Toptec Heating, Cooling, Plumbing & Electrical, Inc.

It all started out okay. My wife was home when the tech came out and he figured out exactly what was wrong. The drain spud, a little plastic piece that connects the humidifier to the drain for the furnace had melted off for some reason, so water from the humidifier was going straight to the floor instead of into the little rubber pipe that leads to the drain. He said that he will have to get the part ordered, but that it should only be $10-$20 for the part. He also said that since we had already paid for a trip charge, we would not have to pay that and that the install would be based on time spent here. He was here for maybe 15-20 minutes and left. He said someone will contact us once the part was in, which would be within a week. Then came all the problems. A week went by with no phone call. I call them and they say that they ordered the part, but it's not here yet. They will call me once it's in. Another week goes by with no phone call. I call them back again and then they say that they didn't order a part because they don't know what part the tech wanted. They said nobody at the office knew what a drain spud was. The contact I spoke with said that she had talked to all of her suppliers and insisted that they don't know what a drain spud was. This makes no sense to me. If you Google "drain spud", it immediately shows you exactly what it is and takes you to many vendors that sell it. It looks like none of their suppliers nor anyone else at the office has access to Google. After another promise that I will get called back once this is clarified, another week goes by and no phone call. I call back again. They said they finally figured out what they needed to order, but that it was a special order and that it would cost $80 plus installation. To my further amazement at their incompetence, they said that if I wanted to part sooner, I would have to pay $40 upfront by credit card over the phone and the rest upon installation because I wanted to overnight it. This was after 3 or 4 weeks of back-and-forth because of their incompetence and poor customer service. I said no, I will pay for it all once it's finished and asked them to order the part. They agreed to do so. After I hung up with them, I told my wife about the $80 part and she told me that the tech said it would be no more than $10 or $20. I immediately looked at vendors online and the part was anywhere from $2 to $10. At this point, I already had lost faith in their ability to order the right part and didn't want to get stuck with paying them for bringing in the wrong part and charging me again for installation. I ultimately decided to order the part myself and it took me about 5 minutes to install it myself, despite my complete lack of knowledge about heating systems. It cost me $10 including shipping. Overall, their complete inability to understand what the tech was trying to tell them, their inability to figure out what part needed to be ordered, their ridiculous markup and high installation cost estimate for something that takes 5 minutes by a layman, and, last but not least, their complete disregard for following up with their customers and making things right, will ensure that I never recommend them to anyone and that I never use them again.

I purchased the big deal coupon for this service and everything went fine. The deal was for my choice of furnace cleaning and check, or water heater. They were timely and polite. They did a nice job and were clean. They did a good clean up and were professional. I can say all good things about them.

First the good. I had bought a promo some time ago that I had not used. I asked if they would help even though it has expired. They did agree to a bit of a discount on the service (about the same as others were offering as a seasonal service through the Angie's list promos). The service technician seemed to do a good job. But ... I felt as though there was too much push to replace things and to up-sell additional services. In fact, there were at least three things they suggested I buy. All quite expensive. So by the end, I started to question what was really true and nearing the end of its life and what was just an attempt to add work. Too bad because I would have liked to find a company I could trust for future work.

Reviews for TopTec were strongly positive, so I asked if someone could be out that afternoon. The person I spoke with was very professional, and seemed genuinely concerned about the situation. After checking with tech crew, would get back to me soon with a time. As I recall it was about 15 minutes later that I got a call back, saying they would have someone there within a couple of hours. I asked if I could use the "Angie's list coupon" and was told it did not apply to this situation. (Writing this several months after the fact, I don't recall what the coupon offered, but something like 20% off...maybe $100 off...I was disappointed, but didn't feel "jipped.") I met the tech on site, and even though we discussed the scope of the project ahead of time, I was surprised that he didn't have the main part he needed -- the riser! He gave a fairly narrow price range to complete the work the next day, and said it depended on how it would take to remove the old riser, meter, etc. I said I would try to remove the riser and meter myself. Well, he was out the next day and took care of the job, and the work looked just fine. I got the bill, and while I did the "demo work" myself the final bill came on the higher end of his estimate. | All-in-all, though, I was very satisfied with their prompt and courteous service, and would consider using them again if the need arose.

this service was pretty god. He provided a diagnosis of the issues. Then he left. It was unclear how long it would be before he returned. It was a few hours. Eventually he returned with the parts and completed the job.

