*** Response to A & Y Plumbing's response
- blaming the customer and the bathtub company without taking any responsibility, is not the correct approach
- saying that it was "impossible" to notice the defect before installing the tub, is ridiculous
- I noticed the defect, and spoke to Alex on the phone about it prior to installation. I asked him to write it on the work order to investigate
- I talked to the plumber about this, and asked him to check it
- He felt it was ok, despite the fact that there was a port open to the air, outside the tub, leading to a connected water jet!
- He insisted that he was an expert and insisted that there was nothing wrong with the tub, instead of investigating
- He was wrong
*******
I read the reviews about this company and they looked pretty good. I'm sure they are fine for small repairs and installing faucets.
I had a similar experience, to another recent review, about a bathroom upgrade.
I was left with a flooded house, multiple giant holes in the ceiling, and scratched walls on my freshly painted hallway.
The company wanted to charge me extra for finding the leak, that in the process of finding, destroyed my ceiling.
Let's get to the beginning of the story:
I ordered a whirlpool tub from Costco, which was delivered to my home.
I inspected this tub, and decided to call a plumber to do the installation, because I was not qualified to do it myself.
I noticed a pipe on the hot tub, which led out from one of the jets, was open, while all the other ones were closed. I asked Alex, the person who answered the phone from the plumbing company, to please make a note on the work order of this concern, and to have the plumber verify if this is okay. he told me that it's not necessary to make a note of it, because the plumber is a professional, and he would notice any problems.
I should have canceled at that point, because ignoring customer concerns is not good practice.
The reviews were pretty good on this company and I decided to go ahead because I trusted them.
I was not home when they showed up, because they were late. I did call the plumber and ask him to please inspect that pipe. He assured me that he would.
A few hours later I came home to double-check his progress, and to remind him about inspecting the tub. I saw that as he had moved the bathtub up the stairs, he had done a lot of scratches along my walls which were freshly painted just a few months before. I had spent more than $500 to paint that hallway. In a short time, he had made a brand new paint job look like garbage.
Things were not looking good. But I did see that the bathtub was in place. The plumber assured me that everything was inspected.
I left and let him finish his work. I came back later and he was ready to go.
After he left, I finished the faucet plumbing, and tested the tub. my wife was downstairs and started yelling about the tub leaking.
I quickly drained it all, and called Alex.
I had to wait until they came back a day or two later, to check it. Instead of quickly checking, the plumber kept the water running forever, causing a huge flood in the ceiling, and then he felt that he had to cut open two giant holes in my textured ceiling of the living room.
After causing several thousand dollars in damage, Alex called me from their head office, stating that I owed them more money for the inspection.
Eventually we found that the cause of the leak, was the same pipe that I was initially concerned about and asked him several times to inspect.
Alex wanted $200 extra, and meanwhile I wanted them to pay for the damages.
I didn't really want to get into a big argument. I told him I would hold back any payment until damages could be assessed.
The living room ceiling is still not fixed. I did not pursue him for damages. The blame is somewhat on the manufacturer of the tub. And that's why I didn't give a zero rating.
They got paid $500 for their work, plus taxes, minus $50 for a can of paint.
I lost thousands of dollars in damages.
- Approximate cost of services:
- $500.00
- Company Response
Thank you for the feed back. Just to point out, the work was done two years and one month ago before the review was posted and until then we were not aware about this until the review was posted. The last time the customer contacted us was in October 18, 2016 and informed us that that the manufacturing company will compensate for the costs. We learned these concerns only from the review.
As you can read from the customer's review: the leak was caused by a manufacturer defect which was identified by us when we conducted the leak investigation. It was determined that the leak was the result of a manufacturer defect in the area of the jet tubing. This kind of manufacturer defect can be detected visually very rarely since the right layout of the tubing is determined by the manufacturing company specialists and it is pretested after the assembly of the unit in the factory. This is why, it could not be detected visually by us, but only when the whirlpool starts working, the leak may appear.
N.B: We did this work in September of 2016.
We need to mention the bathtub was very heavy and when they carried it, they accidentally scratched the wall. We recognize this was our fault and we changed our policies from 2016. From then on, if the bathtub is very heavy, we ask the customer to invite movers to bring it upstairs. This is more safe and will protect their properties. As for this case, we asked the customer how much to compensate for the wall and the customer said: $50. In the review, the customer said he spent more money to paint the hallway, but we asked if we should pay more and he said $50 is good. We sincerely apologize for this inconvenience and we have been more careful since then on. If the bathtub is really heavy, we advise the customer to bring in movers.To recap: before installing the whirlpool, we visually checked the tub for damages. This is our regular procedure which we do every time before any installations. It is a necessary part of the installation. We did not find any visual damages that would prevent us from doing the installation.
Shortly after the installation, the customer called us about a leak and we scheduled an appointment. We do not know why it was 2 days later, because more than 2 years have passed and we cannot recollect this. Usually we come on the same day or the day after if the customer wants us to check something. On this visit we needed to conduct an investigation in order to find the source of the leak. For this, a standard procedure for water leaks was conducted. A water test was conducted and no leaks were detected from upstairs. The only way to determine the source of the leak was to open the ceiling. He opened it with the customer's permission. Prior to the investigation, as was discussed with the customer, if the leak was found to be a result of our work then we would take full responsibility for the ceiling and further plumbing repairs. With the customer's permission, the ceiling was opened. During the investigation, the plumber identified that there were no problems with our drain and water connections and we ruled out this possibility. The only possibility left was a manufacturer defect which was confirmed later on. To emphasize again, prior to the installation a visual assessment for damages on the whirlpool was done by us. At the end it was found out that the leak was caused by a manufacturer defect on the jet tubing. At the point of visual inspection, such a defect could not be identified by us visually. In no case it could have been seen visually by us. Again, when we did the visual inspection, we did not find any visual damages that would prevent us from doing the installation. Besides, it was tested by manufacturer assemblers prior to being bought by the customer. After the investigation, I spoke to the customer and he told us to send him an invoice for the leak investigation, which we did.Some further highlights: in a few weeks we contacted him to ask if he contacted the manufacturing company. In the middle of October the customer sent us a message that the manufacturing company agreed to cover his costs including our invoice and he would pay us. Please note that this was after a month that the service was completed. After that we did not hear from the customer about any concerns and references to any damages mentioned in the review, nor that he is connecting anything at all back to our work. During this time, the customer did not reach us with any concerns or questions or issues. The last time we heard from him was in October 16, 2016 when he told us about him contacting the manufacturer company of the whirlpool and that the company will pay his costs. So we didn't hear from the customer at all during all of this time until the review was posted - it was posted 3 months ago.
We built our reputation over the years. We worked hard all of this time to make sure that the customers are happy with our work and to provide them with the best work that we can do. We pay attention to all their concerns and return calls right away when they want to check or recheck something as well as accommodate their needs in any potential situation. We always get back to our customers and clarify/address any concerns in a prompt manner. This review took us by surprise but we will take this experience to grow further while taking in mind this experience.