Hero Plumbing, Heating & Cooling

All went really well. Just took a little longer. I had another appointment show up so I left TJ on his own after an hour. I felt he did a thorough job although I have no means of verifying it other than warm air and water being available 24x7

I recently moved into a 1920's bungalow with a 1952 boiler and was hooked by Uptown's $69 price tag for cleaning and inspection. After one reschedule, the technicians arrived and promptly got to work. After firing the unit and doing some basic function checks, they measured CO levels and called me down to break the bad news -- 22 ppm around the flue, which was beyond some limit and they were legally required to shut down the boiler. I was given a ballpark quote of $1200 for repair, but was told in a way that made it seem like fixing was not the way to go. I scheduled a quote for a new system the same day. The rest of the cleaning job was very superficial (wiping down exterior, poking/prodding, etc.). I've since learned that it's very possible to repair this boiler and worked with a wonderful local company to so for much less than Uptown's ballpark quote. I'm not happy that they used the CO measurement as a scare tactic to push me towards a new system. I won't be using their services in the future.

Uptown was very responsive and professional. When I called, it was one of the first cold days of the year, so the scheduler had to get permission to add another person to their list of appointments for the next couple of days. Not only did she get permission, she had a technician (Jason) who was just finishing up at a previous job and could come right over. Jason arrived in about a half hour, assessed the situation, told us what needed to be done to resolve the issue, and also quoted us a price for a part that was corroded and likely to cause problems down the line. While the price quoted seemed on the expensive end, we decided to (hopefully) save ourselves a future service call by having both parts replaced at that time. Jason got the needed parts and performed the service within about 2.5 hours and at the price quoted. Since then everything seems to be working well.

Uptown Plumbing Heating & Cooling sent a technician who from the very beginning set out show the furnace is unfit for normal operation and should be replaced. The furnace was working for 38 year without any problems and we do annual tuneups every year. The technician from Uptown Plumbing Heating & Cooling came to do the annual furnace tuneup. 1. During the tuneup, the technician yanked out power assembly to the blower and could not fix it. Later the technician tried to find the part in his truck to fix the problem and did not find the part. He completed the tuneup of the furnace without fixing the problem. Because we're having warm weather there was no need for heat and I did not notice the working of the furnace. After week later, I noticed that the blower was not working and just heat smell was there all through the house. I turned off the electrical switch and had to place a call to for Uptown Plumbing Heating & Cooling technician to come and correct the problem. The technician came and attached the electrical connection which he said came out due to internal vibrations. This furnace was working all these years without any electrical collections coming loose due to vibrations.Then he told me that if the connection comes loose again the next time you can fix it yourself. It came loose two times after that and I had to fix it myself. This shows the LOUSY QUALITY of service provided by Uptown Plumbing Heating & Cooling. 2. At the end of the service call, the technician turned off the electrical switch and placed a red tag on the electrical switch saying the furnace is deemed unfit for normal operation and gave a high quote for a new furnace purchase. Eventually, we ended up installing a new furnace because the technician made it non-functional since the electrical connection comes out loose often. This was an added unplanned expense for the year. This shows the BAD PROFESSIONALISM shown by Uptown Plumbing Heating & Cooling technicians. 3. It seems that the Center Point Energy provides furnace tuneup rebates to customers. I talked to one of Uptown Plumbing Heating & Cooling representatives about rebates.I was told that they would fill out the rebate form and it is their standard practice. I was not informed about this practice by the technician when he came for tuneup. This shows the LOUSY RESPONSIVENESS provided by Uptown Plumbing Heating & Cooling technicians.

Scheduling was a breeze and the employee was very friendly. The technician arrived on time and gave great information about the appliances and what condition they were in. It was a great experience and well worth the time and money.

It was fine. They diagnosed some things that I would have a second opinion on. They suggested I might want to replace my furnace. I ended up calling a different company after. They disagreed with the recommendation. They diagnosed the issues relatively well but they missed the mark on the replacement of the furnace. I'd recommend a different provider. They were prompt and courteous but they were young and a little bit inexperienced.

They were great right up until the end. They were professional and the price seemed really high so before signing the dotted line we had another person who came in and said all of these parts are covered under warranty except for two. That was not something that was ever discussed. I didn't think a 10 year old furnace would have any warranty left but we're going to be saving, the cost was going to be $2300.00 and we're going to be spending only $700.00. The cleaning and inspection that we paid for from Angie's List, they came in and did all that and then he came up and said, I'm sorry to tell you but I pretty much have to red tape your furnace. There's something wrong with the blower motor and it's leaking carbon monoxide and it needs to have these parts replaced or it needs to be replaced completely. And so, when I did some further checking, it was true all that they said, all these parts need to be replaced but I was a little disappointed that they didn't offer to look into the warranty. Otherwise they were very prompt and professional. They called in the morning asked if they could come earlier, that worked out great for me. Overall they did a good job, it was just that one thing about the cost of it. Knowing what I know now, I would use them again knowing that I had to ask for them to check for warranty.

Went great, the technician went above and beyond what I expected. Checked out furnace humidifier at no additional charge.

Seemed very thorough and efficient with doing tune-up and flushing the water heater. Pleasant man.

He was extremely comprehensive. A great teacher explained information to me since this is a new home for me and I had not dealt with furnace filters this size and there were other unusual things about the devices.

