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| - Summary: Rude, lazy technicians; pushy sales people; price gouging
I had previously used On Time Air to install a heat pump at our last house after the hailstorm of October 2010. The crew did a great job, so after we moved and had a problem with a heat pump that was just out of warranty, I decided to use On Time Air again.
We have two heat pump split systems and one of them was blowing cool air when on the heat setting in December 2015. A technician came out, topped off the refrigerant and told me we had a leak. He attempted to charge me $270 for 5 pounds of R-410 and a visual leak check. He also stated that since he couldn't locate it, another technician would need to come out and do a compression test the following day.
I talked him down to $170 for the recharge (if he was willing to go this low, why charge more?) and scheduled the test for the next day. I was told that it was very involved and they would need to evacuate the system, fill it with nitrogen and dye, then visually inspect all of the coils and lines, then clean the system and recharge it. I was given an estimate of $540 for this test.
Upon the next technician arriving the next day, he spent about ten minutes with leak detecting machine and found the leak. He then closed everything up before showing me the leak. He told me the indoor coil was leaking and that we would need to replace it. He then gave me an estimate of $3,671 and told me I'd be better off replacing the whole unit, which they would be happy to do.
I told him that I would call around to get other estimates and to please make sure my invoice did not include the full cost of the leak test since that was not what he performed.
A salesman called me approximately three times over the following week to try and get me to buy a new system or get the coil replaced, even after I told them to stop calling and that I would call them if I was interested.
Additionally, they charged my card a total of $710.15 for the "work" they did. After multiple calls to their billing department and speaking with a manager, they did refund a portion of that.
After all was said and done, I went with another company (check my other reviews) who charged approximately half the cost to replace the coil. That price included the new coil, miscellaneous supplies, four pounds of R-410a, and two follow up checks.
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