Commonwealth Water Purification

Company made emergency repairs and left damage affecting home, some from installation & more for this call. No response to 2 calls/1 email.On [redacted] 2015 [redacted], one of the owners of Commonwealth Water came to my home to repair 2 water leaks. One was in an old filter and the other was in a new filtering system they installed in [redacted] of 2013 at a cost of [redacted]Once he repaired the leaks, I thanked him profusely. It was a [redacted] afternoon and the water had to be shut off to prevent further water damage to my basement. He charged [redacted] for the two hours he was here, and when I asked for a receipt he said they would send me one. He still has not send the receipt itemizing the charges (which I thought were excessive, but nevertheless was grateful that he had fixed the problems).The following day I went outside to help the boy that mows my lawn and saw the pipe [redacted] had cut when installing the water system was pushed out over the lawn! I attempted to push it back, but couldn't. I tried to pull it out, and couldn't. I called him afterwards and left a message that he needed to fix this. It's an eyesore (mu home is going up for sale soon) and obviously he also ruinned the caulking when he did this.[redacted] left a container of water with used plastic parts in it as well as a bucket with unknown purple liquid in it AND a submerged snow brush/scraper in it! The liquid in particular was troublesome as I have award winning pedigree cats that reside in this partially finished basement, which could have been poisoned by whatever it was.In spite of being disabled, I managed to clean up the buckets and such and drag them upstairs and outside to empty the liquids.[redacted] did not return my call, nor was there any response to a picture I emailed them of the outside of the house. I called again [redacted] and [redacted] said he would be over last week. He has not shown up nor called. Three contacts are more than enough to give him a chance to remedy the damage he has done, thus I am writing to report this damage and lack of response.Desired Settlement1) Repair the damage: Remove disconnected pipe and fix exterior wall at no charge. This was an unnecessary disconnection and allowed water into the house.2) Provide invoice.Business Response Contact Name and Title: [redacted], PresidenContact Phone: XXX-XXX-XXXXContact Email: [redacted]@aol.comOn [redacted] 2015, we received a call from Mrs. [redacted] that she had an emergency with a leak in her old filtration system and one at the top of the control valve on the water filtration system that we installed. The leak was so large that she ha to shut off the water to her home. We saw her late in the afternoon, that day. We replaced a piston and seal on the control valve of the filtration system that we installed. The large leak was due to a cracked sediment housing canister that was installed by someone else (we believe it was her husband who installed this when he installed their original filtration system). Regardless, [redacted] removed the canister and re-piped the water lines so that the water could be turned back on to the home. In order to access the canister, he had to push out the pipe that is referred to in this complaint. The pipe is an old vent pipe that was installed with the original filter. This pipe is cemented into the basement floor and we truly have no idea why it was installed - it certainly was not necessary for the filtration system. When [redacted] finished his work, he pulled the pipe back into the basement. Apparently, Mrs. [redacted] does not think that the pipe is pulled back enough? Once again, this pipe is a 1.5" x 10' PVC pipe that has been at that home, protruding outside for many, many years. Wen we installed the new filtration system, we removed the old filter and, contrary to what Mrs. [redacted] is saying, it was necessary to cut this pipe to remove the filter. After cutting it, we turned it so that the open end was facing the ceiling in the basement. We did this so that water (via snow or rain) would not enter the basement from the outside. There was no way that we were going to remove the entire pipe since it was cemented into the basement floor and drilled through the sill and removing it would have required carpentry repair of the sill. TO RE-ITERATE, THIS PIPE WAS INSTALLED BETWEEN 10-20 YEARS AGO BY SOMEONE ELSE AND IS NOT OUR RESPONSIBILITY. IT HAS BEEN PROTRUDING FROM THE HOUSE TO THE OUTSIDE LAWN THIS ENTIRE TIME. As far as things being left behind, we may have inadvertently left a container with water and a few used plastic parts. We usually take any parts that we have changed with us, but these may have been left behind by mistake. As far as the bucket with purple water - that has been there for years. [redacted] has seen that bucket there any time that he has gone to make a service call. We believe that the purple water is left over from their old system (the system used potassium permanganate, a purple material, to clean itself). We are at a lost to know where this bucket with the snow brush/scraper came from? It is not ours, it belongs to Mrs. [redacted]. It should be noted that the condition of the basement of this home is quite poor. There is considerable clutter all around (e.g. the bucket with purple water) as well as residual cat feces, vomit and a very strong ammonia odor.Mrs. [redacted] did call us after seeing the pipe in the back yard. We never received an e-amil from her (we are not saying that she did not send it, but we never received it). [redacted] and she spoke on the 31st and he told her that HE WOULD STOP BY WHEN HE WAS IN HER AREA. He did NOT say that he would stop in within a week. He has not been in the Rindge area, so he has yet to stop in and see her. This is certainly not an emergency situation at all.Having said all this, we will do the following:-An invoice is on its way.