They were prompt, courteous. They got it done

The work went well, however the estimate was higher than anticipated. However, once the work was done the actual cost was much lower than anctipiated. To be honest, the confusion with the estimate was a little off-putting. They did show up on time and complete the work as requested.

They have been very fair with me and give me the best price and options for keeping my house in working order. Scheduling is great, they ususally have been able to come out within the day.

It was fantastic. He was able to tell me all without trying to get my wallet. He told me I might gonna need a new furnace so I should keep an eye on it over the winter. He gave positive advise on how I could get my furnace to last long. He did a great job. I needed plumbing a week ago so I called them but they were swamped and unable to come so they recommended somebody else in the area that could do the work. It was nice.

Very Nice Person and honest

At seven PM on the coldest night of the winter to date our furnace stopped working. I determined that it was not lighting. I thought it was likely the igniter but where on a Saturday night am I going to find an igniter for an off brand furnace. With the house temp falling through sixty degrees I needed someone out to fix it. I looked for a local A rated HVAC service company with twenty four hour emergency service and found TopTec. I called their number and talked to a friendly operator. She told me the technician on-call's name and I should expect a call in fifteen minutes. He called me back in about ten minutes and explained the emergency service pricing. When I agreed he said he would be at my place in about 30 minutes. Twenty-five minutes later he rang the bell. He got to work immediately. It was in fact a bad igniter but the furnace being an off brand he did not have a direct replacement on the truck. He was able to use a similar igniter from another manufacturer to fit and work. After that he gave the furnace a quick once over and found the flame sensor needed cleaning, which he did. In less than forty-five minutes the house was warming and he had finished the paperwork.

Paul the plumber came out and identified what was leaking into my neighbors garage and installed a new unit shut off valve. Good work, very professional, and courteous in a stressful situation. The dispatcher could use some work as I had to call them back to find out if someone was able to come out the same day.

I purchased an Angie's List Big Deal for this service. The description of the maintenance plan was very rough and I found out the maintenance plan does not include labor. It seems like there is some disconnection between Angie's List and the vendor because I am always being contacted about wanting to renew the Big Deal. I really do not know what is included in the maintenance plan I purchased. The guy came out to fix my leaky furnace on a weekend and there was an additional charge above the Big Deal price. They had to order a new part and everything is working fine now. Angie's List should provide a better description of what is included in the Big Deal. It took three weeks to get the job done and my basement was flooded as a result. The first technician who came out did not fix anything. The second technician who came out found the problem, but he ordered the wrong part. The third technician was really good and fixed all the issues and tied up all the loose ends so the quality of service depends on which technician I get.

It was recommended to replace humidifier filter so I took care of that as well. Technician did not realize I had pre-paid via PayPal but he took my word and only charged for the humidifier filer replacement.

