I hate being the first dissenting opinion, but I had a pretty poor to mediocre experience with Dave (aka Henderson Plumbing). And, you can see from my extensive review history, it's rare, rare, rare that I don't write a 4 or 5-star review. But, I feel like the issues were extensive enough that I should warn others.
In short, we had 3 small-ish plumbing issues at our new house that I figured would be good to have fixed. We called around to a number of highly regarded, Yelp recommended plumbers, and Dave gave the lowest quote at $170 (the highest was $220). The issues were pretty benign: (1) We had a leaky hot/cold water spigot where the washer connects. It only leaks when the water is shut off and the washer is disconnected (so no problems when connected). But, we figured we'd go ahead and get it replaced, just so there isn't a future issue. (2) We had a master bath shower drain that backed up a little bit. It never caused issues w/ taking a shower, but more or less something that should be looked at anyway. The problem was hair from the previous homeowner that was lodged in the drain. (3) The cold water in the master shower turned hot/warm after 2-3 minutes. It wasn't burdensome, but was a buzz kill after a couple of hours of yard work in the Texas heat, and craving a cold shower.
So, we set up an appointment for Dave to come out to our house on a weekday afternoon. The day of the appointment, just before he was to show, he called to reschedule b/c he'd gotten a last minute back doctor appointment. No sweat! Gotta take care of the ol' back. So, we rescheduled for the next day at 9:30 am. 9:30 comes around the next day......no Dave. 9:40.....no Dave. 9:50......no Dave. Finally, just after 9:50, he arrives. When he comes in, he kind of chuckles and offers a half-hearted sorry I'm late, then totally dismisses it (as if forgiving himself for making us wait). Honestly, I don't mind so much that he was late, it happens to everybody. But, I do mind that (a) he didn't call to say he'd be 22 minutes late, and (b) when he arrived, his apology was pretty nonchalant (like the guy who bumps you pretty hard in the store, and just keeps trucking while offering a muttered sorry. So, that was the first negative. Not a big one, but it let me know how much he valued me as a customer and my time away from work.
So, Dave does his work, makes one run to the hardware store, and finishes up in about 3 hours (of course, he somehow managed to charge us for 3.75 hours....at $95/hr). He changed out the spigots & replaced the little drip pan that water from the spigot drains into. Had to cut a hole in the wall so he could grip the pipe to unscrew the hot & cold water spigots, but I gave him the thumbs up on that before he got started. He also dug out the hair from the shower drain and got that working as well. The hot/cold issue he wasn't able to fix, b/c our shower apparently needs a special cartridge to work. So, he did 2/3rds of the $170 job he quoted.
So here's my problem.......when it was all said & done, he presented my wife a bill for $639. $223 for parts, $356 for labor, $25 for showing up (seriously, it's a line item on the bill), and $35 for using a machine. Aside from the fact that he actually had the gall to charge $25 to show up LATE, I'm a bit stupefied that a plumber would actually charge $35 if he has to pick up a took that is battery or electricity operated. He lists off the parts he used on his form, all of which have been marked up 200-400%......this on top of this $95/hr labor charge, which evidently includes time spent hunting for parts at Lowes he neglected to show up to the job with. The parts he used were about $50-75 at Lowes, yet he charged $223.
What angered me about the whole deal is that I told him before he started that if he had any issues that were going to put us significantly over the $170 quote, to come get me (I was working out of my home office that day). He never came to get me. Not only did he never come to get me, when he was done, he never asked to speak to me to explain the extra costs. He gave the bill to my wife and convinced her to sign it w/o ever asking to speak to me. So, he managed to take a 3-part job that he quoted $170 on, do 2/3rds of it, and increase the cost by 376% w/o so much as uttering a single word to anyone (me or my wife) about the increased costs until he hands the bill to my wife and bolts before I can talk to him. Classy.
I'm a business owner in the service industry. I work with clients much like Dave does. No matter how great someone's performance or product is, if they don't respect their client's time or money, and operate based on what's in the best interest of their wallet, rather than their clients, they're not worth much. I can attest, Dave does good work and has a good personality. But, his tactics are shyster-ish and his business etiquette is severely lacking.
~ Fabrico