Max Appliance Repair

We came home from a 3-day weekend away to find our freezer had defrosted completely. Lots of ruined food! Called Max Appliance Repair and they got a technician over within 3 hours. The technician found the problem quickly (about 20 minutes). The defrost cycle timer was broken. He had the part in his vehicle. That's the end of the good news. While he was getting part, I looked up the cost of it online: around $85. When the tech came back in, he told me the part cost was $185 and labour would be an additional $180. Considering that installing the new timer was a matter of about a minute, I thought the total price was outrageous. I don't mind paying a reasonable mark-up for parts and expect a labour charge, but $400 (including tax) for this job was outrageous. (On top of that Max Appliance adds on 3% for credit card use.) We decided not to go ahead with the repair at that inflated price. I asked the tech to close everything up, which he did. We were charged and paid their $79 + HST standard diagnostic charge. My son later convinced me that I could easily replace the part myself, so I ordered it and did the installation (simple) when it arrived today. After plugging in the freezer, nothing went on except for the interior light. The compressor and fan would not turn on. We called in a repair technician, recommended highly by a friend, who discovered after trying various things that somehow the compressor and fan had become “disconnected”. (Both had definitely been on when the Max Appliance technician had arrived.) Hmmm… Once both parts were reconnected, the freezer started up just fine and it’s running fine. Form your own conclusions as to what happened, but my STRONG recommendation is to stay far away from Max Appliance Repair.