Houston summers are unbearable without air conditioning, which is why I was distraught when my A/C stopped cooling a couple weeks ago. I got great A/C repair recs from Yelpers. But instead, I made an unwise decision: going for what seemed like the cheapest repair.
I called a dozen A/C repair shops to get quotes on service calls, hourly fees, and the cost per lb of freon. I made sure to inquire about all the "hidden fees" since right now, saving a little goes a long way.
I came across Texas Central Air through their Google ad. They had rave reviews posted on their website (obvi), although I later found what looked like fake reviews on Google Local. What excited me most was the $60 service call (waived with repair).
I called them Wed. to confirm prices. The gentleman I spoke with was courteous and helpful, and offered to come out the next afternoon. He said that any repair, including (in his words) adding a couple of pounds of freon, would mean the service fee was waived. I made sure to ask if there were any "hidden fees" (which I would assume to be hourly fees or other fees) and he indicated there would be none. That's why I was so gung ho about them!
I called them today and got David on the phone. I asked for a Sat. appointment, but he was in the area and said he'd drop by in an hour. He initially quoted $70 for a preventative maintenance visit, but we established I wanted the $60 service call instead.
He came on time and started by looking at my outside units. He said one of the units was very low on refrigerant and filled it with freon. He didn't indicate how low or how much freon he filled it with. I guess I should have asked.
Then, he checked out the inside units. He glanced at the unit quickly and said it was a problem with the coil (I explained there was some icing on the coils and figured it was a leak). I asked him to check inside the unit and he agreed to. He didn't seem to think it was necessary, though.
He said the part was under warranty and quoted labor at $575. When I inquired about where the leak was, he said that it was impossible to determine because the leak was so minuscule and that it would be a "waste of his time" to do so. He said replacing the coil was the only solution.
I guess I wanted to be convinced that replacing the unit was the only answer, since I've heard it's not a good sign when the repairman jumps straight to an expensive replacement. So I inquired about using a leak detector to check where the leak was.
That's when the trouble started. He got defensive and told me that he's been doing this for years. He said he knew what he was talking about and that he wasn't trying to sell me anything. At this point, I had no doubts about his knowledge level or expertise, so I was confused as to why he was getting so defensive. I just didn't want to shell out several hundred without knowing the exact problem.
I let him know we'd get a second estimate and call him back if we needed his services. He went back to his truck and reappeared several minutes later with a leak detector. He looked peeved about it and reiterated that I had to get the coil replaced. The whole visit took 45 minutes, tops.
He came back with a bill for 6 lbs of freon and an $80 labor charge. I was confused, because the label on my A/C unit says it holds a max of 5 lb, 6 oz of freon. I asked him about the 6 lbs and he said he could prove that it was 6 lbs by looking at the unit label. We went outside and it turned out the max was 5 lb, 6 oz. Now I'm not an expert but I guess it's possible the whole system (inside and outside) contains more than the max. But I doubt there was zero freon in the system. Thankfully, he did change it from 6 to 5 lbs, but that left a bad taste in my mouth. He had never indicated how much freon was actually in the unit when he started filling it and also never told us how much he filled it with.
But he then got visibly angry and told me he wasn't trying to cheat me. Now, I never accused him of anything, just asked him about the 6 lbs. Less than 5 min ago, I had read the label on the A/C. I was overwhelmed by how argumentative he was and it made me skeptical of what he said from then on.
As for the labor charge: I have no problem paying for labor. He's performing a service and I should pay for it. However, I was confused by what the gentleman had said earlier (no fee except the "repair," which could be a freon recharge). This was probably a miscommunication, but a disappointing one.
Toward the end, he did soften up a bit and agreed to charge $60 for labor. But by that time, I was disappointed by my experience. I had expected the experience their website had promised: great customer service and low prices, but neither came true. David's reluctance to work with us to determine where the leak was or be up front about the labor charge was disappointing.
Thankfully, I called another A/C repair guy (recommended by friends) who quoted a considerably lower price for the repair! read more