worked to setup this new process this year. I know of at least one person locally that helped work on implementing this process that was going to help work out the issue for me back in early April that got the boot.

Are you noticing any events called on the PW yet this summer?

 

[jhn_]

First 2024 event just got scheduled for Friday 6/14 6-8pm for NG in MA.

 

[Blueaudi18]

First 2024 event just got scheduled for Friday 6/14 6-8pm for NG in MA.

Wow same here.. guess it's starting this week

 

[Tdreamer]

Agreed. First event scheduled for tomorrow.

 

[TORQU3]

Strange behavior with mine vs last year. I have two power wall 2s and 2 + units. Last year I'd see about just shy of 22kw output during a grid event. I'm only seeing 17kw from fully charged units. Anyone else notice this?

 

[appleguru]

Strange behavior with mine vs last year. I have two power wall 2s and 2 + units. Last year I'd see about just shy of 22kw output during a grid event. I'm only seeing 17kw from fully charged units. Anyone else notice this?

I noticed something similar, though I suspect 1/3 of my powerwalls may not be working correctly? My graph from today’s event is blank so it’s hard to tell. My PWs went from 100% to 20% over 2.5hrs:

 

[djlandkpl]

Strange behavior with mine vs last year. I have two power wall 2s and 2 + units. Last year I'd see about just shy of 22kw output during a grid event. I'm only seeing 17kw from fully charged units. Anyone else notice this?

In previous years, my 2 batteries would discharge at 10kw until they ran out of juice. Last year, they would last 1:45 mins out of a 2 hour event. Today, it seems like the PW discharge is modulating to it discharges for the entire 2 hours. It is odd that there are 2 minutes left in the event a I'm at 24% charge left discharging at 9.3kw

 

[jhn_]

Weird behavior for me as well that after it discharged for two hours down to 20% SOC, it then immediately grid charged afterwards back up to my reserve of 33% SOC.

 

[MASS-sunshine]

I just PTO'd last week, and I tried signing up for the VPP option in the ioS app on the phone. It fails every time I try to submit the app with the attached. I'm on hold with Powerwall support but WTF? the 95+ degree days are coming this week and I was hoping to get into the program, as I signed up 2 years ago for Connected Solutions and finally got my solar roof installed in January alongside 4 PW's. Ideas/thoughts to accelerate my enrollment and the phone app acceptance of the application?

 

[Brian Murphy]

I am having similar behavior, have 2 powerwalls and last year at each event pulled for about 2 hrs at 10k. This recent event a notification showed up early as normal, on the day of the event it showed some powerwalls were contributing however my powerwall never contributed to the load. I would have expected during this heat wave some events again but for now nothing. I suspect its a tesla-eversource config issue.

 

[MASS-sunshine]

I am having similar behavior, have 2 powerwalls and last year at each event pulled for about 2 hrs at 10k. This recent event a notification showed up early as normal, on the day of the event it showed some powerwalls were contributing however my powerwall never contributed to the load. I would have expected during this heat wave some events again but for now nothing. I suspect its a tesla-eversource config issue.

You have Eversource? I have National Grid. With some help from Tesla yesterday, I was able to get my application submitted via the iOS app. My current status says "Application Pending" - the waiting game has begun.