Sullivan Super Service

Review: My partner and I contracted Sullivan to perform several plumbing upgrades to our home in July 2014, including a complete renovation of the 3rd floor bathroom. As part of this $25,000+ upgrade, a quote for $3,000 was given to replace the drywall in said bathroom. Once the plumbing and electrical work was complete in the bathroom, the drywall went up. After a few attempts by Sullivan personnel to finish the drywall, it became apparent that they could not finish it satisfactorily (there were many spots where drywall tape was bubbled under the drywall mud or just wasn't affixed at all). Sullivan offered, in August 2014, to hire an outside contractor to complete the work. This contractor came in September and October to work, but was unable to complete the job to anyone's satisfaction and then became unresponsive to both us and Sullivan. In late November 2014, Sullivan hired another outside contractor to finish up the drywall. This contractor worked on the bathroom in December, but the issues remain. After having our project manager with Sullivan look at the bathroom again in mid-January 2015, he agreed that the work was still not completed satisfactorily. As of 1/29/15, there has been no movement towards getting anything done, and the project manager has informed us the Sullivan is not willing to do any additional work). The project, originally estimated at 2 weeks, has now gone over 6 months, and the bathroom is still not fully usable because it cannot be painted until the drywall is complete.Desired Settlement: At this point, we would like to contract with someone directly to complete the drywall work and are requesting a refund of $1,500 (half of the original drywall estimate) to do so.

Business

Response:

This job was a job we hired a subcontractor to complete. The customer was unsatisfied with the sub-contractors work. Our technician went back out in January and was supposed to contact a new subcontractor to have it re-done for the customer. A few days later that particular technician left our company. We are happy to get another contractor out there to re-do the drywall for the customer. We will contact a new subcontractor and contact the customer.

Business

Response:

We have contacted Mr. [redacted] in regards to this issue. We offered to have a technician come out to his home and resolve this issue, he has refused for us to do so and has asked us to pay him $i500-$2000 instead which we are not willing to do at this time. Several months ago he was unhappy with a few things to which we sent another contractor there to take care of, to which he is now unhappy with that as well.We are more than happy to send someone at his convenience to see what needs fixed and how we can proceed, we are in no way or have we refused to address his concerns, however sending a customer a large sum of money without looking at the issue and assessing the situation is not something we tend to do, understandably. Sincerely,[redacted]Sullivan Super Service, Inc.

Consumer

Response:

I have reviewed the response made by the business in reference to complaint ID [redacted], and have determined that this does not resolve my complaint. For your reference, details of the offer I reviewed appear below.The work has been completed by an outside vendor, so there is nothing to "look at". As was made clear from the beginning of this complaint, sending yet another contractor out to "look at" the problem was not sufficient. In fact, Sullivan sent two different contractors out and, after the final visit from the second contractor, Sullivan's own technician agreed that the work was not done satisfactorily. This project took over 8 months to complete (it was originally estimated at 2 weeks), and it is only complete now because we hired our own contractor to complete it.When I spoke to [redacted] at Sullivan about a month ago, she did, in fact, offer to have a different technician out to look at the issue. I declined and said we would prefer to handle it on our own. She then asked for an estimate of the work to be done, so it could be considered. To now have [redacted] respond that they aren't going to do anything because we rejected to have *another* technician come out is just ridiculous.The fact that this complaint has been open since January (and still isn't closed) speaks volumes about Sullivan's dealings with us on this whole project. Regards, [redacted]

Review: The Co.did a routine check,first one,on Jan.10,2016.The employee said he was shutting off the furnace because of a dangerous cracked heat exchanger.It was freezing cold and evening,so our pipes would freeze.Our furnace had been recently checked and was perfect.He left the furnace on and sent for a salesman.He came and sold us a coleman furnace and air conditioner.He said they were the best,quiet and depenable and his installers were experts.Also,if we had any problems,they had a person to answer calls 24/7.

The next day 4 young guys came to install.They had the wrong thermostat.They worked all day and left.We told them to leave our furnace as we wanted to have it checked and they said no.We told them again to leave our property,but they took it against our wishes.

After they left,our house was freezing cold.We waited for the warm-up.Ice formed on the inside of every window.At 2 am ,I called the emergency number and got a recording.I called again in the morning and was upset.They sent someone to fix problms.The furnace was very noisy and gave uneven heat through the house.The expert was sent out another time to fix more problems.The furnace is still noisy and does not hold an even temperature.We believe This was the common scam and that we did not have a problem at all.That is why they kept our property when they had no right to do that.We were guaranteed satisfaction,but that isn't happening.We had to make several calls just to tell them about this problem.The property they took from us worked better than these pieces.Desired Settlement: I want the furnace and air conditioner removed and a full refund issued,plus compensation for the furnace and air conditioner (in perfect condition) that they removed against our orders.