-We will schedule an appointment with Mrs. [redacted] and pull the pipe back into the cellar to its original position. We will the cap the end (outside) to insure that no water/snow gets into the pipe. We will use our usual caulking/putty around the pipe where it goes through the sill.We will NOT remove the pipe and fix the exterior wall. As stated above, this pipe was installed with the initial filter 10 -20 years ago and it is not our responsibility. Consumer Response (The consumer indicated he/she DID NOT accept the response from the business.)Correction to my original complaint. [redacted] 14th was NOT a Friday afternoon. The first phone call was on a Friday.Commonwealth Water's response is full of inaccuracies and false statements. Contrary to their claim in all capitalized letters, the pipe was not an eyesore until [redacted] got done with it. I have forwarded labeled pictures which show this pipe before and after [redacted]'s installation. There are other photos that show the installation in general.Let me preface further comments that I am disabled and had my hip replaced (as a result of an accident) 4 months prior to the water installation. Because of that, I was unaware of some of the issues, even until now. The surgery was not successful, and I still use a walker or a cane. Additionally, I've been hospitalized a couple times since that surgery due to cardiac problems. I am also widowed. All of these things have severely limited my ability to be completely aware of the work [redacted] did. I trusted him. It was with great difficulty and pain that I navigated the installation to take pictures and discover additional issues. [redacted] did NOT remove one of the items in the former installation, which is also leaking and causing mold. I just discovered this as I was trying to get photos of the pipe in question (the white one). If you look at the pictures carefully, you will see that there are several intersections in this pipe. The old units were removed from the empty intersections, with the exception of the one at the bottom WHICH I COULD NOT SEE. Rather than reattach the units neatly as the old ones had been, [redacted] chopped off the pipe sloppily and stuck the hoses leading to the dry well into the chopped off pipe. He took a piece of it out at the time and turned the rest upside down (unbeknownst to me). MEANING water could come into the house. Also breaking the caulking to the outside creating more problems with water damage from rain and outside air creating heat or cold in the basement. Since they are so busy discounting my claim, let me also mention another WORKMANSHIP-related flaw. He wrote in permanent black magic marker on the brand new tanks directions to alter the times so my TENANT could shower in the morning! The tenant is long gone. I let most issues go without comment, including this one, but I was horrified. Tenants are temporary and black magic marker is not. It was done before I had a chance to say anything. It could simply have been written on masking tape and hung on the units.[redacted] also fooled around with the timer controls on the unit that was leaking and I ended up with days of foul water. He didn't even set it back to the correct time to ensure it did not affect (or be affected by) the two other units. Nor did he warn me to do so myself.The tank he just "fixed" still has water collecting around the bottom (picture). The comment about the bucket is false. That was a new bucket, the snow brush resides in my car during the winter. [redacted] is the ONLY one that has worked on this system. I have never touched potassium permanganate in my life. It is highly poisonous and they would have a lawsuit on their hands had one of the cats been poisoned (these are prize winning pedigree show cats). Thus this brush was stuck in that bucket since sometime in [redacted], when the last of the snow melted. When the purple water got there is unknown, but I certainly didn't do it! Yes, the bucket belongs to me.