I purchased the "One Year Complete HVAC Maintenance Plan for only $198? on November 29, 2013. I had gone with another local company for over 7 years but thought I would try Top Tech out since they had a better deal going. Big mistake!!! I added dates available in the Angie?s List form for preferred appointment windows. I never received a phone call. Apparently that step was not necessary since there was an expectation that I call them for an appointment anyway. I called after the available dates passed passed and I received no call. I got voice mail and left a message and received no call back. About 3-4 days later, I called again. This time I spoke with someone explaining my Angie?s List purchase. I then scheduled an appointment. The tech guy shows up the morning of December 11th. I was up stairs working so my wife let him in. He started making a call on the blower motor being bad as he was walking to the furnace just from hearing it without even looking at it. This was obviously not a good sign. Seemed like dollar signs were in his and his company?s eyes as soon as he walked in the door. My wife proceeded to explain that it had just been replaced with a brand new one about 4 years ago. He then stood by it saying it was about to fail based on the way it ?sounded?. It used to sound like a plane taking off before it was fixed so it was rather quiet and no noisier than the day they put it in brand new 4 years ago. After not getting my wife to dive in and take the bait on the blower motor he proceeded to do the furnace tuneup and check. He then suddenly tells my wife there is a crack in the heat exchanger and the furnace needed to be shut down due to it being an immediate safety hazard. This is indeed a serious problem when it truly happens, however, keep in mind that this is also the #1 scam HVAC companies pull to get a pressure middle of the winter sell of a new furnace from customers that they attempt to scare with this strong arm tactic. Just Google it and you will see dozens of articles on it. In addition, it is a complete myth that a true crack on a heat exchange = a safety hazard due to a carbon monoxide leak. There are many other factors like the type of furnace, whether it was built after the late 80's, whether we are talking primary or secondary heat exchangers. The answer to all of these questions that put my furnace at risk were false. My furnace is older but is from 1996. My furnace is an 80% AFUE rated furnace and only uses primary heat exchangers when the major troublesome CO leaks are known to come from secondary heat exchangers See this site for some points on the mtyhs: http://carbonmonoxidemyths.com/myth-1.php. Given that there is a liability due the possibility of there being a real danger in a true situation where the heat exchange crack is big enough to flood the home with dangerous levels of carbon monoxide, this scenario (whether true or fake) is essentially a blank check for an unethical HVAC company to take advantage of unsuspecting customers. So after the drama was kicked off by the technician, my wife came upstairs and got me and explained what happened. I came downstairs and told the tech he needed to leave my house and was not touching our furnace any further. He said he had to shut it down. I said I would call the cops if he did not leave my property and he snickered at me with with a giggle. I asked if he though that was a funny comment. Talk about being unprofessional! There are surely legitimate situations where this bad news must be honestly given to a customer, however, it is all in how you approach these situations and deliver the message. This guy got a 0 on a scale of 1 - 10 in customer service communication tact. Had he first explained the situation calmly, explained the potential dangers calmly, talked to wife and explained our options calmly, we would have reacted differently. Instead, we have this stranger coming in our house and acting shady right off the bat as he appears to be fishing for costly repairs that did not exist with the blower motor comment. Now, he is basically going into: "This is extremely dangerous, I am shutting down and tagging your furnace, we can RENT you some space heaters so your pipes don't bust!" Then he says he can do a $1,000 heat exchange replacement for our 17 year old furnace, or have his boss come out and give me a quote on buying a roughly $2,500-$3,000 new furnace within 24 hours of course since time is of the essence! Wow, talk about choices, huh? You have to love a business that can use the scare tactic of you and your family dying as a pressure tactic to sell new furnaces in the middle of the winter to fearful and uninformed consumers. Very sad. The tech later tried to show me a crack on a small barely visible 2" x 3 ? part of a heat exchange but i could not see anything. I later did research and found that it is nearly impossible to tell if there is a crack in the heat exchangers unless you take the entire furnace apart or use a camera on the tip of a flexible hose. He did neither of these things to prove there was a crack before deciding that it was time to break out the tags and shut us down. In addition, I have 4 First Alert carbon monoxide testers installed in my house. One of them 4 feet from the furnace in my laundry room. All of the these have memory showing the peak CO levels over the last 6 months. The peak reading is 0 on all of them. Just in case, I proceeded to test all of them when he left and they are all working fine with battery backups fully charged. That day, I called another company for a second opinion since I did not want to take any chances. He had a hand-held meter and found a reading of 0 and could not find the heat exchange crack after a visual inspection. Long story short, be VERY, VERY, VERY, cautious about using this company especially if you have an older furnace and live in an upper middle class neighborhood that makes them see you as an easy target. It seems like those two factors along with my wife answering the door, made the tech see dollar signs when he came in my house. I would never use them again. I can only imagine how many people they have had fall for this scam. Especially older customers on a fixed income. I have the A/C tuneup left but I will not be using it. I am looking to get a refund on the remaining service that I will not use. UPDATE - January 6, 2014: Just to pour salt in the wounds of a really bad experience with this company, I received a call from Maria from TopTech a few days ago asking for me to call them about my "outstanding" balance of $179 for the work they did on December 11th. First of all, I purchased their annual warranty as part of the big deal along with gutter cleaning and have my debit card record to prove it! Date: 12/02/2013 DBT/WDR*33######### ANGIES LIST 888-888-5478 US ($297.00) TopTec = $198 Gutter Cleaners = $99 In addition, here is the Angie's List confirmation email after the payment went through: Angie's List Email Confirmation: Item Price Qty Total One Year Complete HVAC Maintenance Plan for only $198! 198.00 1 198.00 Order Number: 998904 Ordered On: November 29, 2013 Item ID: 72782 Ironically, TopTec really OWES me a refund for the A/C tuneup I will not use now. I do not want to have anything else to do with this company and now the nerve to call me asking about an outstanding balance that does not exist. I had a tuneup covered under the $198 warrant (paid in full) and nothing else. After all the drama over my phantom heat exchange crack that did not exist, I would rather pay 5 x the amount for a tuneup than use them again. It is January 6, 2014 and there is no sign of any CO levels rising. This is not hard to believe since there was never a true crack to begin with. In addition, I see no rebuttal from this company which is a little suspicious if you are innocent of trying to scam a customer.