Business

Response:

4/12/2016Response to complaint ID [redacted]Revdex.comOur technician, Don H[redacted] visited our customers home on Monday January 11 to perform a safety inspection of the furnace. During the inspection Don determined that the heat exchanger was cracked and needed to be replaced. Don has had extensive training in the methods of detecting failure of a heat exchanger and applied those methods correctly while diagnosing this particular furnace. It was a 23 year old single stage [redacted] furnace. He also contacted Bob A[redacted], our senior technician to discuss what he was seeing before making this determination. He then contacted [redacted] the Technical Service Manager from [redacted] to confirm that he was making the correct decision. We set up an appointment for our Comfort Advisor, Glenn R[redacted] to visit the home and discuss replacement options. Glenn visited the home on the evening of Monday January 11. The customer made the decision to replace the furnace, air conditioner, and humidifier. We arrived on Tuesday January 12 and replaced the equipment as requested.I asked our install crew to keep the furnace intact and return to our shop so it couid be visually inspected by [redacted], the Technical Service Manager from [redacted] arrived at our facility on Friday January 15 at 8:00AM and inspected the heat exchanger and agreed that it was unsafe to operate. At this time we conducted a training with all of our available technicians to review the proper methods of detecting Heat Exchanger failure.We returned to the customer’s home on January 13 to correct a problem w/ a malfunctioning thermostat. The customer expressed concerns about the performance of the system. Glenn, in an extended conversation identified all of the customers concerns and scheduled a return visit. Caleb, our senior install technician returned to the home on January 19, and made adjustments and corrections to make sure the system was operating correctly. He was there for 4.5 hours. Glenn, our comfort advisor returned on January 20 and completed our follow-up checklist and identified several minor modifications. On this visit the customer stated that they were satisfied w/ the project. Caleb returned on February 4 to make some minor modifications.We take our customers safety very seriously at Sullivan Super Service. We take aggressive action to make certain that we are keeping our customers safe and also that we are making the correct decisions when conducting an inspection of their equipment.1. All of our technicians are required to be NATE certified which insures that they are qualified to perform these inspections. 2. Our technicians participate in a weekly ongoing education program to keep them abreast of new tools,techniques and products that can benefit our customers.3. We conduct specific heat exchanger detection training several times throughout the year to insure that all thetechnicians are aware of and practice safe and correct methods for inspections.4. All technicians use a manual that documents hundreds of common furnace brands, common failures that occur and methods to properly diagnose each of these furnaces. (The Documentation Book of Furnace HeatExchanger Failure). To produce a quality installation of equipment we follow the following process. 1. All our installation technicians are required to be NATE certified. This process ensures that our techs are well qualified. 2. The technicians complete a 3 page checklist as part of the installation process that is designed for the particular type of installation that they are engaged in. This increases the quality and completes of the installation.3. The Installation Department meets weekly to review recent installs and discusses challenges, check on tools and equipment, and report on recent installs.4. The Comfort Advisor returns to the customer home some time after the work is performed and completes a 22 point quality checklist to ensure that the system was installed properly and is functioning as expected.We are sorry that the customer is unhappy w/ the HVAC system that we installed, We have installed many similar systems w/ great results, We are willing and eager to return again to this customer and satisfy any remaining concerns they have.Sincerely,John [redacted]Owner Sullivan Super Service

Consumer

Response:

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

On Jan. 11,when the technician visited for the safety inspection,we were told he had to shut down the furnace because it was so dangerous.But after we agreed to see his salesman,he left this dangerous furnace on.When the comfort advisor,Glenn R[redacted] came to sell us a new furnace and air conditioner,he left the furnace on also...the dangerous furnace.He knew the furnace was on because he was down in the basement looking at the furnace and the duct work.Now that is two experts in the field who left this killer furnace on.That is not legal,unless you know the furnace is not dangerous.We felt forced into buying because it was hinted that if not the furnace would be shut down and all our pipes would freeze.They took our furnace after we told then to leave it so we could get it checked.They refused.It was our property and legally,they stole it.Therefore,why would anyone believe our furnace was damaged?Under those conditions anyone could tamper with the furnace to insure a dangerous rating.We have no proof that our furnace was damaged while it was still in our house.It had been inspected and was given a great rating.And it was tested with a CO2 detector.Never did any of the Sullivan employees test that way.At present after the different experts came in 3 or 4 times to fix the mistakes made by the experts who came before them,the furnace is still noisy and does not heat the house evenly.Sending another of their experts,to an intelligent person,would appear annoying.I feel this expensive furnace is junk and fear the air conditioner is the same.Our furnace and air conditioner were in perfect condition.Since Sullivan took them and destroyed them,we cannot get them back.So,I still want these 2 [redacted] appliances out and my money returned and compensation for the 2 items illegally removed from our premises.

Regards,

Business

Response:

On January 11 our technician, Don did make a determination that the furnace was unsafe to operate. He documented this on his paperwork and turned the furnace off. The customer informed him that he was going to turn it right back on because it was cold outside. Don had him sign our form in which he acknowledged that we had informed him that the heat exchanger was cracked and the furnace was unsafe to operate. A copy of that paperwork is attached. Regarding our request to bring the furnace back to the shop for further inspection, we always remove the old equipment from the customers home and in this situation I personally asked the installers to return the furnace to the shop so we could have the crack verified by an outside expert and also to use for training for our enter service team. If the customer had insisted that we leave the furnace at their home so they could have it checked, we would certainly have complied. Regarding the complaint that we didn’t use a CO2 detector: This detector is a device that all our technicians carry and it detects and measures carbon monoxide. It does not tell you whether or not there is a crack in the heat exchanger. It is not the appropriate tool to determine if a heat exchanger is cracked. Regarding the customers complaint about the current operation of the new furnace: We are eager and willing to return and address any concerns regarding noise or proper operation. This is a brand of equipment that we have installed in hundreds of homes with great success and most of our customers are pleased with the quietness, efficiency, and reliable operation. That is why we choose to offer this system to our customers.Sincerely,John [redacted] Sullivan Super Service

Consumer

Response: