Brad Emberton's Heating & Cooling LLC

"Who You Should Never Call On For Your Home Heating and Cooling Repairs In Daviess County" A Prime Example Of How Integrity For One Local Business In Our Community Is Of No Importance How could a simple blower motor warranty replacement on a home heating unit take a month to diagnose then another week to replace, during the winter season? The short answer seems to be that a deliberate act of dishonesty occurred due to greed, by attempting to justify 5 visits and charge each time when 2 visits would have been sufficient by a qualified professional. They charge twice the amount that it should be by padding the bill and make threats and berate you when you dare to question them. A business having the proper diagnostic tools, knowledge, ethics, and providing honest service to customers is of particular importance. I implore those taking the time to read this just to be aware of some of these tactics when choosing a local reputable company to invite to your home. I had an issue with my heat at my residence in which the temperature overnight that was set to 72 degrees had been dropping to 68 degrees while in alternate heat mode which is gas heat vs electric. My unit uses both electric and gas, the alternate(gas) heat mode activates when the outside temperature drops below 35 degrees which it recently had, as well as an electrical burning smell as if the motor was locking up while in alternate (gas) heat mode. Brad Emberton's heating and cooling LLC an HVAC company had arrived at my residence on 12/2/2020 I had explained everything it was doing such as not getting to temperature while in gas mode but would seem to function properly in electric mode intermittently, as well as producing a burning smell through the vent and showing that the unit was engaged/heating when no heat was blowing through the vent. I had expected the issue to be assessed and repaired. Bill was at my residence for about 45 minutes in which it was stated that he had cleaned the burners and flame sensors as well as checked the blower motor and all functions of the unit and stated that no problems were found and that the issue that I had been having would not occur again. It was a few days later early on 12/6/2020 that the same issue had recurred, the same loss of heat, not blowing while in gas mode, and the burning smell coming from the vent closest to the unit mainly. I switched the unit to electric-only for the remainder of the week to further see how the unit performed and had no issues until I switched it back to the alternate heat option on 12/13/2020 where gas heat would engage below 35 degrees. Overnight it was doing the exact same thing, loss of heat dropping to 68 Degrees while set at 72, not blowing while in gas mode, and the burning smell was back again. I had called Embertons once again on Monday 12/14/2020 and explained everything that the same problem was still happening, Bill arrived the following day 12/15, and removed the panel to briefly check the unit and stated that he saw no issues, he was at my residence for about 5 minutes then left and said to call the office when it is not blowing again. The unit had operated normally in alternate mode from that point up until 12/23/2020 in which it presented with the same issues. I called again and explained the same things I was instructed to switch it to electric-only mode through the holidays as Bill would arrive the following week. Bill arrived Monday 12/28/2020 and again stated he saw no issues while he was at my residence for about 20 minutes. He further mentioned that I would need a disposable filter for the unit and that would resolve the issue, he said he would replace it which he did with an oversized disposable filter that was crammed into the unit that does not fit and cannot be safely removed. Bill left having me again believe that he as a certified professional heating and air technician he knew what the issue was and that it should not happen again. A few hours later that same day 12/28 the unit again was producing the same smell, not blowing while on, as well as not reaching the temperature it was set to. I called again to get the issue resolved which was the same issue that I had been having since 12/2 nearly a month later. Bill arrived again that afternoon and within 10 minutes was able to determine that the blower motor was not engaging while in alternate heat mode and that one of the two-speed settings in the motor was not functioning and they would order a blower motor under warranty. Also during this month's time, my energy bill is accumulating in excess of what it would normally cost, while not being able to use gas which is more efficient and less expensive than electricity. I received a message from Brad Emberton the following day that the blower motor would arrive the next day 12/30/2020 but hadn't heard anything for a couple of days while my unit was losing heat and malfunctioning again and had to be switched back to electric-only mode. I called and left a message on 1/1/2021 that it had been malfunctioning again and to check the status of the replacement, I received a call back that afternoon and they stated that they wouldn't be able to get back out until the following week. On 1/4/2021 no one arrived that morning, then later that day I received a message that it would not be replaced until the following day. Then on 1/5/2021 Bill arrived and spent 50 minutes at my residence to replace the blower motor that seems to have resolved the issue that I had been experiencing the entire month. I received a call the following day on 1/6/2021 from Brad Emberton of which I had never previously spoken to, he was inquiring as to the original install date of the unit of which I provided I had installed new on 11/2017, I also asked about the filter that was in my unit that bill the tech had replaced that did not fit and Brad assured me that would be corrected. I further inquired about my final bill that they had mentioned that they would call me to provide the previous day so that I could submit payment in full, Brad told me the bill was 319.00, I said that does not seem correct and proceeded to explain to him why that was not a fair bill for the time spent addressing the one issue that had been going on all month, had the certified technician had the proper diagnostic tools to assess the issue during the initial visit on 12/2/2020 it would not have taken a whole month. Brad cut me off and interrupted me while explaining my reasoning why this was not a fair bill and that it should be reassessed based on the warranty and not being able to resolve the original issue within a reasonable timeframe. He stated drive time was also included, although We are located 5 minutes directly from the busiest area of town, I'm not out in a rural area that takes more than 10 minutes to get to, also If you do charge drive time it should never be at the same rate as on-site time such as 37.50 which is claimed as 30 minutes drive time each time to the job site for 5 visits, plus having a customer in a different area of town should not put the customer at the disadvantage of being charged a higher fee especially without disclosing that information. If I had experienced various issues during that time it would be understandable to be charged