Response from Florida Water Treatment Inc
WOW, I am just floored by this review. Since you left out a majority of what happened while I was at your home I will fill in the gaps and tell the entire story so it does not look like we are a bunch of criminals that go around and over charge everyone. I (the owner of FWT) was at your home on December 13th, 2013 and diagnosed your system. To begin the water softener at your home was 17 years old and was in extremely bad shape. I was at your home for 1 hour and 53 minutes (all of our calls are time stamped) and completely broke your system down. Your bypass valve was not working and had a slight leak, nothing bad just a slight drip but this is the safety valve that shuts your system down and puts you back on city water in case of any problems. Your timer was not initiating regeneration or metering the water flow and would not allow me to change any settings - the timer needed to be replaced. All of the seals in the valve were so swollen that I had to use pliers to get them out of the valve, they should be able to pull out with no effort at all - they also needed to be replaced. When I spun the valve off of the treatment tank and inspected the inside of the tank there was only about 25% of the filter media left in tank. After further inspection the bottom basket and top basket were both cracked which was allowing the filter media to flow out of the valve during regeneration and there was a possibility that the filter media could enter the home. The filter media is comprised of thousands of little beads and if it does enter your home it will clog absolutely everything in the home and could shut down your water flow. Your system was in very bad shape and had sever damage to it - I showed you everything that I found and spent over 20 minutes explaining this to you. The part that was replaced was your safety bypass and it was replaced so that none of the filter media would enter you home and the system could be properly shut down, it had nothing to do with a leak or anything flooding. I explained this to you and suggested that you install this part because of the issues that may occur if the rest of that filter media was to blow into your home. This was the only way the system could be shut down and be 100% sure that you would not have any more issues. The part was brand new that was installed (I have the serial numbers off of the part that will back this up) as well as pictures of your equipment and everything that I am claiming was wrong (this is done for multiple reasons - this scenario being one). My cost on that part is $74.65 so I do not think that we are wrong for charging you $99 for the bypass. What is sad is that if I would not of replaced the part and the filter media was to blow into your home or the machine was to leak you still would of left us a negative review. The equipment you were quoted was an Angie' List Big Deal we were running that ended the following day (feel free to contact Angie's List to back this up) and the price was $1338 installed. This was not a sales gimmick or me trying to pressure you in any way, I was trying to be honest and give you the opportunity to purchase the deal and save money. The system I quoted you was 50% larger than the current system you have and was not just a water softener, it was a conditioner which means it would not only give you zero grain soft water but it would remove all of the chemicals out of the water giving you chemical free soft water. For you to say that the other 2 companies were 25% less is just not right without giving more details, you are just trying to make us look bad. At Florida Water Treatment we build all of our own equipment and nothing is pre-made, many companies try and make this claim but they know we are the only true manufacturer in this area. I could of quoted you a low end system that was entry level and just a softener that was the same size as your current system for $900, but it would be to small for your home and not have a very long life at all. We are professionals and I gave you a proposal on the system that would be the best fit for you and your home due to the size of the piping in the home, the size of the home, and your water quality. The water in your area has very high amounts of chlorine and that is very damaging to the systems filter media which is why I quoted you on a system that would remove this chlorine and add a protective layer on the machine. We have a very large wholesale division and build equipment for the majority of independent water treatment companies and local plumbers so we know what they are selling and at what pricing. We do not sell any of the equipment we put our name on to any of our wholesalers so the equipment you were quoted by these other two companies was in no way similar or a fair comparison. If you are going to bash a company because of our pricing at least compare apples to apples and make it a fair comparison. A four door Mercedes may be $20K more expensive than a four door Kia, but does that make Mercedes a horrible company that is ripping customers off? No, it means they are offering a higher end vehicle that is built with higher end components and there price is justified. We are no different, at FWT we build all of our own equipment and every piece of equipment is built to order using only the best components available. I guarantee that when comparing apples to apples you will not find a company that can beat our price. I gave you every opportunity to put the system back together as is, but you agreed that the bypass was needed. I did absolutely nothing wrong while at your home and I feel I went above and beyond to make sure you completely understood everything I was telling you which is why I spent close to 2 hours at your home. What is sad is that there is no way another company could take your machine apart and tell you everything was fine and that there was no chance of the filter media blowing into your home, it is impossible if they knew what they were doing (as I stated I have pictures of your equipment when it was taken apart). I am sure that the other companies will take every opportunity to take cheap shots at us and throw FWT under the bus to try and gain your business. I could not of done to much wrong because you obviously were convinced that you needed a new system which is why you had two other companies out. I also wrote on the work order that I would credit the $99 for the bypass and the $39 service call if you purchased new equipment through us. I just do not like when customers take cheap shots at my company when we did not do anything wrong, our price was higher than the other companies you had out - does that make us a bad company and a bunch of scammers looking to rip people off? You don't even know if they were proposing to install similar equipment, you just assumed they were and ripped into us and took the word from a competitor that we installed used equipment. If you have a problem with a company try giving them a call and give them an opportunity to defend themselves or try and solve your problem if they refuse or blow you off then by all means do what you have to do. You did not do either, you assumed you were being ripped off and came on Angie's List and left us a negative review. We run over 450 service calls a month and install close to 200 systems a month and I will never claim we are perfect, but if we do make a mistake and are given the opportunity to fix it we will 100% of the time. You were sold a brand new part that I made $25 on and were given a spot on correct diagnosis that I will stand behind 150%. I did nothing wrong while at your home and feel that you unfairly judged me and my company and the review you left was full of false information that was slanted to try and make us look bad - which you have done. Our only saving grace is that we can give our side of the story and only hope that future customers can see that we did the right thing. I am the first one to admit when we make a mistake and will do everything in my power to make it right, but when me or any of my employees are falsely accused of something I will also make sure that I do everything in my power to defend myself and my company. Unfortunately it is the same situation every time when we receive a negative review (which is rare) it is on a $39 Big Deal service call special through Angie's List for a customer that has foreign equipment (not installed by FWT) and we completely break down the equipment and offer to repair or replace the equipment depending on the situation, but the customer feels we are to expensive or we tell the customer the truth about the equipment and they do not like what we say or it is not what they wanted to hear so they come on Angie's List and leave a negative review. I will not change the way we do business because we are doing the right thing - I do not employ any sales personnel and not one of my technicians are commissioned in any way. When we come to the conclusion that a piece of equipment needs to replaced instead of replacing parts it is ALWAYS in the best interest of the customer not for Florida Water Treatment. It is way more profitable to replace parts than it is to install new equipment and offer a warranty at the prices we sell equipment for and the quality of our systems. I feel it more of a scam to replace parts on a system that we know does not have much life left than it is to replace the system. We are damned if we do and damned if we don't - if we do replace parts and a month later the system breaks down again the customer is upset that we charged them for parts that didn't fix the problem, but if we do the right thing and tell the customer that it is not in their best interest to replace the parts because it is a temporary solution and will not fix the problem and we suggest replacing the system the customers feels that we are out to just try and sell them something and are a scam. Thank you for your review