| rev:text
| - I had Sal's come to replace a hot water heater in my home.
Initially it went well- they came out the next day and evaluated my problem. They gave a reasonable quote to have the hot water heater replaced, along with getting the permit for the job. I agreed to it.
Later on that day, the workers came out and removed my old hot water heater. They did a nice job placing cardboard down to protect my floor, which I appreciated. When I arrived home from work (my wife had initially let them in), I saw my old heater sitting on the driveway with my brand new heater sitting on the driveway getting wet from the rain. When I got their they placed a piece of cardboard to protect it. Not very confidence inspired. They had a problem, they told me. They were able to remove the original tank out of the door, but because the new tank was wider, they wouldn't be able to get it in through the same door. This was the job of the initial assessor to determine this. The only fix would be to remove part of my furnace in order to get the heater through another door and then put it all back together again. Because this would take more installation time, I would be charged at the normal rate- $90/hr x 2 people to install the heater.
This upset me, because I had already agreed to a certain price and here they were, already having removed my heater, let my new heater sit in the rain, and then tell me that they were probably going to have to take apart my furnace and then charge me another probably $360 in labor costs because their initial estimator had messed up? I don't normally get angry, but this seemed wrong. If you made a mistake, you need to make it right. It would have been one thing if they told me about it beforehand and I agreed to the additional labor that would be necessary.
I called the office and was connected to the manager eventually. After explaining the situation, from my perspective, he said he would check with Sal, the owner of the company. After checking, he came back and said that I was going to have to pay for the full labor costs, but that they would only charge me normal hours prices, not after hours prices. This, he was saying, was in effect "doing me a favor". In my mind I was thinking- "you guys made a mistake, want to charge me another $360+, and tell me that you are "doing me a favor"? I was quite upset at this point, honestly not about the money but more at the injustice of the situation and I pretty much said, "that is fine, but I am an Angieslist member and will be posting about this in my review" and said "goodbye".
The two installation guys worked hard and got the heater installed and it seems to be working fine, though I hope that the rain on the electric motor on top of it does not cause any premature failure.
When they presented me the bill, they "only" charged me an extra $90 or so, even though they worked a solid 2 hrs. I suspect that after my threat of a bad review, management had a change of heart, which makes sense. While I appreciate their "discount", it really bothers me that if I were not an Angieslist member, I would have had to pay the extra $360. I tipped the guys $50 each for their labors, because I appreciated their hard work- and honestly it was not about the money, it was about doing the right thing.
Sal's has lots of good reviews, and I suspect they do good work, but this experience left a horrible taste in my mouth. I have not been so angry in a long time and I do not think that I'll be using them again. Hopefully this review will cause them to treat all customers, not just AngiesList members, with respect and courtesy.
|
![[RDF Data]](/fct/images/sw-rdf-blue.png)
![[cxml]](/fct/images/cxml_doc.png)
![[csv]](/fct/images/csv_doc.png)
![[text]](/fct/images/ntriples_doc.png)
![[turtle]](/fct/images/n3turtle_doc.png)
![[ld+json]](/fct/images/jsonld_doc.png)
![[rdf+json]](/fct/images/json_doc.png)
![[rdf+xml]](/fct/images/xml_doc.png)
![[atom+xml]](/fct/images/atom_doc.png)
![[html]](/fct/images/html_doc.png)