I have a toilet that will occasionally clog, and now we're renting out our house, so I figured I'd get it checked out to hopefully prevent clogs in the future. I called Dave's and: -it was recommended that my "cheap" American Standard toilet be replaced with something more expensive -they tried to snake my toilet and *failed* to get the snake down -they left scrapes and scuff marks all over the inside of my toilet after their failed snake attempt -they tracked mud all over my bathroom floor -they charged me $40 for their "excellent" service! I'd flush the idea of using Dave's plumbing. read more

I called these guys when my toilet refused to flush when I told it to flush. The next day at 11 am Guy 1 showed up. He seemed to not know how to do anything other than basic unclogging which is not what my toilet's problem was, so he left. At around 3 that same day Aaron came by to finish up what Guy 1 started. Aaron was friendly and explained what was wrong. Apparently one of the pieces had corroded and needed to be replaced. He gave a $25 discount for Guy 1's incompetence. A few months later the faucet on my bathtub would not turn off. It wasn't just leaking, the thing was on full blast in the off position. I called Dave's and they sent out a guy right away (20 minutes from hang-up to doorbell ring). I opened the door to find Aaron, my friend from two months ago. He remembered me and asked about updates from our conversation prior. 40 minutes later he had replaced every washer in my bathroom, performed surgery on one of the faucet's, and showed me where the various water shut off valves are throughout my house. He asked what I wanted him to do with my extra 20 minutes (they bill by the hour) and I jokingly asked him to fix my keychain. He actually did it for me. Aaron does not leave a mess behind, in fact he said "I want it to look like I was never here." After going into the yard he puts shoe covers over his boots so as not to track mud through the house. Aaron is the man. read more

I had a clogged toilet. Based on reviews here, I thought I give Dave's Custom Plumbing a try. It was a simple thing and it took the guy 5 minutes to clear up using an auger. He then walked around the house and told me I had to fix this and that. He said it would cost around $400-$500 to fix and he can get the parts right away. He made it sound like it was something urgent and that we're lucky that he is there and available. I Googled the item and found that it costs much less. I had a feeling that someone was trying to pressure me into buying something I don't need. So, I said no. He then went and charged me $160 for the toilet. That's $160 for a 5 minute job! Given, he has to drive out here and spent the time. But the rate was still a bit outrageous. Sure enough, a few weeks later, the toilet (a different one) was clogged again. Since I was kind of suspicious at Dave's plumbing at this point, I called a different outfit - Bay Plumbing, which is also highly recommended by Yelper. Harry from Bay Plumbing came out and proper diagnosed the problem I have with my two toilets. He correctly fixed both toilet by removing both toilets and reinstalling them. He spent 2.5 hours here and charged me a very reasonable $105 per hour. Most importantly, he took the time to diagnose the problem and fixed it properly. The other guy from Dave's just fixed the symptom, and then went on and tried to sell me an totally unrelated expensive job. Oh, the kicker is, I had Harry from Bay looked at that $500 problem that Dave's guy wanted me to fix. Harry took a look at it and said it's not even close to requiring any repair! You can see my detail review of Bay Plumbing here: http://www.yelp.com/biz/bay-plumbing-redwood-city#hrid:QvytD5eW1H2pcL875pMavg So, I seem to be the only one that had a bad experience with Dave's. My advise is, you TRY to get an estimate out of them before letting them fix things. And don't let them put you on the spot and pressure you into any unplanned repair. Do you research, ask for quotes, before agreeing to let them fix any "emergency". BTW, I did try very hard to extract an estimate out of them before letting them start work. The phone operator was VERY skillful in avoiding to give out any estimate - not even a range. The guy here gave me a range, but the actual repair only took him 5 minutes and he took the rest of the hour here (that he charged me with) to try to upsell me something else. read more

I'm not sure what to say. I called Dave last night at about 10:00 because we needed help - water backing up into the bath tub and we were taking it out by the buckets. The answering service said that someone would call me asap. It's now 7:30 the next morning and still no call back. I can't say if Dave's is a great plumbing service or not, but they dropped the ball this time. read more

They sent Brian out to look into our dishwasher (we suspected that the drain was clogged causing some water to pool in the bottom of the dishwasher at the end of each cycle). After a thorough inspection of the plumbing and the dishwasher, he couldn't find anything wrong with the drainage. He checked the pipes and the pump and even fiddled with the dishwasher where he would start a wash, interrupt the cycle and see if water was collecting (he did this a few times). Since we could actually hear the water draining at the start of every cycle, we hypothesized that it might be the machine itself, perhaps the control panel is off-sync. The services that were rendered were pretty straight-forward and for the sake of keeping it real in terms of my Yelp star ratings, I'm giving these guys 4 stars. I'll definitely call these guys again for my plumbing needs. read more

