P.E.T.E.S. / Palmer Electric

Review: in dec.I lost power to the back half of my home.I called palmer electric who then sent an electrician. the electrician spent over three hours at my home then stated that he could not find the problem.I called the next day for an estimate.palmer returned my call stating it would cost about $580 dollars to restore my power.later I recieved a bill for $226.00.I called palmer questioning the bill and the next day was sent a registered letter threatening to put a lean on my home.not having that kind of money I had my nephew check the problem.he took about fifteen minutes to find it was a bad breaker switch which I replaced for $5.90.I called palmer and explained what the problem was,and was told it was too bad but I still had to pay a substantial amount of money.I was treated with no compassion.I am a 53 year old disabled man living on social security disability.Desired Settlement: bill should be waived due to substandard work from a supposedly qualified electrition.I had to live over two weeks with no power to half my home because I could not afford over $806.00 they wanted to restore my power.

Business

Response:

Thank you for the correspondence. In regards to the matter regarding Mr. [redacted], he called and requested our services. Promptly, we made great effort to restore power to his mobile home. The electrician was working with a home that was not wired correctly. During his troubleshooting, our electrician explained this to Mr [redacted]. Working on a home that is not wired correctly is challenging and can be time consuming for electricians that work according to the National Electrical Code. He asked our electrician to leave before he could complete his evaluation.

While we were not able to correct the issue, time was spent troubleshooting the issue. This is billable time. The total invoice was $226.00. Mr. [redacted] contacted me in regards to his bill. I was willing to work with him in regards to this bill. I said that I would reduce the bill by $68.00. He said he will not pay at all. I was trying to explain to him that if he was not going to pay, I was going to file a lien on his property. Unfortunately, I was not able to finish my sentence due to him hanging up on me.

There is only a 30 day time frame for filing a lien. The invoice clearly indicates that a lien can be filed if not paid. I also sent a letter indicating a lien would be filed if not paid. There was no response to my lien letter. Therefore, a lien was filed.

This is not the first time Mr. [redacted] has not paid his invoice with us. In June 2010, we had invoiced $105.15 and $87.15 for electrical services. For these services, we were paid $25.15. This is $167.15 short.

The bottom line is he hired us to provide electrical services. There is a cost associated with this. Unfortunately, he asked us to leave before we could resolve the matter. In an effort to protect ourselves, a lien was filed. Mr. [redacted]. I feel that his dispute is invalid and any negative correspondence recorded with the Revdex.com will be disputed.

Thank you for your time. Please contact me at ###-###-#### if you need further information.

Owner of Palmer Electric Technology Energy Services, Inc.

Consumer

Response:

[To assist us in bringing this matter to a close, you must give us a reason why you are rejecting the response. If no reason is received your complaint will be closed Administratively Resolved]

I have reviewed the response made by the business in reference to complaint ID 9364934, and have determined that this does not resolve my complaint. For your reference, details of the offer I reviewed appear below.

[To assist us in bringing this matter to a close, we would like to know your view on the matter.]

Regards,

first off there must be some mistake because I have never hired p.e.t.e.s palmer electric for anything.

in late december I had lost power to the back half of my trailer,I called p.e.t.e.s palmer electric,they sent

out a seviceman .I informed the man that it had messed up before but when I flipped the breaker a few times it came back on,but then a few days later it did it again but this time flipping the breaker did not work.while he was looking at the breaker I told him that I hoped it was just the breaker as I only had about $300 I had saved for tires.the man spent over 3 hours looking for the problem.then he informed me that I was near my $300.when I asked him what was wrong he did not know.I believe the next day I called for an estimate on restoring my power.the seviceman called with an estimate of $580,I said I didnt have that kind of money and thanked him.a while later I got a bill for $226.I thought that was pretty high since I still had no power(over 2 weeks) and I still did not know why.I talked with a woman to work something out but she still wanted to charge me for over two hours,I offered the min. of one hour that I thought was reasonable since nothing was fixed or diagnosed.I was threatened with a lien by registered mail the very next day.my nephew (a mechanic) came over to see if he could help me and found a bad $6 breaker as well as traced and labeled my breakerbox in about an hour.I would have paid p.e.t.e.s palmer electric $806 (estimate)for a $6 part. I find that outrageous. that and attacking a mans home.

Business

Response:

Troubleshooting electrical work is 95% straightforward. When there is a circuit that does not have power you trace the line to figure out where a bad component or splice is. Repair that component or splice and that solves the problem. The issue at hand is that by going through a thorough troubleshooting procedure our experienced electrician was unable to find the root cause of the problem in the time allotted by the customer.

We received the call from [redacted] that he had lost power to the back half of his trailer. A seasoned service electrician was dispatched to the project. Upon arrival Mr. [redacted] made the electrician aware of the issue and what was going on. Given that information the electrician did the following:

1. He checked for power at the circuit breaker panel, flipped on the circuit breaker and found power there.

2. Traced the line from the circuit breaker panel to a junction that is near the circuit breaker panel and found that there was power at that junction.

3. From there he went to the area of the trailer that did not have power and opened up those junction boxes to see if there was a loose wire nut or bad junction, re-tightening the junctions as he trouble shot. Still not finding a bad connection.

4. From there the electrician went outside and tried to find a possible break in the line under the trailer where he once again had no success.

5. About that time it was determined that the electrician was getting close to the $300 limit that Mr. [redacted] had given him so he put everything back together and returned to the shop.

6. The electrician then let his supervisor know that he was unable to resolve the issue and that Mr. [redacted] wanted an estimate for a repair.

7. Given the nature that we did not know what was causing the problem the only repair we could propose would be to re-feed the circuit with new wire coming from the circuit breaker panel, so that is what was proposed.

After the phone call with Mr. [redacted] regarding the estimate for repairs we created an invoice for the time spent trying to diagnose his problem and sent it to him. We then received a phone call from Mr. [redacted] requesting to lower the invoice since he is on disability. Our office offered to provide a one hour labor discount due to the circumstances. This was not acceptable to Mr. [redacted]. He only wanted to pay one hour of labor and at that point he said he was not going to pay the bill. Upon hearing that statement and knowing our only potential option of recourse would be to file a lien within 30 days of performing work so we took the action to file a lien.

I’m happy that Mr. [redacted]’s nephew was able to replace the breaker and solve the issue, it is quite possible when the breaker was replaced it moved a wire that was potentially causing the problem. This does not excuse him from paying his invoice for the troubleshooting labor that was performed by Palmer Electric Technology Energy Services, Inc. Had we not received the initial phone call requesting service from Mr. [redacted] we would not have visited his home.

Consumer

Response:

[To assist us in bringing this matter to a close, you must give us a reason why you are rejecting the response. If no reason is received your complaint will be closed Administratively Resolved]

I have reviewed the response made by the business in reference to complaint ID 9364934, and have determined that this does not resolve my complaint. For your reference, details of the offer I reviewed appear below.

[To assist us in bringing this matter to a close, we would like to know your view on the matter.]

Regards,

I told the electrician that by flipping the breaker several times the power was restored the first time my power went out but not the second time a few days later.he should have been more thorough when checking my breaker box.when I called to work something out with the bill I was treated rudely and with no compassion at all.I find the work was not adequate.