ComplaintsforBotetourt Mechanical Heating & Air

• Initial Complaint

  01/07/2022

  Complaint Type:

  Service or Repair Issues

  Status:

  Answered

  More info

  It’s the middle of winter, and our heat has been completely out since mid-December. *** assigned this “business” to us, who was quick to contact me after sending in my request for service. I made an appointment and thought, “oh, great, they can be here to fix our heat within a couple days! My family won’t have to suffer from freezing temperatures in their own home.” However, even after missing work to be home, I was stood up and told there was an emergent situation for someone without heat who needed service. I explained that WE did not have heat, to which she replied, “we did not know that.” So, I make another appointment and give them the benefit of the doubt. They stand me up AGAIN, after I’ve missed work to be there. I contact them again, quite frustrated this time and receive a paragraphs long response of apology and excuses. So, I schedule AGAIN, and, as you can see the pattern, I missed work once again to accommodate their visit. And, as you also suspect, I was stood up again. After calling *** numerous times and getting nowhere there (which is an entirely other trash bag of nonsense), I got a response from them after two weeks saying that they FINALLY got in contact with the contractor but that the contractor had experienced all kinds of issues (power outage, telephones down, an apocalypse ), and that there may be a delay in them contacting me for service. Such a joke. All of this. It’s right at a month later and after countless calls, emails, and missed appointments, I feel like I’m in some sort of big joke for which I am the butt of. Like “haha! You and your family don’t have heat! ***** *** *** **********  So…still no heat. This company has NO idea how to run a business, and it’s clear that they do not prioritize the safety of their clients or the wellbeing of those they’re supposed to serve. For a house with 4 people, 4 dogs, and 11 other animals, we are suffering at the expense of these unethical people. It’s 23 degreese.

  

  Business response

  01/18/2022

  We tried our best to schedule these homeowners as they were referred to us thru a 3rd party & during the busiest time we've encountered to date. We had more than twenty work orders in an active status at different levels of completion. The correct protocol thru the 3rd party is to address each work order ( if we choose to take them), as they are categorized.  Normal urgency calls are taken after expedited calls. This call was a normal urgency call & if there was a situation which garnered an upgrade the call would've been reclassified as "expedited", therefore moving this call ahead of our other calls but it was not.  **** has been working without any kind of a real break including after hours & weekends. This homeowner did not effectively communicate their needs to the 3rd party or to us. This is the first we've heard about animals being in the home or the temperature being 23° inside. We are animal lovers ourselves & would absolutely never put their well being in jeopardy. **** was delayed repeatedly due an emergency boiler installation who's urgency was sent to us as expedited.  We tried again & again to work them in the schedule instead of scheduling them out 2 weeks which was our earliest available appointment at that time. We were also under the impression that their was not a big rush but we tried to get them scheduled.  We've never been to this residence & we feel like a person should allow for trouble by purchasing a secondary heating source. I have a difficult time believing that they would put their animals thru the ringer like they are alleging they did. They received no service from us but we see they both seem to enjoy making nasty remarks & false allegations towards us creating a personal attack about something they never received.  Bottom line is this: of they were experiencing an emergency they only needed to communicate that to the 3rd party & we would have gladly moved them up ahead of the other normal calls & there would've been resolution within 2 days.  We cannot expedite service when a 3rd party is involved. It must go thru them & it must say that in their contract with the 3td party.  I don't know.  I do know that there are guidelines set & protocol that we do our best to follow. Again, we would never purposefully try to hurt a potential customer or an established customer for that matter & we find their complaint to be insulting, inflammatory & really it sounds a bit like rednecks trying to bully us & push us around as they see fit.  We won't be bullied or threatened by them. That's just wrong. We seriously doubt we could've satisfied them based on this complaint.  We should attach the emails they sent to us but they just got more trashy & that's not helpful. We have tried to be responsive & not reactive unlike these homeowners who chose to take the low road. Hopefully, the 3rd party found them another contractor which could've been requested as well, an out of network contractor that they could chose & the 3rd party would've paid the whole bill including paying for the contractor like they do for all of their customers. The homeowner doesn't have to pay anything other than a $75 service fee & the 3rd party covers everything else. We don't feel like they utilized any other option in getting their appointment set when we were unable to get to them based on their status being classified as normal when all they had to do was communicate their specific needs to the 3rd party who then could have expedited their service request. At that point, we would've known to increase the priority level to high & resolved their heating issue asap with a minimal wait time.

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