Simulis Plumbing & Heating, Inc.

They were timely, they stuck to the budget, they did not increase the budget and the quality of the work was outstanding. They're are market price.

My boiler stopped working overnight. I called Simulis Plumbing on a Monday morning. The receptionist was friendly and helpful. She arranged to have someone come out to my home that afternoon between the hours of 12-4. When the technician arrived, around 2:15, I showed him the boiler and explained that it had stopped working overnight. I asked if he needed me to stay in the basement with him and he said no so I returned upstairs to do some work. After about 20 minutes, the technician came upstairs and said he had fixed the boiler and gave me the bill. The bill was $525.00. I then asked what was wrong and he told me he had had to replace an electrical panel. I would have preferred that he had informed me about what was wrong and the estimate on the repair before he had actually performed it but the boiler was fixed so I wrote him a check for $525.00. A few minutes after the technician left the smoke detectors in my home went off. I went to the stairs leading to the basement and saw smoke/steam coming up the stairs!! I immediately told my children to go outside. I then went into the basement and it was full of smoke/steam. Smoke/steam was coming out of a pipe of the boiler and water was spewing all over the floor. I shut off the switch by the boiler and I immediately called the Simulis office number in a panic. I called the office at 3:00 pm, just a few minutes after the technician left. The receptionist was once again kind and helpful. I was quite distraught at this point. Once the technician returned I explained about the smoke/steam and he started fiddling with the electric panel he installed. As I watched him the part next to him sparked and caught on fire. As you can imagine this was even more troubling to me and I admit that I did panic. The technician explained there were other things wrong with the boiler that needed to be fixed. I asked what else was wrong and how much it would cost to fix those things. He said he needed to call the office to get prices. I had to go wait for the school bus for my youngest, at the end of my driveway, at this point and asked him to do that while I was gone. When I returned he gave me a quote on the repair cost. I asked if these repairs would fix the problems and he said there was no guarantee that the boiler would work even with the repairs. Since he had left after the initial repair I contacted a friend of mine and explained what had happened what what he had replaced. My friend looked up the price of the electric panel and told me I had been extremely overcharged. This time I asked him to tell me each part that needed replacing and the cost of each part. Also since the repair cost was so high and he said there was no guarantee the boiler would even work after the repairs, I asked what the cost of a boiler replacement would be. He said he'd need to call the office again to get pricing and I said that was fine. After he got off the phone he started telling me boiler names and pricing. All this went over my head. I had no idea about different boiler types or brands. He also told me that the owner of the company was willing to put whatever I paid in repairs that day towards the purchase of a boiler later in the summer. I found this kind of the owner as I was not willing to agree to a $8000 purchase without doing some research of my own. I declined any more repairs and asked for estimates. The technician said I'd have to speak to the owner the following day. I did speak to the owner the following day and asked for estimates which he said he would put together for me. At this point I did not relate how I felt about my experience with his company. He did put together an estimate for me for a new boiler and an estimate for the repairs. He was willing to put the $525.00 I paid for my initial repair towards the purchase of the new boiler. I had also asked about the rebates available for putting in a high efficiency boiler and the Mass HEAT LOAN. After I received the estimates, I related to the owner how I felt about my experience with his company. I explained my concerns about how my home could of burned down because the technician did not check to make sure my boiler was actually working before he left. Mr. Simulis responded and he did seem to take my concerns seriously and said he would speak with his people to make sure what happened at my home would not happen again to someone else. My positives: 1. All my interactions with the receptionist were positive. 2. My interactions with Mr. Tom Simulis, the owner, were also positive. It was kind of him to be willing to put the cost of the repairs towards the purchase of a new boiler. 3. Everything that the technician told me was wrong with my boiler was correct so he did know what he was talking about. I know this because I had my boiler repaired by another party and they replaced the exact parts he identified that day. My negatives: 1. I feel that the technician should have told me what was wring with the boiler and the cost of the repair before he started working on it. 2. I also feel that if the technician had taken the time to check to see if the boiler, heat and hot water was actually working before he left my home, the entire situation with my basement filling with smoke and scaring me and the children could of been avoided. He would of likely noticed that the system was not fixed and diagnosed the other problems then fixed those and we would have been blissfully unaware that the home could of caught on fire. That is my main concern in this instance. The home could of caught on fire if I had not taken the day off to remain at home that day. It is a scary realization to know your home could of caught on fire. If I had left after the technician told me everything was ok, there could of been disastrous results. Thank goodness this did not happen. 3. Once I declined further repairs the technician left my home in a mess. He left the new electric panel open with exposed wires. My boiler now had multiple drips, a constant leak and no heat and hot water. He pretty much made my situation worse.

They were excellent. We have used them before and we are very pleased with them. They have great prices and good services.

Tom came to give me an estimate and offered me a good price (I cannot really compare the price fairly as it was for a simpler installation than the other companies proposed). He took the time to understand the situation and what I need and convinced me that his product is the best for me (in the process he exaggerated significantly the simplicity of the boiler, knowing that I want something simple that I can repair myself, I would not say that he straight out lied to me). He sent me the proposal promptly and responded promptly to my many inquiries and worked with me in order to obtain the MassSave loan I wanted for the project. He started the work in 2 weeks from the agreement at the proper time as we agreed, but he sent me his B team with a fairly decent plumber John, who had a problem though that day, and made a few mistakes, but the other 2 people on the crew, whom I cannot name, were probably apprentices, didn't know much about how to do things and were all day in a playful mood, not focusing on the job. The work was dirty (soldering material dripping inside the uncovered boiler, potentially in the circuitry and the blower which were open). One of them slipped an broke the dry wall in the boiler room, but they never bothered fixing it. They did not mount the back insulating cover of the boiler and claimed it was an ornament despite the 1 inch insulation on it. They finished the job as promised, but the heat in the house would not work properly, only the hot water and the installation was dripping in 2 places. They came back for a check which I did not give them until they fixed one of the drips and I fixed the other myself because they missed it. When I reported the issue to the owner, Tom, he came promptly to review the work with his team. He admitted to misdesigning the system a bit, even though the flaw in my view was significant and due to not taking the time to actually look at the design of the heating area enough or at manufacturer's recommendations. He designed the system based on the looks of the old one and on experience. He disregarded several of the manufacturer's recommendations. It turned out that John miswired the hot water termostat and there was a pump obviously missing from the system. There were other minor faults to which Tom would not admit and would refuse to remedy without a lot of haggling on my part, the next day he sent a team of 1 plumber and 1 electrician (his A team I assume) who did a good job, under the title "to make the customer happy", not because the manufacturer of the boiler required things done in a certain way and not otherwise. In short the project took 3 days rather than the 2 proposed. It involved me looking over the manual and finding all flaws and haggling with Tom over whether they were real flaws or not (don't get me wrong the system would have worked even without some of them being fixed, but the manufacturer's instructions said "never do things that way"). The system is still not completely compliant with the manufacturer's design, but I think (and hope) that what is still not right won't have a visible effect on the performance and lifespan of the boiler and if something goes wrong, some of the things are not hard to fix.

It was great. They were very professional and clean up liked they were never here. They follow up after they were done.