Air Comfort Services LLC

I was beyond relieved to finally experience the level of work ethic that I expect from true professionals. In the end, they are in the business of people. From first impression, when calling, the most pleasant and thoughtful person assured me and re-assured me that she cares and will do her utmost to take care of me. When she called back, she not only came through, she did so with energy and care. Then, the technician who arrived did so quickly after that call and found the issue in no time. I did my homework first and made my own diagnosis, which sounded correct on explanation. Turns out, the problem was hidden and cumulative, and it could have been REALLY bad if I didn't make that call. I was not offered any up-sell of services or equipment that I did not need. Even more, based on the level of work ethic I was seeing, I thought that this technician must be a part owner or have some stake in the company. Turns out, he had about 35 years of experience and is so loyal because they truly care about their employees, and about other people. These days, one rarely hears an employee speak so highly of their employer ... especially when their skill level and options are so wide. By the time he left, I felt like I made a friend. One thing they don't do is charge you for labor that is not spent. Some companies charge by a book prescribed labor time, no matter how long it takes. As a professional, I may charge a bit more for time because of greater skill and efficiency, but never would I charge for time that I did not use. I really appreciated that this company could have found ways to try to up-sell or overcharge, but instead, actively sought to save me money and time. That to me says that they have more than enough business to not have to.

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On 4/13/12 Perry Van Fleet and his company Air Comfort Services came to my elderly aunt?s home (who I care for) and looked at the A/C. At that time he concluded that the compressor was of no use and needed to be replaced. Mr. Van Fleet provided her with a quote of $3,197 that included replacing the compressor and air handler with a sufficient unit that met all county codes. Being a 63 year old single woman and having no knowledge of the HVAC industry, she whole heartedly trusted Mr. Van Fleet and his employees to complete the job and give her what she needed to keep her home cool. The job was completed with the new unit being installed on 4/17/12. After the installation my aunt made several phone calls, stopped by business?s office, and had service requests filled because the home was cooling below 85 degrees and the unit was running constantly. Mr. Van Fleet explained to us that the reason our home would not cool was because all the duct work in the home needed to be replaced, and he then provided us with a quote to complete this at almost $2,000. He then informed us that this is also the reason he had never called for a final permit inspection ? the system would not pass the inspection until we replaced all of the duct work and we needed to get that done before the permit expired in October. After three months of receiving the same explanation from Mr. Van Fleet and not getting anywhere we contacted two other A/C companies to come out and look at everything. We were given updated load calculations that were suspiciously different than those given to us by Air Comfort Services. These companies performed complete inspections of the system and our duct work and informed us that nothing was wrong with our duct work - it simply needed to be sealed to meet code requirements. The problem was that Air Comfort Services had removed our previous 3 ton system and installed a 2 ton system ? a system that, even by their lower load calculations, was too small to cool the home. I contacted Mr. Van Fleet with this information and after several days he finally responded with an offer of coming out and installing a 2.5 ton compressor (that according to load calculations was still too small) for and additional $300. However, he would only do so after we replaced all the duct work that we had already been told did not need to be replaced immediately. He then said if we would rather have someone else replace the duct work for us he would give us a drawing and supply list, but he still would not install the bigger unit that was needed to cool the house until the duct work was replaced. He gave us 3 days to either take him up on this offer or "forfeit" our right to have him deal with this issue. At this point it had been four months since my aunt?s home had been below 85 degrees, and the summer was only getting hotter. I was forced to get an attorney to see what our options were at this point. My attorney contacted Mr. Van Fleet via a letter to inform him that his offer was unacceptable, and unless he contacted us within two days with a competitive offer of replacing the system with a sufficient 3 ton unit that included sealing the duct work, we would be rejecting his system as non-conforming and would have a new company come out and install a sufficient one. At that time we would package Air Comfort Service's equipment up and when Mr. Van Fleet presented us with a full refund check he could claim his equipment. We never received a reply from Mr. Van Fleet and after having my attorney send two more letters with no replies we were forced to finance a new system at a cost of $4,038 with a different company. I am now trying to come up with the monthly fees involved with the financing of the new A/C system and the costs of the filing fees to start a claim in small claims court against Mr. Van Fleet for the insufficient system he knowingly installed and refused to correct. IN RESPONSE TO AIR COMFORT SERVICE'S RESPONSE: I find it funny that there is no response to the fact that you put a system in that was too small by your own load calculations - one that was an entire ton smaller than what was previously there. You keep claiming the duct work was a problem. However, two other companies and the manatee county building department disagree with you completely. The duct work has not been replaced - the only thing that has been changed is that we had a system put in that matched the system you took out. One that the accurate load calculations said we needed. Now, the house is cooling great and passed the final inspection with flying colors! You never once told me or my aunt that "my solution would work or they would not have to pay for the ductwork". And as I stated above, your only offer to fix this problem was to replace all the duct work (that didnt need to be replaced) and you would then come out and give us a slightly bigger unit that was still undersized for the house. Regardless, you are still just covering up the fact that you lied and cheated my family out of almost $3,200 by placing a unit that was under powered in the home. Now is probably a good time to also mention that you also lied and told us that FPL no longer did rebates on new units, and the undersized 2 ton Goodman unit you gave us is the lowest possible piece of garbage you can buy. Yeah, stand up business guy.

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