Sila Heating, Cooling, Plumbing and Electrical

I thought it was a fair price and Sila was prompt and professional.

The folks at Sila are very good. they respond promptly, and get out to you in a reasonable amount of time. The only issue I have is price, as they are pretty expensive. Additionally, if you have a problem on a weekend, there is an emergency fee that is pretty steep. That said, i would use them again, as they are prompt and trustworthy (on a couple of occasions I had to leave them to head into work.) But you aren't going to get a deal . . .

The owner/manager (Steve Markussen) was very easy to deal with. The company started the work when they said they would, and finished when they expected to finish. The installation was very easy; in spite of the work required to do the job, there was minimal disruptiton or construction mess to deal with. My understanding is these systems are very hard to balance correctly (in order to heat/cool rooms evenly); but in our first week of running the system (for heating), it's worked very well so far.

First, regarding the price: I purchased an Angie's List Big Deal of $49 for 1 hour of plumbing work, and the remainder was for a part. I don't know their usual prices. I first made an appointment for a Monday at 10 a.m., calling the week before. The time came and went, and no one arrived. I called to check, and was told that there had been a "computer glitch", and the appointment hadn't been saved in their system. I made another appointment for Wednesday at 9 a.m. On Tuesday evening at 5:30 p.m., I received a call telling me that the plumber (they have only one) would not be able to make it the next morning, but could come between 3 and 5 p.m. Unfortunately, that was not a good time for me, so we rescheduled for Friday at 11 a.m. On Friday, the plumber (Jim) arrived about 10 minutes early. Jim was very personable and had a helpful attitude. I described the first problem (restricted flow on hot water in bathroom sink), and he first checked the valves under the vanity. It turned out that they were not open all the way! I felt pretty silly for not having checked that myself, but Jim made me feel at ease. He also mentioned that the intermittent pulsing we had was probably due to the same issue. The second problem was almost as easy -- he tightened a part attached to the sink stopper so that it would stay fully closed, rather than allowing the stopper to pop up a bit. This meant we still had plenty of time to address my final problem, which was noise in the pipes of our forced-hot-water heating system. Last winter, it sounded like there was a lot of air in the system. I hadn't heard it much this year, but I wanted it to be checked. Jim looked at the vent on top of an air scoop in the return piping, a Watts Duo Vent, and suggested that it might be the problem, but that I could wait. I decided to have him replace it, since it seemed like an inexpensive fix, and he was already here. He turned off the boiler, drained some water to relieve the pressure, and replaced it with a Taco Hy-Vent 400 ($28). He cleaned up, and was out in less than an hour from his arrival, so I didn't have to pay for extra time. In retrospect, I'm not sure the replacement was needed. The old Duo Vent has two vent caps. After some later research on the Web, I found that the black one is for automatic venting (should be open), and the red one for faster manual venting (normally closed). I'm not sure the vent caps were set correctly. Jim didn't seem familiar with this style, and it might have led to an incorrect diagnosis. However, I'm not really sorry it was replaced (there are two other Duo Vents in my system, and now that I've examined them, one seems marginal). All in all, I was satisfied with the work. The scheduling should have been better.

After speaking with Bobby on Sunday when we had no heat, he walked me through some potential fixes. When the pilot wouldn't stay lit, he suggested a service call for Monday morning, saving me the weekend rate, which was fine with me. I called early Monday morning, just after 8AM. Peter, the tech, arrived just before 9AM. He confirmed Bobby's diagnosis and replaced the part. He provided some helpful tips and was very polite and professional. His work was completed by 9:45 and he even encouraged me to print out a $30 coupon for the service call. Where else would a tech who arrives within an hour, resolves the issue within an hour, mentions a discount coupon, and is that professional! I will definitely call Sila again.

.The serviceman came at the appointed time and worked through much of the day on both units. When he left, he said he had put everything back together but that we were missing a filter that they would have to order. Later we checked both units. The one in the attic seemed fine, but outside the unit in the basement were some of the unit's parts, just hanging out on the floor, and the place where they belonged was empty of filters and the frames. I called Sila and asked what the story was with the downstairs unit, and they told me that the unit was okay to run, even with the empty filter space. I wondered why the serviceman did not explain any of that to us. Several weeks later, I received a phone call from Sila saying that the filter had come in, and apologized, saying that someone had forgotten to order it. A different person came to install the filter, and that part of the service went well. Overall I was disappointed with the first serviceman who came, because he told us that he had put everything back together, when he hadn't. :Later when I called the company, they could not reach him for an explanation, which, in any case, I never got.

