Rich Holthaus Plumbing Inc

Went very well. The plumber, Mike, was one we used before. The job cost $170. That's reasonable for $100 labor and less than 2 hours to complete. We called them after another company quoted anywhere from $500 to $750 by trying to sell us an annual service contract (billed monthly of course) and a faucet we didn't need. (I had already purchased the faucet we wanted). We will stick with Holthaus from now on.

Not so good.

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Great problem diagnosed and solved in one visit .

Had I been informed when I was making the appointment that I would be charged a $90 service fee for these estimates, I would have called another plumber. When I received a bill in the mail, I called the company to inquire as to why the service fee wasn't mentioned to me up front - all she had to say was that $90 was their minimum charge, and I had said I wanted them to DO the work, which was completely false. Beware of hidden fees!

They always do a great job.

This is a 2 part deal. The part with the technicians went fine. The parts with Peggy the person who answered the phone did not go well on any of the 3 times we talked. I called 3/2 in the late morning because after reviewing the 11 options on Angie's list this sounded as though it might be the right one for our needs. We would have called roto rooter but most people thought their costs were high so we thought we'd try the "family owned" local folks. Peggy answered and I said "Hi, we read about you on Angie's list and I we nave the need of having a drain cleaned out at our rental property. On their page it says mention Angie's List and get a 10% dicsount. Her immediate response was - it will have to be tomorrow. I said ok. She asked if we prefer morning or afternoon. Since there was some urgency I said morning. She asked me if we were going to be there to meet the tech. I said yes, we want to be there so she got the phone number to call us to let us know when they were on their way so we could meet them. Then she asked me to describe the nature of the problem and since my husband had tried to fix it and snake it out I asked him to explain the problem to Peggy, which he did. At 7:56 this morning a man called from their office and wanted to know the details of the problem again. I again asked my husband to explain, which he did, then he said "are you on your way" and the man said yes. So, on a freezing cold morning at 8 am my husband went over to the rental house. At 9am he called me and asked me how far away this business was. I told him it couldn't be more than 15 minutes from the house. He said the tech still had not arrived and I said I would call. I called and got Peggy again and she said that based on the sound of it, they thought it was a sewer and not a drain problem so she had sent that guy on another job and we had to wait for the "sewer crew" to come out. Would have been nice if someone had called to tell uss the change of plans. I told her I was not happy about my husband wasting an hour of his time and this was not a good introduction to Holthaus plumbing. I told her I wanted a better estimate on the time someone would now be there and she said she could not provide that. I told her that was not right and she said she couldn't determine how long it would take the crew to finish the job they were doing. I told her, fine, I'll tell my husband to come home and we'll just cool our jets waiting for your call. Goodbye. At 10:05 Jerry called and said he was going to be on his way. I asked him if he was really on his way as the last person told us that too. His response was "Yes, I won't let her redirect me like she did the last guy." So my husband drove back over to the rental, the tech came shortly and did the work. There was no sewer "crew" and, in fact, the sewer had nothing to do with the problem. However, my husband was satisfied (so far) that the procedures the tech performed fixed the problem. He liked the tech, who also gave some suggestions to help prevent the problem in the future. When my husband got home he gave me the bill and there was no 10% discount. Keep in mind not only does it say they give a 10% discount for Angie's list but also for first time customers (which we were) and seniors (which we are). So I called again a third time and spoke with Peggy. I said the service had been done and my husband just gave me the bill and they had not given us the 10% discount. She said, we don't give that for rentals, just for seniors. I told her that their Angie's list coupon didn't say that, and she said - They must have done that - we don't even want to be part of Angie's list. I told her that if they had not been part of Angie's list I would not have called them. I told her that when I spoke to her yesterday I had mentioned the Angie's list and the discount. She said "I talk to a lot of people but I don't remember anything about Angie's list". She said she would give us this discount the one time but she couldn't offer it again. I told her fine. After thinking about it, because of having to deal with Peggy, I would not use this company again. I can't say she was nasty, just short and indifferent and not friendly and definitely not customer focused. Apparently they have more business than they need. It seems they (or she) change the rules once the game is in motion. She said she had already run my credit card (wow, that was quick) but she would issue a credit for the 10%. We'll see. The ratings we gave probably would have been higher if the communication/professioanlism and customer service and attitude had been significantly better.