[redacted] obviously did not pull the pipe back into the basement, which is why I called.He also didn't send an invoice; the work was done [redacted] and as of [redacted] I still have not received the invoice. I'm pretty certain that would not be the case had I not paid him on the spot when he did the work. Their claim that they did not receive the email is questionable. I used their website contact which unfortunately does not leave a copy in my own email. Nevertheless, two calls and an email were placed.Ms. [redacted]'s claim that they never promised *when* they would be here is also completely untrue. When I spoke to [redacted] on the following [redacted] afternoon and he said "I'll be over this week". When I reminded him it was [redacted] he amended it to the following week. I waited that full week to hear from them (though I really didn't expect it because they kept blowing me off). It was at that point that I decided I didn't want to waste my time with them anymore and wrote to the Revdex.com.Her response also implies the "in the area" is a distance from their business. It is 7.9 miles.His claims about cat feces are simply UNTRUE. Period. If he smells cat urine it's because I have a bucket for cat litter. When the bag is full it goes to the dump - or is stored at the top of the stairs until the dump is open. I have someone that comes in every week or two to help me clean that can certainly vouch for that, because she also cleans cat boxes. WHAT DOES THAT HAVE TO DO WITH THIS CLAIM except to try to embarrass me and DETRACT ATTENTION FROM HIS VERY SLOPPY WORK? It's nothing he has to navigate around.In addition to emptying the 10 Qt Bucket, I had to haul a 22x17x7 litter pan 1/2 filled with water and plastic parts up the stairs to be emptied. This is unreasonable to expect from an elderly, disabled woman with cardiac problems. In summary:Consumer's Desired Resolution: has changed to include a third item.1) Repair the damage: Renew the aesthetic appearance as in the photo taken prior to your installation/maintenance. Ensure protection and waterproofing from outside weather elements. Original disconnection was unnecessary, and allows water as well as hot/cold outside air into the basement. 2) Provide invoice 3) Remove unit that should have been disconnected during the original installation (or preferably allow me to hire someone else do it at Commonwealth Water's expense).Final Business Response We are in receipt of the second response from Mrs. [redacted]. At this point, we will BRIEFLY reply to each issue and then, hopefully, we can move forward. It should be noted that we were not able to access the pictures that were sent along with this current response.- The invoice was mailed on 8/22.- Of course we removed the cracked sediment housing cartridge from the old filtration system - it was the piece of equipment causing the large leak.- The old pipe that was used for the original filtration system, as mentioned in our first response, was cut to remove the old filter. This pipe, that is cemented into the floor, leads to the dry well and we have our effluent line in this pipe, just as the effluent line from the first filter was discharged the same way. The top of that same pipe went outside and this is the pipe that is currently in question because it is sticking out too far into the backyard. Mrs. [redacted] is correct that we turned the pipe upside down, but this was done to keep water out of the cellar. It is hard to know what she is talking about with extensions without the pictures in hand.- We INTENTIONALLY wrote in magic marker on the filters so that whoever is maintaining the filters will know exactly how to set them. The writing on the tanks is specifically there to insure that only one tank at a time will backwash. This is very important for the integrity of the filtration system to work properly. Permanently marking the tanks will insure that the timing units are always set properly.-If Mrs. [redacted] is getting "puddling" at the bottom of her tank, it is due to condensation. The well water comes in at 50 degrees and once it hits the filter, it sweats. With the recent humidity, this has been a significant problem for all homeowners who do not use a dehumidifier in the basement. We are positive that "puddling" has always been an issue at this location during the summer months and this can result in some mold growth.- Most of our work is done on the Rt. 2 and 495 belts. We rarely are in either [redacted] or [redacted] We recognize that Mrs. [redacted] does not live far from us, but we are not just sitting around waiting for work. We are extremely busy and this issue is not an emergency.-We certainly did not intend to disparage Mrs. [redacted] with our comment about the condition of her basement. Our point is that it is not a pristine, finished cellar - there is clutter, buckets and other items all around.- There has never been any comment from Mrs. [redacted] about "shoddy workmanship" since we installed her water filter two years ago. To now begin complaining about puddling, cut pipes, etc. is very odd. Mrs. [redacted] tends to her cats in the basement and we are sure that she is down there often. In two years, she must have made at least 200 trips to the basement and to now say there are problems is suspect. We believe that she is just very angry with us for not immediately responding to her call.In summary, the back and forth in these complaints is no longer productive - it is time to resolve the issue. First, we would like to apologize to Mrs. [redacted] for not getting to her sooner about the pipe in the backyard, but we have been extremely busy in other areas of the state and her situation is not an emergency. We are going on vacation from [redacted] - [redacted] When we come back, we will call her and schedule an appointment to correct the position of the pipe back to where it was before the last service call and to caulk/putty it so that it will not leak. We will also cap the outside end of the pipe. This is what we will do for Mrs. [redacted] to correct her situation.Final Consumer Response