Our sewer backed up, so I checked Yelp for help. Finding Dave's highly rated, I called them. Aaron showed up right on time, checked the cleanouts, and determined that it was a city problem. He said he'd be glad to clean it out right then and there or charge me a diagnostic fee (less than 1/4 the cost of the job and very reasonable) so I could call the city which would take care of the problem in an hour or so. I opted for the latter, and Aaron then showed me how to tell if the problem was the city's or mine, gave me the city phone number for future use, and then actually called and made all the arrangements for me. Service just doesn't get any better than this!! read more

Dave's Custom Plumbing is my go-to plumbing service. They have repiped part of my old house, replaced old toilets with low-flow models and fixed various leaks and problems. I find them always fair and 90% of the time very competent. Like any service, it varies according to who you get. Aaron, John and Dave (the owner) are great! Once or twice some other person has showed up and they have been less great. The price is not cheap but it is fair, and they are very good about asking if there is anything else they can do once they are on-site, to maximize your value for the time you've paid for. When the shower was leaking, for example, Dave went around to the other shower and checked, and checked a couple of other things, since I had already paid for him to come out. read more

Awesome response time and professionalism! All it took was one phone call and Dave's Custom Plumbing came out and fixed both of our bathrooms. When you run a business, you gotta have bathrooms that work. Thanks for getting us back up and functioning! read more

I think the management either changed or they just decided to get bored with their work and not work. We spoke to the head guy "Dave" described what we needed done, gave him an open decision on new parts or whatever, we were very open minded, we set up the appointment, my wife took the day off to be there for him and not only did he not show up, but even after 4 to 5 phone calls each of the two phones he uses, he did not even call back. Not to apologize not to reschedule, nothing. nada zilch. Years ago we had a good experience more than once, but things change and I am sad to say that what was once a great place went way down hill into the unprofessional zone. Oh well. read more

I'm normally the type to fix everything myself, including plumbing, but when my water heater starting wetting itself all over the floor, I decided I should probably call a pro. I had seen some incredibly nice bathroom work at a friend's house done by Dave's, so I decided I would give them a try. They were prompt, clean and very professional. I am a bit picky when it comes to quality of installation and I must admit, I was very impressed. The install went amazingly fast and they updated the entire setup to current codes with earthquale strapping and all the right connections. I'm not sure If I could have done it right myself, so calling Dave's was a good call. Besides, I'm a little nervous when it comes to natural gas! Price was very competitive and there was even the added bonus of a ten year warranty on the heater they sold me. Frankly, a water heater should last well beyond ten years, but it's a little extra piece of mind in case it was built on a Friday afternoon and decides to fail prematurely. Bottom line is that my experience was nothing but positive and will definitely call Dave's Plumbing next time I get in over my head on a plumbing fix. read more

Great job folks, thank you so much! I was a customer of AAAAA "Let Stinky Do It" for several years before they were bought by AAA Plumbing. Every 3-4 years they'd have to come and auger out the main line to remove the tree roots. Time for it to happen again last summer, I call Stinky and AAA Plumbing comes out. They try to upsell me with everything they have, including a $6K solution with, get this, financing! Yikes. I didn't buy most of it. I did not like the used-car-lot, time-pressure feel of AAA. Yesterday our pipes backed up. Only eight months after AAA did a pressure-wash treatment for a few hundred dollars. I called them and asked about the situation, but it's only warrantied for 90 days. Plus the lady on the phone sounded like she had been drinking. She didn't even ask what the problem was - I kept trying to tell her and she just kept on talking about how they could send someone right now. She could not be bothered to set up an appointment for the next day, when I didn't have a meeting at work, and told me to call again later when I was ready. Hoo boy. That's it, time to find a new plumber. Yelp to the rescue. I called Dave's. The lady on the phone was competent, polite, smart and handled my job scheduling. She informed me of the $25 Yelper coupon (thanks!), and tried to get what info she could about my problem. She made sure the schedule would work for me and told me the plumber would call 10-15 minutes before he arrived, which he did. I met Aaron of Dave's plumbing today, right on time. He explained that I had a two-way cleanout valve. He did a couple of tests, we saw the problem, and he headed out to the street to do the snaking. I should also mentioned that he put on shoe covers while he was standing at the front door to come inside, and when the whole job was done - wait for it - he cleaned up my entryway tile. I dream about contractors who do things like this. Nice! He recommended a couple of things I could do myself to remove tree roots in the future, recommended Barron Park plumbing supply (they rock!), and when I asked about AAA, he said that a lot of plumbing shops pay their plumbers on commission. That explained a whole lot about AAA. He also told me why Dave's would dig up the main line should it ever need replacing instead of cementing it in (which is only a band-aid). Aaron really enjoys his work, I could tell. He genuinely seemed to enjoy talking about plumbing, getting a job all the way done right, and most of all, helping people. The man was careful to make sure his job was thorough and well-done - he ran the snake through more than once until it ran cleanly all the way through, and he ran all the water in the house for 10 minutes before he would call the clog removed, and said to call him if anything were to happen once he left. He was careful to explain what could be done if the trees eventually overcame the pipes, but said that there was no need to do any of that unless there was mud in the line (unlike AAA who was all ready to re-plumb the mainline *right now*). The bill was under $200. Thank you to Dave & his super staff. You're my new plumbers! read more