Rich Holthaus Plumbing were very quick (within a couple hrs) in dispatching a technician to my home.  My home is a 130 plus years old and the pipe was located in a laundry room addition that had no access from the inside.  The technician, (I believe his name was Jerry) helped me make that discovery after some work.  When it was all said in done he had to belly crawl under my deck on a very cold snowy January day to reach that access.  He did all this with a "all in a days work" smile on his face.  Jerry had a great professional attitude and had the job done in no time at all.  He gave us preventative measures and he was on his way.  My wife and I couldn't have been more pleased, we were expecting the job to be much worse.  The cost was fair and reasonable, we will be using Holthause for all of our plumbing needs from now on.

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They showed up promptly and got right to work. They made sure they got everything unlike our last plumber. I was very pleased.

I recently used Rich Holthaus Plumbing at the suggestion of my brother. I had a tub re-glazed and noticed in the process that there was a leak at the overflow. The technician and I determined that it would be best to have the plumbing fixed prior to the completion of the glazing. I called Rich Holthaus Plumbing and met the plumber the next day. He looked at the situation, assessed the problem, had the parts in his van but needed a second person for some assistance. He called the dispatcher and learned that there was not another person available at that time. This meant he would need to return at another time. We determined when he could return and made arrangements for him to gain access to the house (it is unoccupied and I live in Kentucky and needed to return home). I asked how much the job would cost and was told it would take him about an hour at $90 an hour. He also gave me an estimate of the cost of the parts (about $110). I expected a bill for about $200. Instead, I received the invoice for $468 ? much more than I was expecting. Labor was $355 and materials were $133.

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The technician arrived on time and finished the job promptly letting us know everything he was doing and even did some services without additional charge.

Showed up right away.  Did a great job.

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Great.

The experience was everything I could ask for.  They responded within the hour, accomplished the difficult repair, checkedk its success carefully, and submitted an extremely fair bill.

I discovered that water leaked into my basement after running my sprinkler and surmised that a pipe connected to the outside facucet had burst.  I contacted Holthaus and they scheduled a plumber to meet with me the next day.  Adam quickly diagnosed the problem and repaired it.  He was personal and professional.  I checked with some other plumbers who are on Angies "A" list and discovered that Hothaus's price to be very reasonable.  I absolutely recommend them.

I have used Holthaus Plumbing previously, and have always been pleased.  This time, the pilot light on my water heater would not stay lit.  Matt determined that a repair was needed and the part was ordered.  He returned to replace the part, but that did not fix the problem.  While he was here he contacted Whirlpool to find out what was needed, and it was determined that another part was required.  I purchased the part at Home Depot, but when he returned to install it he noticed that it was used.  I exchanged it for a new part, and he returned and installed that.  It worked.  After he left I noticed a strong smell of natural gas, so I called Holthaus.  He returned, found a small leak, and repaired it.  So, he came four times and stuck with it until the problem was solved.  He was professional, courteous and friendly.  I would recommend Holthaus to others.

UPDATE 03-05-2012: Holthaus Plumbing has adjusted the cost charged for labor and has credited us for the 45 minutes that took for the parts to be fetched. Revised invoice was received today. This is a very welcomed resolution and very much appreciated by us. Thank you! This brings up our  overall satisfaction with Holthaus Plumbing to A for price and quaity but remains on B for the rest, due to reasons explained below.

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We called to ask about the service as it is a local company, close to our location, and wanting to pay locally-owned plumbing company to do the job. We were given an up-front quote of $90 for the service call, which was fine. The plumber was scheduled to come in the next morning at 8:30. We were called at 8 am that morning to see if the plumber can come right then. This was not possible for us, so we were going to be moved to a later time due to some other job they were going to go to first. Fine.

The plumber arrived later that day (I'd say about 11:30), looked at what needed to be done and was going to go away in order to get supplies (that were not on the truck) - 2 short 3/4 nipple-sized pipes and an union. About 45-60 minutes passed and the man returned - I'd say - about 12:30. (As I had to leave for a meeting it must have been around that time - this is why we asked to have them come in at 8:30 am.) I left for the meeting as the plumber was heading for the basement. The bill was left with the office when he was done - we were charged for 2.5 hours of labor (@$90/h), for a job that probably took no more than an hour and a half to do, if that.

At any rate, the call to the plumbing company's office resulted in us not being able to work out a compromise over the cost. We feel we've been taken advantage off and paid the $90/h rate for them to go look for parts. Well, I understand parts need to be fetched, but this was something most plumbers I used in the past had on their trucks - pipes and unions - after all, they are plumbers. I understand some jobs are not easy to troubleshoot before being seen. This job, however, needed a pipe cut, backed-out of two fittings, replaced with two shorter pipes with an union and tightened. That's it. If I had the time to do it, I would have done it my self. Next time, I will.

For someone on a tight budget, we feel this was a little deceptive.