Chris T.
02/08/2016 12:00:00 SA
Pros: Quick service, nice attitude on the technician, did exactly what I asked quickly
Cons: Bait and switch pricing, running the business through his phone while at my house and charging me for it, never saying that the quote over the phone was different than the price I would be charged, not telling me that the hours he spent on the phone and working at the already solved problem were actually going to cost me more money, leaving saying the job was not complete and needed to come back out with cameras and a larger crew (when the job was complete), offering token discounts off a bill still way larger than what was quoted over the phone and in person, disputing the events by the owner (?Dan?) over the phone and justifying why the tech should be charging me MORE than what he did, essentially calling me a liar over the phone.
Longer version:
I called Saturday for a mainline back up. I had had this issue before and my regular plumber was not available. I needed 100-120 ft snake run through some roots in the front yard. Received quoted price twice over the phone and once in person of $250 for going in the roof and $200 for the toilet pull. I said lets try the toilet pull. Tech started the work but then immediately was receiving phone calls and messages through out the whole time he was here. I told him to take whatever time he needed, offered him something to drink etc.. When he was able to get the second drum on the snake he ran it all the way out (?150ft) and pulled it back. (this is when the job was completed) then he tried again and said he hit something at ~130ft. I asked if he had tried to run water down it since he cleared the pipe at 150ft already, he said he did and could still see it in the bottom of the pipe. I went to the lowest spot in the house (garage basin) and saw it was clear, ran 20 gallons of hot water down and saw everything was moving fine. I couldn't find the tech. He was outside on the phone again. He apologized for being on the phone for so much, said that he was responsible for all the calls tonight and that it was a crazy night, one guy (tech maybe?) had failed to show up and didn't call. I was understanding. He kept trying to snake the pipe since he said he still saw water in it (which maybe he did, but the mainline was clear non-the-less). I suggested he try running water down it, he balked at that. More calls, more snaking, more me saying do what you got to do. Finally he came to me and said he could spend all night here but he didn't know what was wrong and that it would be really expensive. I told him to stop at this point. This is the first time anyone had said the quoted price would change. He left sorry and saying that they could be out Monday with a camera to inspect the line. He gave my an invoice for $350 a full $150 over the quote. He said he didn't charge for the cost of the second drum (which I specifically asked for on the quote) and he took off one half hour. So total was 2.5 hours, $200 for the first 1.5 hours and $150 for the next hour. I questioned him about that, he was sorry, said he had to charge his time to something, can't spend 3 hours at a site and not charge for it. It was seven PM, I had 2 week old twins, a toddler and a wife standing 15 feet away so I signed the bill and paid instead of fighting over it.
I did two things right after he left. I called the office immediately to discuss and left a message and I ran hot water down every faucet in the house for 10 minutes with no issue. I called again on Sunday and left a message. Finally spoke to someone Monday who said that if it were up to her she wouldn't have given me any discounts and that I should be happy with the bill as-is. I asked to talk to someone else. Shortly after that Dan(?) called me back and I discussed the above. He did not once look at it from my side. He even had the audacity to say that he didn't charge me for HIS time when the technician call him at his house that night to ask for advice! I suggested that he discuss this with his tech or look at the number of hours his tech was on the phone and not working my job, he evaded saying it was not possible. Yet they have GPS on the truck and knew he was at my house from 3:50 to 6:50PM. Dan repeatedly asked me if I thought it was fair for them to work at my house for 3 hours and get paid $200 for it which works out to $66/hour and no one works for that much. I restated my argument repeatedly, 1) I got a quote for a job, a specific need that I knew would solve it, 2) the technician solved it very early on, did not admit it and kept working 3) the technician was on the phone for way over an hour running the call center for the night and charge me for that. After running through the argument 3 or 4 times with Dan I hung up. And here we are.
If they had quoted me $500 I would have paid it. I need the line clear and was pretty desperate. But they didn't work on my problem while they were here, or respect me when I called to discuss... so this.