The Plumbing Ministry

This Louis guy has gone silent since I contacted him about his Mexican workers drilling cement inches from my Mercedes Benz which has caused extensive damage to my car. I showed the workers the cement particles that landed on my car and the scratches and asked them why didn’t they just ask me to move my car they just hunched their shoulders like they couldn’t speak english anymore. I contacted the owner he said they would have contacted him if there was damage. I contacted Mercedes to get an estimate which came out to be over $8k. I tried to settle with Louis and told him to pay my deductible $2k and I’ll file an insurance claim. He said he’d pay for my detail $49?? So I’ll let my insurance go after him for the full $8k. I tried texting and calling again he still hasn’t responded. Very sloppy work.

I pondered about posting this review as it has been sitting in my drafts since October 2019: Me giving them 2 stars in more than generous after the horrific experience I had with the owner, the workers and the 2 LOVELY (sarcasm) women who work in the office. I can say the work did finally get done correctly but the customer service I received was absolutely disgusting. It all began when I pulled up to home and found out the workers had taken over not just my driveway but also my neighbors driveway and they had debris all over the place. I had to call the office and get that handled. But that's not the worst part. I received a text from the owner saying the work was complete and he needed full payment. I was at the sight less than 4 hours before he sent the message and we were no where near complete. I had someone else stop by and check to make sure everything else was cleaned up and squared away. The photos I added show how it looked when he demanded full payment. At that point one of the most disrespectful conversations I have ever had with a contractor ensued. I began be yelled at by the women who worked in the office and the owner. I let them know that they would not be receiving a payment from me until the work was completed. They then attempted multiple times to send me a "invoice" saying they needed a deposit for the work which should had been sent before the work began. I then informed the owner that he would need to meet at the sight the following morning so we can see what he calls complete vs what I call complete. He never showed and dodge each and everyone of my phone calls. I took off of my job in order to deal with this man. Once they said the work was complete I myself went by and doubled checked. I then proceeded to head to their office so I can put a face to the name of both the disrespectful office assistants once I arrived the room was filled with tension and disrespect. They then blamed me for why the merchant rejected the payment over night. Saying that they don't make transactions that large ($7500.00) and that's why they wanted a deposit. Which if they would've been up on their paperwork and paid attention to what was going on they would've sent over a invoice for a deposit. With that being said please run far,far,far,far,far,far away if you can from them. And if not make sure you get everything in writing and don't let them bully you around.

I contacted Plumbing Ministry on a Sunday because Roto Rooter said I needed a camera scope and he didn’t have the equipment. My regular plumber didn’t have a camera either and recommended Plumbing Ministry one of the reasons being the camera service was free. I left a voice message and also emailed because the message said I would get a faster response. I indeed got a faster response, but many of my questions in the email went overlooked and I could not for the life of me get a meeting time nailed down after three or four requests after we had to reschedule. The original time didn’t work because my tenant refused to meet them. Nailing down a time was important because my property manager needed to be able to meet them, according to his preference, even though I said he could access the panel outside the building and run the camera and no one would necessarily have to meet him. They ended up out there at 930-10 am or so, but even though I provided my cell and my property manager’s cell, we had not been informed when they would arrive. They emailed me when they arrived, which is really inefficient. They patiently waited for her to arrive. I later learned it wasn’t the camera scope work that happened then, but two workers sent to run a snake - which had already been done the day previously by Roto Rooter. My manager not only had to convince them the access was the access, but also told them it had been snaked the previous day. I only learned this after the fact. She had to leave, and was told the camera would be there an hour later. This was a waste of everyone’s time: I told the owner that he would be able to access the pipe from the outside of the building and the original time he proposed, my manager couldn’t make. So we rescheduled. But then, he didn’t show up with his crew whom she met, and he came by himself anyway. This makes no sense. He told me what the work order would be and how much it would cost. But he just said “there’s a blockage” - no kidding! I asked if I could see the video, if he knew what the blockage was. He said he couldn’t see from that side of the pipe because the camera was underwater. I told him I wasn’t ready to move forward on any work and he said my outstanding balance was $495, which threw me for a loop. There hadn’t been a quote or an estimate, and both his Yelp and my plumber had said the camera was free. When I asked him what the charge was for after sending him a screenshot of his business’ Yelp info, he said the charge was for his guys running the snake. There had been no detailed invoice, and my property manager explicitly told them the work was done the day before and they continued anyway without confirming with their boss that that work needed to be done. When he gave me the price quote, I felt like he was trying to take advantage of me. I wanted to believe in his business’ mission statement but the lack of professionalism or standard operating procedure is a huge turn off. To his credit he told me to forget about th charge, but I really don’t like the feeling that remained after that interaction. I don’t normally write reviews, but I can’t support this type of operating procedure.

