SMITH MECHANICAL COMPANY

When he came for the first service call, he was all about blowing his own horn that he was a "licensed professional plumber" that did everything up to code and had it inspected. Which is all well and good. He had a very clipped, military, loud, manner of speaking with authority, as he pointed out each and every code violation I currently had and what had to be done "to get it up to code". So since he had been sent out by my Home Warranty Company HMS, he would have to first file a report with them, and they would let me know what was covered and not covered. He had shown me one of the copper pipes leading into the tank that had obviously been leaking, and said that they would cover it. I owed $100.00 for a service call and wrote him a check..          When HMS called me , they said they would replace the actual hot water heater, and that was all. The rest were non covered items that came to a total of $900. That price does NOT include the cost of the actual heater. Well you are given the choice of taking the money for the heater, or them paying for the heater and paying him to install it, with you paying the extra mod charges. Since I had already paid for a service call at that point and they assure you they only send out trustworthy contractors, I agreed to have him do the work, but asked them to send me a itemized copy of the bill. Which I did not receive. I asked at that point about the copper pipe that had the leak in it, if it was covered, and she said no. I explained what he had told me,and she said he would either have to call them and explain where the leak was, or call when he was doing the work, and then they would see if it was covered and deduct it from the non-covered items..So I called Smith-Mechanical's phone # to leave a message for the plumber about what HMS had said about that covered charge,and got the voicemail. Interestingly enough, the voicemail sounded just like the plumber that had been there for the service call. I thought, hmm-odd.
So one of the items on the bill was disposing of the old water heater, which he was charging $150. for. That seemed really high and I knew the city would pick it up for free, or I could get a scrapper to pick it up. So that came off the bill. When he came to fix it, I told him that and he didn't seem very happy about it and remarked, you know that means I don't even take it outside. The permit from the city was listed at $165. I thought that seemed very expensive and said so, he said, well that's how much they charge. So he went about changing it out. He told me how much it was, and as he started to write up the bill,
I went up to the 2nd floor to get my credit card, when I brought it back down to the basement, he looked at it and said,I don't do credit. So I went back up and got a check.  I find it quite odd that a contractor does not take credit cards, in this day and age, especially since the work is usually at least a $100.00. So then after I come back down with the check, he says-do you have the receipt? I said what receipt-throughly confused by this time. He said the one I gave you for the service call the other day, I said well it is upstairs, put away with my papers,wanting to say, I have already ran upstairs twice! I said why do you need it? He said well don't you want me to write your detail on it? well, I really had no clue what detail he was referring to, so I said no don't worry about it. So now he was at the back door of the basement and asked me to sign the receipt, which I did. Then as he was walking to his van he was telling me the city inspector would be calling me to make an appointment to come out and check it. And he left. As he was pulling out of the drive, it dawned on me he had not given me a copy of the receipt.  So I went in and called the office phone and got the voicemail,not much later, I received a call back, from a blocked phone #, and it was definitely the person who had just left my house, and he identified himself as the office for Smith-Mechanical. He was extremely irate with me and using a VERY loud voice saying that the "technician" had requested my receipt to put my items on it and I had refused him!!  WHAT?!?   I said, that was for a service call, completely different day, different charge,and he just kept interrupting me, yelling at me, and telling me if I had wanted a receipt then I should have asked for one and not said no. Every time I tried to explain, he would interrupt, I finally had to say, also in a loud voice, just so he would hear me, If you would actually let me finish a thought instead of rudely interrupting me, I had no idea that was what he wanted that for and it was already mixed in with a stack of other papers to be filed. He stood right there and wrote up a receipt and I want a copy of it mailed to me. He practically screamed-fine! and hung up. There was actually other things said, I was even explaining WHY I needed a receipt. And looking back on it now, I am thinking, who does that?  Well the more I thought about the whole thing, the more suspicious I became. Why did he not want me to see the receipt? So I called the city permit department only to find out that they charge.....$40.40 for a permit! The same permit he charged me $165,00 for!!  So I stopped payment on my check. When he found out, this same person called me, again from a blocked phone # and claimed he was the "legal" department for Smith-Mechanical!!! He certainly has a lot of jobs there! LOL So when I questioned him about the inflated permit charge, he told me I was being charged for the labor it costs for someone to go down there and pull the permit. Well interesting enough, when the inspector came to inspect my hot water unit, not only did it NOT pass inspection, because a fitting was not up to code, but he told me he could tell me how that permit was done -in person or online. Would you care to take a guess??? DING DING DING Yes, online! He charged me almost $125.00 to sit at a desk and pull a permit online!! Just a few other facts, that pipe that was supposed to be covered by HMS? It never was taken off the total of non-covered items, even though when he arrived I started to ask him and he said-done,taken care of. I said you talked to- he interrupted me and said -done, taken care of. Also in every other warranty covered item we have ever had replaced, the contractor has always given us the receipt for the item purchased. No, not this time. And when he left, he said, if you have any problems with it, just call your warranty company. yeah, right, so I can pay another 100.00 service call on a brand new water heater!! I don't think so buddy, I am pretty sure you need to be offering some kind of warranty on it.So he has now filed a lien against my house

I'm very satisfied with the professionalism & promptness of returned calls. He performed work on the weekend, within time frame & budget. All work passed city inspection without any problems; Mr Smith actually worked with the inspectors for me since my original contractor had not completed the work.