Technician was punctual, professional and friendly. He cleaned his shoes before stepping inside (without being asked) and then put on shoe covers which was appreciated. He easily answered questions about use and maintenance of the furnance.

The scheduling and arrival was prompt and convenient and the plumber gave very good advice, which led me to expand the initial scope of the job. The problem was that his hourly rate was significantly higher than the big deal price and he was already there and starting the work before we agreed to expand. This was compounded by the job going much more slowly than expected. I started the day thinking I was going to spend about $149, moved to thinking it would be nearer to $500, but ended up getting a bill that was over $1000. The good news is that I was well received when I called the office the next day and explained that the open-endedness was unfair since I probably would not have agreed to having the additional work done if I'd known in advance how much it would cost. They agreed to reduce the cost by an hour's labor, which I thought was fair. That element of their customer service was pretty impressive, but it's the high hourly rate that would send me looking for a small independent guy before I'd go back to them.

Very good experience. Great customer service!

Arrived on time.Was very polite and business-like.Was neat and clean.Worked quickly and efficiently and quietly.Did a good job fixing the sink.

An inspection turned into a big repair. I paid for the Angie's List coupon for inspection and am now seeking to get this money back as it did not apply to the repair work.

Everything seems fine. Serviceman arrived promptly, seemed to do a thorough job of servicing the boiler. It was a little off-putting when he suggested a five year service contract plus some upgrades for $5,000--and then could not leave me the paperwork, nor, as he promised, did he email or fax it to me. But I would definitely use them again.

Very well. They communicated well. were on time. had all the tools, extra parts , etc. professional. everything cleaned up afterwards. nice

He came on time for the appointment. They were very good and very professional. I was very happy with them.

Very knowledgeable and professional.

The technician arrived, performed the fall maintenance. They also went to the roof to check that no damage had been done by hurricane Sandy, and fixed the rattling. The technician was skilled, personable and professional - everything you could want!

He explained what he did and was very good. Routine maintanence.

We ran out of oil in our new house- something we are unlikely to do again! The oil provider we have with tried to prime the system to get it restarted, but were unsuccessful. We ended up calling Sila who showed up promptly and got the system cleaned out and restarted rapidly. The service was not inexpensive, but they came though quickly and did an excellent job when we were in a pinch.

I have used this company before and found them to be particularly responsive. They always call to reconfirm the time of arrival and on the day the work is performed, they call just before they plan to arrive. The work is performed professionally and recommendations are made to improve performance of the heating system--e.g., installation of a high-grade filter. I will definitely use them again.

We purchased the Big Deal for a tune up with Sila. We had just purchased our house and we have a very old oil burning furnace. Scheduling was easy and Sila was on time on tha day of the appointment. They inspected the furnace and I cant remember if they did a cleaning or not. I was happy with the services they performed and felt that they were knowledgable. I would not hesitate to use Sila again.

Sila performed a furnace tune-up that I purchased on Angie's List. Scheduling the appointment was straightforward. The day of the appointment they called to give a more specific time for their arrival. They arrived on time and were polite and professional. I would definitely use them again.

The boiler it was ~40 years old and has seen better days - it is rusty as water has been leaking. The actual servicing went fine as the technician arrived on time, was professional in all his interactions, and tidied up after himself.

They showed up on time and completed the work as planned. I did not met the technicians in person but my tenant told me they were very nice.

I was very impressed! He listened to all of my questions and tried to answer all of them. He explained why some rooms were having heating issues and said Sila could do it. (We have not had anyone do it yet). He was mindful of my cats and recommended a few other preventative measures we could take, such as replacing our drip pan with a larger one. He also, unfortunately! informed me that the a/c unit is too small for our indoor living space, which explained why the upstairs was always so hot!

Everything was completed quickly and correctly.