This initial visit went well. The man was clean, professional, and polite. He changed the igniter and I was perfectly happy, ready to give them a solid "A". However, two days later the new igniter went out again. I called the company that night (Saturday night), they came out within 2 hours as promised. The second technician was also professional, polite, and clean. However, when he was already into the repair, he said I would have to pay $45 for his time. He said the warranty would cover the call and parts, but not his time. I paid because it was Saturday night, and I was not going to wait 2 days without heat when temperatures are down to the singles. I told the technician that I don't think it's right and I will call the company on Monday. I don't know the name of the person I talked with that Monday, but he said he would check into it and call back within an hour or 2. After 2 days he did not call back. When I called he said the most silly excuse that they would not reimburse the payment because "I agreed to pay". I asked for the manager to call me and after the call I also filed a complaint with Angies List. That evening the office supervisor let a message on my phone that they would reimburse the payment. I don't actually know if this was in response to a call from Angies' or because the manager could see that they should stand behind the repair. Either way, they made it right, therefore I would use them again. I hope that the company will educate the employees to know better what they are doing and not decide if they do not have the appropriate training. I would have ranked them with an "A" if I did not have to go through the fuss to get reimbursed. -

Quoted me a rate, then charged me roughly twice that. They said the rate I was quoted was a mistake. The rate charged is more than I would have paid anyone to do this. The replacement of the fan went okay, the tech had limited English and a little bit of an odor, but seemed very competent. Left a small mess in the bathroom. They did nothing useful on the furnace, just cleaned the flame sensor even though I told them I'd already done that. They offered to apply the "cleaning flame sensor" charge to the cost of a new flame sensor, but I'm not paying for another service call just to attach a wildly overpriced flame sensor which I can get on Amazon for less than their "reduced" price. Two people promised to look into the overcharge. Never heard back from either of them. Would not use again.

Service was excellent. I dealt directly with Joe the President on the specifications. He gave me a number of options at different efficiencies and price points. The work was preformed the 3 first days of Thanksgiving week. All work was performed in a timely and professional manner. The installers took care to highlight the efficiency of the new system and walked me through operation and maintenance. My family is very pleased with the result.

It turned out fine. They had the service done right away. It was a good transaction and there were no problems.

We are totally satisfied with Toptec, the only criticism being that their plumber was about 30 minutes late. But on the whole they were professional, extremely helpful, and I wouldn't hesitate to use them again!

2hrs of wk- Ceiling fan replacement x 2, changed light bulbs, assessed outlets voltage to determine if additional appliance could be added to existing outlet. |Very professional and focused to get all work completed in the alloted time. Have other electrical projects and intend on using again.

This went about as well as one could want. We used Toptec several years ago for duct cleaning after a major renovation and were happy. Today, we awoke to no heat in one of the furnaces. Within three hours (I didn't ask for anything sooner because that was plenty fast), a very experienced field supervisor arrived. He immediately put booties on his feet and went to the basement to squeeze into the place where the furnace sits. Although I suspected it was the blower motor, as did he, he took time to make sure this was the problem. There was no replacing things one at a time until the furnace was working. He didn't have a replacement part on his truck, but told me accurately how long it would take to come back to finish the job, which he did. He took all the old stuff and new packaging with him and didn't leave a mess. I was able to use the Angie's List coupon, which was a nice extra.

After replacing the igniter, he did get the furnace working again, but found that there were other problems (which wasn't surprising given that the furnace is 23 years old). Adam seemed knowledgeable and patient in explaining what was wrong(cracked heat exchange, faulty blower). I should say that Top Tec was the first of 3 companies that was able to make a housecall the same day that I called. I would recommend them.

I purchased an Angie?s List Big Deal for this service and it went well. They were on time, very friendly and professional. They gave us a lot of advice of what we could do, but there was no pressure to purchase anything. They were really good and they still check-in to make sure that everything worked well so I would rate them very high. We ended up paying a little more because we upgraded the model of the humidifier we were using. I don't think we paid a lot more additional and we did have them do some extra work. They really were quite phenomenal. They are a little pricey, which is why I have not used them since. From a price perspective they were a little high, outside of this deal.

Top Tec replaced our furnace, air conditioning condenser and installed a new air filter system. Our house now has great air flow, cools and heats more quickly and efficiently, uses less energy and is overall a much quieter system.