Home Repair HVAC - The Great (Climatic) and the Ugly (Algonkian)

The Great.....Sonny & Dave and the whole team @ Climatic HVAC

The Ugly....Algonkian HVAC

Here's the story.

Couple of weeks ago during the super heat wave, we called Algonkian to come out as our upstairs HVAC was blowing hot air and temp inside was up to 90. We had a service contract and I called after hours on the weekend and left message after message. I would have thought that as a contract holder, and with young kids in the house, I would at least get a call back. About 3 in total and NEVER received a call back.

By Day 2 (we had to sleep downstairs on couches and air mattresses), I had to call Climatic who not only had a after hours LIVE answering service, the on call tech responded (Dave) within about 10 min, but was out here and helped us replace the capacitor to get us cooling again. It cost me a pretty penny between the after hours and the equipment but we are talking about my family's welfare, so there is no price on that.

ALgonkian finally calls back on Monday with no sense of urgency, just a "returning you call". When i spoke with them, I got some story about how their phones and beepers were not working and that I was not the only one who experienced problems and they still had problems when I was talking to them on Monday. That is a bunch of bs.

I wouldn't recommend them at all - customer service was horrific

On the other hand, Climatic was FANTASTIC. I would recommend them for anyone looking for a HVAC service provider. We also used them to replace our downstairs furnace/ac and they did a great job, on time, courteous, follow ups, and helped me with getting rebates from state and manufacturer.

These guys know what they're doing and in an economic climate where businesses should be remembering who they work for - their customers - they stand out in my mind.

 

We've had Algonkian out about 5 times, they have been nothing but fantastic. Back in '02 they installed our Aprilaire whole house humidifier and did an amazing job. They had to reroute a bunch of pipes just to fit it in our townhouse. They replaced our water heater last year (again very hard job due to our blasted tiny closet in the garage) and were right on time and very professional. Too bad their service was bad with you, but I very highly recommend them. We've used Plumb Crazy too, they are excellent as well.

 

Based on another post, I called Climatic, they were very quick to suggest to my wife that we should replace the entire AC unit (both inside and outside) due to a coil leak. It turned out all i had to do was replace the coil but he wanted to charge me 2X as much to replace the entire unit, and even when to just replace the coil it was significantly higher than other providers I called. If you want to use them, make sure you shop around!

 

Well, I don't have the whole conversation, but I can say that given all of the close "deadlines" in the HVAC arena [puron | minimum SEER | etc], replacing your coil only would be a "short term" fix.

http://www.epa.gov/ozone/title6/phaseout/22phaseout.html

So looking long term, I would be surprised if your technician didn't suggest a total replacement. With the high SEER systems, you will replace both components, since many of them use "smart" fan controllers / multistage systems to get the rating.

 

I ended up using Airnovations. 7038138900 They were way better than the guy that showed up from Climatic.

Airnovations actually got me a OEM coil replacement for the exact unit so there wouldn't be any compatibility issues like you mentioned above. The outside vent unit eventually will need to be replaced but given the current condition (in great working shape), I was told I should be good for at least another five years which would put the total unit at around 13 years (a reasonable time frame). The part that pisses me off is that just because my wife was the one at home to meet the guy, he didn't provide any options and just assumed she didn't know any better and told her she NEEDED to replace the entire unit. That is just BS business practice to me... you can do all you want to defend these guys but a good contractor in any field should always 1. try to educate you on the problem, 2. provide you a couple of honest options. Is that so much to ask?

 

When I met with Climatic we sat down and discussed how the systems work, the current regulations for freon, how to save money on electric bills, "green" options, and what my choices were. I was pleased with the answers I was given to my questions. I had done a little research in advance so I would know a little bit on my own because as "the wife" in this situation I didn't want to be taken advantage of.

I'm sorry you didn't have the same experience as mine with Climatic and I hope your AC unit lasts a while longer.

 

I'm very sorry you weren't happy with the experience with Climatic. We train our technicians to always start with repair versus replace mentality. Unfortunately, with leaking evaporator coils, there are many routes to take that have some pretty big risks. When replacing an evaporator coil and connecting it to an older outdoor unit, that coil needs to be installed for the old refrigerant, which makes it non-compatible with the current refrigerant and efficiency levels in most cases. That means you may will probably have to replace the coil again when your outdoor unit needs to be replaced or risk a mismatch or contamination. Due to the number of equipment issues we have seen with the Goodman systems installed in the Broadlands, we have a hard time advising our customers to invest too much in repairing those systems. When we do replace a coil, we replace them with a higher cost Carrier coil which is copper coated with tin and carries it's own 10 year warranty. We also have a standard practice or replacing all the refrigerant and the filter drier. Because of the equipment costs and the methods of our installation, the cost of the repair may be greater than another company. We find these practices to be important to provide a quality repair. I did research your service call and saw that we left you with an estimate for the replacement coil. I also saw we were able to come out to diagnose the problem and perform a leak search for you for under $150 total. If there is ever anything else we can do for you please don't hesitate to call us for help.

Sonny/Climatic

 

Climatic came yesterday to fix our broken heat. I called at 1:05pm. They answered my call. They said the technician was in Ashburn and would be there between 2:00 and 2:30. They called at 2:00 and said he was on his way.

Cliff came and found a hose that was loose, replaced it, and was very friendly, professional, and I would recommend him to anyone. In fact, I am hoping to contact Climatic about a service plan and to have a humidifier installed in the near future.