Sigma-Tremblay

Review: Dear Sir or Madam,

We're writing regarding the service we received from Sigma Tremblay of Wappinger's Falls, which was either grossly negligent or intentionally deceptive. We recently purchased a home with a 2007 Carrier Infinity 95 furnace/HVAC system. We noticed that the heating function appeared to be inadequate, and also noticed an alert that would occasionally arise on our thermostat.

Sigma Tremblay was identified on the Carrier website as an authorized dealer/service provider, and we reached out for service.

A technician came to our house, inspected the heater and informed us the heat exchanger was broken.

The next day, a sales rep came to our house and explained our options. We did some research and discovered a class action suit regarding heat exchangers on our Carrier model. After we informed the Sigma Tremblay sales rep of this, he then suggested he would work with Carrier to get service and parts under an extended warranty related to the lawsuit. We don't know if this option would have been presented if we had not raised it ourselves.

We were informed the FOUR parts we needed would be available approximately 7-10 days later. It was late December, so given the failing heating system in our home, we arranged to be elsewhere for the holidays, and to return immediately prior to the date service was scheduled.

On the eve of our scheduled repair date, as we returned to a freezing house with two small children, we received a call from the same technician who had been in our house as the first point of contact. He claimed he had just reviewed the order and found that there were "ten to fifteen parts" that we would need, and the four parts that had arrived from Carrier were not sufficient. We would need to spend an additional ~$4K on parts and labor in order to fix the furnace. He further warned us that we should replace additional parts, since they usually failed right after a heat exchanger repair. Nothing had happened between the visits referenced in points 1 and 2, and this moment. This new information could have been timely presented at the outset.

On its own, this belated price hike would have seemed like a gross mistake at best, and sharp dealing at worst, but the kicker was the alternative that was then presented: the newly required parts would take an additional 7-10 days to arrive (an impossible option in freezing January weather). Luckily for us, however, for not much more than the repair costs we could just buy a completely new furnace (~$5K) and have it within a matter of days!

At this point we contacted Carrier to notify them of this sequence of events-- which was either grossly negligent or an intentionally deceptive technique to force us to buy a new furnace or unnecessary parts. We also contacted [redacted] home repair. The [redacted] technician came to our house right away, and actually read the report history from the Carrier thermostat (which the Sigma Tremblay rep never did), and used this information in tandem with his physical inspection of the heater. For $1,200 (parts and labor) he performed limited repairs within two business days of his initial visit. Our heater has been in perfect working order with no errors logged on the thermostat since his visit over a week ago. It appears the heat exchanger is working just fine without error.

Everyone makes mistakes. It may be that the Sigma Tremblay Technician and Sales Rep miscommunicated during the initial phase of the project assessment and somehow both failed to review the smart thermostat error report (which prompted our call). It may be that the tech was just being very diligent prepping for his service call and stumbled across a legitimate error that threatened to push the cost and length of repairs so grossly outside of what was reasonable, and he legitimately wanted to warn us of additional costs and delays and offer an alternative. We hope you will take this report in advisement and investigate if you notice a pattern of reports like this.

Additionally, we were charged for visits noted in items 1 and 2. We have requested a refund from SigmaTremblay as we feel that those visits significantly delayed our receipt of actual repairs and did not include the minimal responsible review of error information.Desired Settlement: We'd like to have the charges for the initial visit reversed.

Consumer

Response:

At this time, I have not been contacted by Sigma-Tremblay regarding complaint ID [redacted].Sincerely,[redacted]