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To replumb the house, Plumbing Ministry created numerous holes in the basement ceiling in a sloppy way. The holes were much larger and more jagged than necessary. Rather than doing clean incisions, they cut through plaster and lath with a sawzall. The vibrations caused all the adjacent plaster to crumble. My bathtub has a rubber stopper on a chain. Plumbing Ministry didn't bother to take two seconds to stop up the drain before cutting drywall above and on the adjacent wall. Debris got in the tub drain and clogged it. When Plumbing ministry cut open old drain pipes, they splattered brown goop on the walls and didn't bother to clean it. The contract called for patching and painting by others. Plumbing Ministry took that as carte blanche to be sloppy. The bathroom remodel had too many problems to count. Plumbing Ministry drilled a hole in my subfloor for the toilet drain about 3 feet off from where it should have been. They cut into my floor joists liberally and didn't try to minimize those cuts. They installed the tub vent incorrectly. When it failed the city inspection, I heard the plumber got defensive and argued with the inspector, although to be fair I wasn't there. Then it failed a second inspection. Finally it passed the third time. Where the vent penetrates the roof, Plumbing Ministry did not flash adequately, so when they filled up the vent for the inspection, water poured into the crawl space and started dripping through the drywall and brand new exhaust fan unit onto the floor. Awful. I got a brand new tub but Plumbing Ministry did not set the tub properly. It wobbled. I had to fix it myself with shims just to keep the job moving forward. That's just the rough plumbing. For the finish plumbing, they literally messed up everything: the vanity, toilet and shower! They scratched the brand new tile. They installed the shower controls so the water only gets warm, not hot. The toilet wobbles and is not caulked at the base. Also it leaked into the basement. They set up the plumbing in a brand new vanity and told me it was ready to use. In fact the drain was leaking into a wood drawer. I didn't notice this until the water seeped through overnight and started dripping onto the floor. The brand new drawer is warped. The one page instructions for the sink controls say not to use putty. It corrodes the metal and voids the warranty. Plumbing Ministry used putty anyway. Certain Plumbing Ministry staff lack adequate experience and technical skills. Most of all, Plumbing Ministry has inadequate pride of craftsmanship. They also don't have adequate tools. E.g. they borrowed my shovel and they borrowed my five gallon bucket to use as a step stool. From reading the other reviews, it looks Plumbing Ministry is fine for sewer lateral work, but think twice before you let them in your house.

They were by far the cheapest estimates. I had four companies come out here. This company was recommend by my realtor. All went well with the sewer later. They did the work in a very short time frame in order to meet close of escrow. His crew was very friendly and worked hard. I also had them come out to do some repairs on the house. They did have to go back a re-do a section of piping because I found it leaking. But they did come back and fix it without additional charge. There were frequent rescheduling of appointments, and lack of prompt responses to email or voicemail. I had the work performed august of 2013. Now (feb 2014) with the first storm the pump system completely failed and flooded my garage. Its taken almost a week for his crew to respond, and as of now the work is not complete before the next storm system comes in. Im in the process of fighting for him to follow through on the new sump pump system he agreed to install (larger horse power pump and 18 gallon basin). He promised that he would provide them, but what i got was two five gallon buckets put together with screws, instead of a store bought 18 gallon sump basin. Not to mention that I still haven't seen the 1/2 hp pump. I'm very disappointed at the turn of events with Louis. He came highly recommended by my realtor. Looks like I'll be contacting her next.

Louis (the owner) and his team were amazing. The job was much harder than originally thought and they came up with a creative solution to reroute all the pipes underneath the house so that we didn't have to dig trenches all over the lawn. Team worked long days to get everything done. They were very conscientious, orderly and answered all my questions. I would highly recommend them to anyone getting sewer lateral work done. Very impressed and happy with work.

On time and eager to work out a schedule that fit my move-in date.The Plumbing Ministry guys were there when they said tehy'd be, and worked hard all day to get my ewer repair done on time. They also handled the EBMUD inspection which meant that I could move into my house on schedule. THey were polite and considerate and I'd definitely call them again.

They were on time and on budget. It was a cheaper quote than a couple of other places and overall it was a good experience.

