Scaling Solar Success: How Sungage Financial Amplified Service with Level AI
The results
Powering Home Energy, Powered by Relationships
At Sungage Financial, helping homeowners go solar isn’t just about money—it’s about building confidence in a brighter, greener future. Sungage plays a behind-the-scenes yet crucial role: they provide loans for solar panels and batteries, but it’s the local solar installers who are their main partners. The trust between Sungage and these installers is built over thousands of conversations, with a team that knows every project is a little different.
“We don’t just approve loans—we guide the homeowner and installer through multiple project milestones, from day one through to that first day the energy starts flowing” - Chris Hervieux, Director of Customer Success
The world of solar isn’t as plug-and-play as it sounds. Every project is a new story, every homeowner has unique needs, and quite often, there are multiple project changes before the lights come on. With a 25-person customer service team, Sungage punches above its weight—aiming to help more homeowners each season, without losing the caring touch that built their name.
Keeping Quality as Demand Soars
Big dreams bring big challenges. As solar took off and installers brought Sungage more and more customers, the support team found themselves juggling calls, emails, and even permit headaches from every corner of the country. The tough part? Every customer’s path was winding—one homeowner had a new-build house with paperwork still lost at the county office, while another needed help navigating delays caused by their town’s slow inspection team; therefore, the project completion can take anywhere from 30 to 90 days.
Chris’s team pride themselves on patience and attention to detail, but with old methods—listening to scattered calls and tallying up notes in spreadsheets—keeping up was like trying to build a solar farm with just a flashlight.
“We were working hard,” Chris recalls, “but we needed a better way to draw our attention where most needed, catch the best moments, and keep that white glove service our installers count on.” - Chris Hervieux, Director of Customer Success
It was difficult to assess the accuracy, relevancy, and completeness of information provided by agents through manual review alone. They needed a solution that could provide comprehensive data, streamline QA, and allow their team to focus on critical aspects of customer interaction.
Sungage & Level AI Light the Way
They needed a partner who really got it. Level AI didn’t just show up with software—they showed up ready to listen, adapt, and handle Sungage’s quirks, busy seasons, and even a midstream phone system switch. Chris was surprised at how easy it was:
“We switched phone systems from NICE inContact to Genesys within months of signing the contract and didn’t miss a beat. That wouldn’t have happened with just any tool.” - Chris Hervieux, Director of Customer Success
With Level AI, Sungage uses:
- Auto QA (Instascores): This provides 100% automated QA, giving Sungage confident numbers and a baseline for acceptable call scores. Calls falling below a certain threshold are flagged for manual review.
- Manual QA: A team of three QAs focuses on the nuanced aspects that AI cannot currently assess, such as the accuracy, relevancy, and completeness of information provided to customers, especially concerning evolving project details and state-specific programs and regulations. They also continue to evaluate customer service soft skills.
- Sentiment Analysis: Level AI helps judge the conversation and sentiment, ensuring basic customer service functions are handled correctly.
- Calibration Sessions: Level AI facilitates calibration sessions by allowing QAs to easily select and share calls with the management team in advance, fostering collaborative discussions and identifying areas for process improvement.
- Worker Product (Beta): Users love using Level AI's Worker product, a chat-GPT-like interface, to query data and generate reports - they find it quick and helpful for quarterly reporting.
One week, the team noticed, with the help of Level AI, that a certain confusing step in their online portal kept tripping up installers. The fix was clear and fast, and support calls about it dropped overnight.
Scaling Service, Smashing Satisfaction Records
With Level AI, Sungage’s team didn’t just keep up—they got better, even as their volumes sharply increased. The team stayed lean, focusing its effort where it mattered, and spent significantly less time on routine reviews.
The biggest win? Sungage now hears, after every single call, how customers and installers really feel—no waiting for survey results months later. Their quality scores remained rock-solid, and Chris could spot both proud moments and coaching opportunities as soon as they arose.Among other areas, this is what the impact looked like
- Enhanced QA Efficiency: The QA team can now accomplish more with greater efficiency. Auto QA allows them to focus their efforts on calls below certain thresholds and on specific triggers, rather than random manual selections. This has eliminated the need to add headcount to the QA staff, even with substantial growth in call volume.
- Improved Customer Satisfaction (iCSAT): The iCSAT score, tracked since the first month, has shown a steady increase and consistently remains over four on a one-to-five scale. This provides valuable feedback on 100% of interactions, addressing a gap that post-call surveys couldn't fill due to customer effort and potential for skewed results.
- Data-Driven Insights: Level AI provides access to crucial data points, proving that Sungage is meeting their high standards and enabling them to identify and address issues proactively.
- Effective Training and Coaching: The ability to easily access and share current, high-quality call examples from peers for training libraries has significantly improved the onboarding experience for new agents. While coaching is an area they aim to utilize more, the platform's ability to send notes to agents for review is already being used.