for all of the visits but this was due to a lack of knowledge, proper diagnosis, and diagnostic tools by a trained professional, that is supposed to be reputable and know how to assess and address the issue so that my unit would properly function. Instead, it was dragged out over the span of a month's time all while the tech continues to guess what the problem may be. It can be quite frustrating dealing with such an issue for that timeframe not knowing how to get the issue resolved. This should have been addressed in no more than 2 visits and most definitely in well under a month's time. The tech having claimed he saw no issues or "found no problem" does not justify claiming that there was not anything wrong at the time, it is simply a failure to determine the diagnosis since it was not properly assessed by the tech on multiple occasions. Mr. Emberton made no attempt to explain the invoice only to say that you will pay what we say is owed regardless of the amount or a lien will be placed on your home, with threats of his attorney, for an invoice that had not yet been mailed out while complaining that he has to fill out "all of this warranty paperwork from the manufacturer that he should not have to fill out" and proceeded to hang up on me. I have audio recordings of each interaction with this business that can be provided that show how vile Mr. Emberton is and how he represents himself. They had mentioned that it was a lengthy process filing the warranty claim as if they are doing something above and beyond what would be expected, when in fact many service companies handle numerous warranty claims, it is part of being in business as a heating and air company, you should expect to have on staff someone that can process multiple warranty claims per week, so in addition to not having the proper diagnostic tools, they also do not seem to have adequate knowledge of being able to properly process a warranty claim which results in placing blame again on the customer. This company claims to "take complaints or unsatisfied customers very seriously" to which I say if that were true then they would have reached out to me to address the situation in a calm courteous manner which they did not do. Instead, Brad Emberton lacked any common courtesy or customer service skills during the entire interaction. A reputable business should never treat a customer the way Mr. Emberton treated me in this case, I was never belligerent to Mr. Emberton or any employees of the company as he was to me. I simply wanted to understand the justification of a bill due that is twice what it should have been. Brad could have spoken to me as a person/customer and explained the itemized costs associated with the repairs with professionalism when I inquired about the excessive amount. I was appalled & shocked at the level of unprofessionalism and treatment that I encountered by Brad that I had to endure, I find it unbelievable that a professional would speak to a customer in this belittling fashion, threatening and insisting that they are right in overcharging for work that they caused to be a prolonged process while placing blame on me the customer that I wanted them to come out to my residence so many times over the period of a month failing to recognize it was due to not addressing the same issue and resolving it a month prior. All the while claiming with each visit that the same initial issue would not occur again. There must be a professional standard that protects a customer from being gouged on the cost of a repair at any time & especially during a Pandemic, a company should not simply be able to charge in excess essentially a much higher amount than the value of work completed. If I were to take my computer to a certified computer repair company to fix an issue and that same issue was to keep recurring week after week the integrity of that company would be in question and even more so if they were to say it's resolved when it is not and then proceed to rack up charges for each visit due to the negligence of the company by not adequately rectifying the same issue, it would seem purposeful for them to keep running the bill higher, such as in this case. If it was known that the issue which I fully explained to them was intermittent during the initial call, would need to be occurring at all times and not intermittently then that should have been mentioned and it was not. Instead of having to keep calling with the same issue over the course of a month perhaps the tech or company could have said this or that they would be charging for each of the 5 visits but they failed to do so, first, he said it needed cleaning then it was the filter, nothing for certain. This unit is not something that should be out of the scope of a heating and air company, it is simply a unit that many homes in the area and across the nation are utilizing for heat and a/c, yet this company seems to say that they have trouble making a proper definitive diagnosis for a failing blower motor, it is illogical. I called a professional heating company to assess and determine the issue, not a plumber, not a family member, a company that represents itself as a professional heating company and therefore I or anyone else should be able to rely on that company to reasonably assess and replace a heating issue. What should have occurred & what would have occurred with any other professional company is that they would have made the diagnosis on the initial visit, then ordered the part, and then came back to install the part when it came in within a timely manner. It should definitely be reasonable to expect a company to repair an issue which they specialize in within a reasonable timeframe, especially during the winter season, dragging out a resolution beyond a months time is far from reasonable and extremely unacceptable. Giving Mr. Emberton the benefit of the doubt that may not have been fully aware of the circumstances, I had attempted to explain all of the facts, but given his reaction and not being allowed to discuss the facts of this transaction, leads me to believe that Mr. Emberton was completely aware of the entire situation and overcharging for the service was a deliberate and intentional act meant to scam a customer out of more money. They profess to care about their customers and community as a company although this is disproven by the actions that were taken and how this company has chosen to represent themselves with interactions in real scenarios such as this one. Perhaps as a representation of our community and what they say as a company that they prefer to represent, they should focus on what they can do right to rectify the situation instead of all that the customer did to wrong them, this is definitely not how a preferable reputation is constructed. This is not an instance of a customer misunderstanding the circumstances, this is clearly a business attempting to take advantage of an unsuspecting consumer who was unaware that a company would act in this unethical manner. Please try and be better to others especially during these difficult times that we are all striving to get through together.

He is not done yet but I am happy with the work so far. He was referred to me by someone. He is the only one responded for the quote. He has been really helpful.