My sub-pump broke. It was installed by Dave's Plumbing less than a year ago. He was sold a defective pump. I believe the warranty for labor had expired, but I was charged Zero by Dave. He sent a plumber to check it out the same day who determined the problem. The next day they installed a new pump. Superb service. read more

I've had 2 experiences with Dave's Custom Plumbing. The first was several years ago - we had Aaron install a toilet in our house on a floor that was not quite level (toilet needed to be shimmed) and he did a great job. So when we were having problems with a different toilet I called Dave's again. A few weeks ago, we had a Kohler toilet that was running (water was draining from the tank to the bowl causing the tank to refill ocassionally). The refilling was wasting water and was annoying to listen to at night (toilet is in master bathroom). So I called Dave's and they sent someone over to take a look (not Aaron). The plumber spent not more than 25 total minutes at my house. During that time he made a few adjustments to the parts in the tank (maybe 5 minutes worth of work which included tightening one part and changing the height of one tube), and spent plenty of time listening to the toilet to see if it was still leaking (like 15 minutes). Only after about 20 minutes into the job did he start to complain about this type of toilet (he thought this particular Kohler toilet wasn't good ). And then he started suggesting that I replace the toilet if this fix didn't do the trick. In short, if he didn't think he could fix it I would have preferred he tell me that before I agreed that he try to fix it (I could have saved $135 if I was just going to have to replace it anyway). Moreover, within a day I heard the toilet refilling again so he clearly didn't fix it. When I called back to indicate that the problem hadn't been solved, the plumber indicated I should replace the toilet and quoted me $625 to remove the old toilet and install it with a new one. However, the new toilet only cost $200 so we just decided to remove the old one ourselves and hired a different plumber to install it. In short, I wasted $135 for less than a 25 minute visit to my house for which nothing got fixed. Look elsewhere for a plumber, I was not at all impressed with the service or the prices. read more

I dealt with Dave's Custom Plumbing on 2 occasions: 1. First time Dave, the owner, came out to look at a corroding sewer line, he seemed professional and reasonable, and subsequently provided an estimate for the cost of replacing sewage line that seemed reasonable. He said he would return to perform video imaging and that altogether the overall cost for the esimate would be $275. Indeed, I was billed $275. I was very pleased with their service up to this time. 2. The second time I called them for a walk-through which I was told would cost $40, that they did NOT charge/hour, and that I would be given UP-FRONT estimates and would have to sign off on any additional work that needed to be done in the house. This time Aaron came out and during the walk-through proposed draining my tank, but did not inform me that there would be an extra charge for this or what this charge would be besides the $40 for the walk-through. When I was getting to write out a check, all of a sudden he told me the cost would be $145 and that they DID charge/hour! I called the company back to complain 3 times in additional to several emails. The woman I spoke to was very helpful initially and told me that I was misinformed by Aaron, that he should not be charging me per hour, and that they would credit the $100. Then all of a sudden the next day they came up with additional charge of $60 for the initial visit by Dave, that was supposed to be free of charge per Dave himself, and was NOT included on the original bill with the video imaging! Furthermore, the estimates I asked for during the second visit never materialized. It was a complete WASTE of money! I asked Dave the owner to call me back to ask him for the additional estimates, to give me a timeframe for the work, and to explain how they were coming up with new charges for their trips--NEVER HAPPENED! All in all, I think Dave's Custom plumbing proved unreliable in the end and I believe they are misleading the customers about their charges. read more

In two words, very poor service. Had a clogged main line... The plumber came last friday to fix it, and he "snaked" it from the side clean-out and not the main one... Charged 260 dollars for it, for two hours. WIth in a week (exactly) the mainline got clogged. Aaron came back and their Manager (who is the most "non-customer friendly" guy) wants to charge entirely again... I don't expect 6 months guarantee, but, not even a week for 260$?? As I started pushing him hard, he decided to abandon and they left. He wanted me to sign a contract to let them put a new clean-out in the front (near the main sewage line), and only then he would honor any warranty. I turned around and called "Rotto Rooter". They fixed the problem and even gave a month guarantee.. What a crapp service "Dave's customer plumbing" is... You would be happy with someone else. What a read more

Dave has done a few jobs for us over the years and I've found him to get the job done and is very easy to deal with. Most recently he replaced our broken toilet. A piece of the new toilet broke soon after the install (due to a manufacturing defect). Dave loaned us the new part until we could receive a replacement from the company and fixed it without charging another service fee. I will definitely be using Dave's Plumbing again. read more

Did a house remodel 8-9 years ago and Dave's Custom Plumbing re-piped throughout the whole house (2 bathrooms, kitchen, laundry). I had no need to get under the house in the crawl space until this past weekend when I heard water dripping into a puddle when one of the showers was in use. After further investigation realized the bathtub drain had NO pipe (P-Trap) connecting shower water to sewer line. And no the old one didn't fall off. There was no glue residue on the ABS piping. One can only assume that the job was never completed since I was the first/last person under the house in the last 8-9 years. Left several messages on Dave's office line explaining who I was and the situation. NO call back. Not only did Dave's Plumbing drop the ball not completing the job in which they are the "professional trades men", they lack customer service in returning customers vmails in an effort to rectify the issue caused by them. Will have inspector view water damage to see if there is any black mold issues, etc. and will notify neighbors (which I referred Dave's Plumbing) to never use Dave's again. read more

I was very disappointed by the uninformed, misleading and contradictory information I got from the people at Dave's Custom Plumbing. --The plumber they sent told me our toilet was not a high efficiency model when it is. --He claimed our leaky tank could not be replaced, only repaired, which would be complicated and cost $487. In truth, the tank could easily be replaced for 1/5 the cost he bid to repair it. --He claimed our company could get a rebate from the City of Mountain View for installing a high efficiency toilet (toilet + installation cost $500), when, as a business we could not. (In fact, the City of Mountain View has a free high efficiency toilet program for qualifying businesses but only through their own contractor: in other words, there was nothing in it for Dave's.) --The plumber claimed they had a high efficiency toilet in stock, went to get it and came back empty-handed, claiming he had been mistaken -- the toilet they had in stock was a normal high-flow toilet, but that I had to pay a trip charge of $25 anyway. --The receptionist claimed the toilet they had in stock really was a high efficiency toilet. --The receptionist said it sometimes took days to hear back from the City of Mountain View since they were so backlogged, that it wouldn't be worth the wait. I finally decided to educate myself and discovered that our existing toilet is high efficiency (and therefore did not qualify for the free toilet program from the City of MV), the part could easily be replaced and that I could do it myself for $100. Bill at Conleff Plumbing Supply in Santa Clara was instrumental in helping me "do-it-myself". Thanks to him, our toilet is working like new and I know where to turn when I have a plumbing question! read more

Great service! I ordered a plumber 2 weeks ago. They sent Aharon. He came just on time and fixed everything quickly and efficiently. When something got broke he went to a close store got the relevant part and took care of it as well. Highly recommend! read more

We just moved in to a new house and we had a big puddle right outside of our bathroom. I googled local plumbers and came up with Daves on yelp. Thank you yelp for referring me to such an valuable company. They were very professional and I was surprised that they were also pretty knowledgeable. I found out I had what they call a slab leak. The house was really old and they recommended several ways it could be fixed. In a few days, and lot of messy work, ripping and tearing out my carpet and flooring, we found the leak and fixed it and the puddle is now gone. Thanks Dave and Co. for holding my hand throughout this yucky process. read more

awesome service - came quickly, diagnosed the problem, fixed it. reasonable prices. dave is very friendly and respectful. A+.

I am a highly respected general contractor in Palo Alto. I have been in business for 26 years and used most of the local plumbing companies at one time. I used Daves custom plumbing to replace sewer and drain lines under a customers house. During the time Daves Custom Plumbing was under the house the customers phone line stopped working. The phone line was all around the area the plumbing work was performed. My customer alerted me to the fact that the phone line had stopped working the day the plumbing work started. I checked the phone line myself and found it was in fact not working. When I was invoiced for the work Daves Custom Plumbing completed I paid the invoice minus the repair costs to run a new phone line. Daves Custom Plumbing refused to admit they damaged the phone line and demanded I pay the invoice in full. After realizing I was not going to pay the cost to repair the phone line, Daves Custom Plumbing filed a case in small claims court against me. When I showed up in small claims court to fight the claim, I was shocked to find three other parties in the court room that same day with disputes against Daves Custom Plumbing. Dave seems to be masking poor work by taking people to court. I started to ask around to see if any other contractors I know had had any issues with Daves Custom Plumbing. It turns out that three of my good friends who are very well respected general contractors had terrible experiences with Daves Custom Plumbing. Two of these contractors ended up in court against Daves Custom Plumbing as well. I also found out that Daves Custom Plumbing had not been paying the rent for his business wharehouse. It seems ironic that someone who is using small claims court to try and collect money that is not due, is in fact not paying his own bills. I would never recommend or use Daves Custom Plumbing for anything again and neither should you. read more