Plumbing Ministry was selected by the seller of our new house to perform a sewer lateral replacement to be in compliance before selling the house. The seller had several bids, and Plumbing Ministry was the lowest by far and thus selected by the seller. In addition to the lateral work, several drains that had been improperly tied to the sewer had to be abandoned or tied to a valid street drain on the other side of the house. The seller had agreed to pay to tie one of the drains to the left side and abandon the others which gave me some pause. I met with Louis from the Plumbing Ministry to discuss this and my concerns. He was somewhat dismissive of my concerns and claimed it would be fine to have the downspouts empty onto the sidewalk instead of a drain. After looking at the sidewalk, I reluctantly agreed. Since this work was being done, we also requested that Louis tie two sump pump spouts to the drains so that they would not dump next to the house and inspect and snake the street drain. So, this work is done, lateral passes inspection, sump pumps look fine, but Louis says that last minute they realized there was a french drain that was also tied to the sewer and this would need to be run out to the sidewalk for an additional $900. I was a bit annoyed that he hadn't caught this before, because this would have meant we didn't have to abandon the drains I was initially uncomfortable about and I was unhappy about the extra work. However, the real kicker is that rather than leaving the pipe in a state where it could at least drain to the sidewalk, he simply left it buried 1 ft underground, uncapped to drain into the soil around our house. Now, jump to 3/14/2012 when Louis had said he would be at the house at 8:45 am to start the work. This is the first day of heavy rain and at 8:30 am I notice the basement starting to flood with a clear stream of water coming from near where the buried drain was left. I figured Louis would be there soon so no worry. Well, Louis never came, never called, never emailed. I left several voice mails and emails telling him it was urgent, the basement was flooding and where was he? In the end, he never showed up and didn't call until 5pm and mumbled some excuse about some workers not showing up. In the mean time I had found another plumber to come take a look and agree to do the work the next morning. Additionally, the drain that Louis claimed he had snaked was clogged the entire day, so it was also not draining properly. I ended up having to stay home from work and jerry rig a way to pump the water out of the basement. Louis didn't seem to care that (a) he caused the problem in the first place and (b) never showed up or even called on the day he was supposed to come and fix that problem. I would not suggest you ever use Plumbing Ministry for your plumbing work.

Projects #1 and 2 were performed the first day. The plumber had to figure out the best way to bring the hot water heater strapping up to code which took some effort on his part due to the tight working space he had to deal with. He bolted 2x4 uprights into the wall on two sides of the heater--a very challenging job, and then used heavy duty straps to secure the tank. I was impressed with his effort and the outcome. He cleaned up carefully prior to departure. Project #3 was performed the second day. Two workers installed the backflow preventer. They worked very dilgently the entire time. I had consulted the plot map to help locate the irrigation lines prior to them commencing work. Unfortunately the plot plan was incorrect and the plumbers encountered several irrigation lines that had to be cut and then reconnected prior to finishing the job. They carefully removed a patch of grass and one bush and replaced them at the end of the job. Everything went very well. My only complaint is that they put the left over dirt in my compost container, filling it to the brim and making it very difficult to move. I wish they had carted it away.

I'm just astonished by how efficient, professional and on-top-of-it Louis and his crew are. He sent his bid for replacing the broken pipe by email within hours of coming to work on clearing the back up in the line. He came on Thursday to clear out the pipe, sent the bid to me by Thursday afternoon for the replacement, and he and his crew started work on Monday morning. Replacing a sewer line to the street is no small job: trucks came and went with deliveries, a crew of about four or five men worked for two full days; and yet everything seemed to go like clockwork. They left everything spotless when they finished. The bid was also entirely competitive. I found Louis incredibly personable, hard working, easy to communicate with, responsive, and professional. I have the highest respect for him as a small business owner.

He came out and explained what the job required. He was able to fix two toilets when he was only scheduled to fix one, this meant that I saved some money. He was very honest. He's the owner and he did the job himself. I was very pleased.

Showed up at the wrong time, played w/ his cell phone too much for an adult showing up at a home to give a work bid.. Had an apprentice that scowled most of the visit; might consider not bringing this person when you're doing a quote.. Louis said he would send an estimate, but didn't.. Overall seemed like a flake and non-professional plumber so we didn't pursue.

I recently found them. They provided a normal service for me, but they also do complicated work. I spent $125 for an hour. They were very professional and did their work very well. They cleaned up very well. I will use them again in the future.

They were really nice and professional. They are trustworthy. I think their price was good.

Louis Ray and the rest of the folks at the Plumbing Ministry are fantastic! Professional, calm, able to deal with snags that come up (their work on our seweral lateral was interrupted mid-job by our neighbors, and they handled the disruption with great ease), and trusthworthy. They replaced our entire sewer lateral for a very reasonable price, and worked well with the city inspector. I highly recommend them!

There is a service charge of $84, no matter how long they stay. The guy was real nice and did a few extra things for me since I was being charged the full price. He also showed me how to do some things. He was a very service oriented man and was trustworthy.