We called Paul because we weren't getting any heat from our system and it kept kicking into emergency heat. I had a family emergency so wasn't home when his technician came over, but my husband was and paid the technician $136. The technician called me later saying the defrost panel had an issue and he could come back and replace it for $300. He had no idea that we weren't getting heat and only checked our system on emergency heat. I called Paul and asked him to please send his technician back because we weren't getting heat. Paul said we'd have to pay to pay $136 again, which I objected to since we had already paid once and asked that he please send his guy back when he's in the area and we'd manage till then. I kept Paul updated on our heat situation and he kept insisting that we were doing something wrong - that we should bump it up really high on emergency heat and then our thermostat would maintain it. It didn't (because our normal heating wasn't working). He also told me we should just use emergency heat because it was a cold day (in November) and ignored me when I repeatedly reminded him this had been happening for weeks even on not-so-cold days. At one point when I convinced him we had a heating problem he was annoyed because his guy had just left our area! He promised to send him over the next day or two, but his guy never showed up. I had to travel so my husband tried to contact them to get them to come back out but he didn't get anywhere.
We left for Christmas and came back to a freezing January. We stayed at my mom's for a few days dreading a cold house. I called Paul again - now after a month - telling him we couldn't get past 61 degrees in the house (the thermostat is in a closed spot, the rest of our house is colder). He told me to bump the system up to 75 on emergency heat and that emergency heat was normal because it was cold outside (I reminded him this had been going on since warmer days in November when we originally called him). He told me he would come himself but it was Friday night so we had to hold tight till early the next week. I told him we had space heaters and could go to my mom's so we would wait.
Of course, he never showed up. Because we kept mentioning to people that our heating wasn't working, someone told us they worked for a heating company and referred the guy who worked on his house. That guy showed up on Tuesday, tested the temperature coming out of our vents which was low, told us we had a refrigerant leak, re-filled it, and now we have heat!!! We are now getting 88 degrees out of our vents.
He fully checked out our system. Didn't mention anything about a defrost panel. So I finally asked him and he said the defrost panel was totally fine.
On Wednesday, the original technician called. Paul apparently asked him to call and see if we'd be home for him to visit. I guess Paul wasn't planning on coming after all and I'm sure this technical was planning to charge another $136 for his visit. I asked him what the problem had been with our defrost panel - he said it had hesitated. And I told him we had someone else come out who re-filled the refrigerant so our heating was finally working. He said he thought our refrigerant was fine when he visited.
Given that the technician didn't notice our heat wasn't working when he came, didn't test our system on regular heat (just emergency), that Paul wanted us to pay twice for what should have been diagnosed in one visit, that he refused to acknowledge that we didn't have heating for months, that he promised to send someone or come himself twice, and ESPECIALLY that they wanted to replace a defrost panel which was working fine - I would not trust this company. Fixing heating is so expensive, it is better to invest that money with someone who will be honest, reliable, own up to their mistakes, listen, and not lead you on while you are freezing at home. read more