Quack, quack, quack! Did I say, quack? First of all... DO NOT EVER send out some guy who uses a "DUCK-QUACK" as a phone call. Never, ever. This guy John came out here with a duck call as his phone call/text/everything else. Every 2 minutes I heard "quack, quack" on this guy's phone. HUGE TURN OFF! Secondly, then they send out another "tech" whose best buddy is guy's best buddy! Also knew NOTHING about their IAQ products and boasted that he didn't care about them. So then STOP selling them. Ask technical questions? SOL. These guys know nothing and don't care enough to find out anything. Not even a model number on a product. I can't imagine the logic there. This guy, Jason, was so awkward and uncomfortable. Never, ever want this guy in my house again, ever! These guys will NOT answer ANY technical questions, period. Their tech "Jason", said so. Want an itemized breakdown of costs? NOPE! "We don't do that here". "We don't want to confuse the customers". ... Yeah, because ALL customers are too stupid to understand an itemized cost list. And by the way, they were going to charge me for a second "free call" for $70.00 ... from a tech. A guy who knew nothing about their Indoor Air Quality products.... after the first guy, with his duck-call knew nothing... phone ringer = duck call. Thirdly, sky-high prices. If you are looking for I.A.Q. products (Indoor Air Quality), forget about these guys. At least double the price of every other company out there... way above retail price. Their claim is that they are the ONLY "quality .. premium" service out there. What a bunch of bull. There are plenty of other services out there that cost WAY less and are better. Steer WAY clear of this company.

We purchased a deal through Angie's List for routine check on furnace and cleaning. Where it went right: They were prompt with arrival and called to confirm appointment and when the tech was not far away. The tech came in, was courteous and began the process of inspecting and cleaning our furnace. During the inspection process he found cracks on the heat exchanger of our Carrier Weathermaker 3200. Please note, Uptown is not a dealer for Carrier, but rather Bryant. I didn't think this was a big deal at the time, but would later find out it is fairly important. The tech called a secondary tech to come verify the cracks, because with the cracks they need to shut off our furnace until it is repaired or replaced due to potential danger. At the inspection the tech never said that it was producing dangerous levels of CO or any other issue, but that because it was cracked it had to be done. I said that was fine. When it started to go all wrong. I asked the tech what the time frame and cost would be to repair. He gave me a repair cost of between 3000 and 7000 dollars depending on what level of service I wanted. For the 7000 it was the platinum service that would include an inspection next year and a 2 year warranty. I then asked what the cost of a replacement furnace would be. He said he would have to get his sales person to give me a full write up. Based on my limited knowledge I guessed around 3000. He kind of laughed at that and said "no typically between 7000 and 13,000" This was substantially higher than things that I had quickly seen on the internet. When he gave me those numbers and said that because it was there busy time it would be hard to get someone out right away, but if I wanted he could probably get someone out to get it done right away. I told him, that I would like a call from the person, but I wanted to get a quote from another vendor. He said the sales person would call me. He did not. That night we used our fireplace to keep the house at a moderate temperature. The next morning I had a sales person from another HVAC company come out that deals in Carrier furnaces. I told him what was wrong and he looked at me shocked. He said that he has never seen the primary heat exchanger cracked on our model without it being caused by the secondary. This was important because Carrier had an issue with the secondary exchangers and if it was cracked and caused the cracking in the primary carrier would fix the furnace at NO cost to me. Uptown didn't look at the secondary unit, as they said that would be more work because it was harder to see and since the primary was cracked it didn't make a difference. I don't fault Uptown for this as they aren't Carrier dealers so wouldn't necessarily know this. I guess this is why it is important to have a factory authorized person take a look at your appliances. I then asked the Carrier person about replacement cost. He said replacement cost of the furnace would be about 3000, if we wanted to just repair the heat exchanger that would be 700. He said the exchanger was under warranty for 20years, so the only cost would be the labor. So in short: Uptown repair costs were going to be anywhere from infinitely more expensive than another company(if it is under warranty) to between 5 and 10x the cost. The furnace replacement costs were going to be anywhere from 2.5-4x the cost. Be careful.

The gist of all this is: a) Hard sell and playing on the lack of knowledge of the home owner by vendor. Especially when no empirical evidence was present on the failure of a part in the furnace. Modus operandi seems to be to get in with a low tune-up quote and order expensive repairs. b) Highly inflated quote - Especially to just replace the secondary heat exchanger - it must have been free of cost as both labor and part are covered per warranty by Bryant c) On top of all that - I am not sure if anything was done on the water heater tune-up included in the fee ( I may be wrong here as I was not present in the room all the time but the focus to sell me a new furnace or repair for $$$$ made me feel nothing was done unless it takes a few minutes when I was not present) - I was told that the heater was drained and all looked good. All of this is the home owner's view of what transpired and Uptown is entitled to their own "professional" opinion. I purchased a big deal of $39 from Uptown plumbing for a furnace and water heater inspection and tune-up. The technician arrived on time and was courteous - but then things went downhill from there quickly in my view. Within a few minutes of the inspection and cleaning process the technician declared that I had two fractures in my secondary heat exchanger and stopped further work before he could confirm with his senior colleague that it was in fact the case. He explained that the options are to shut down the furnace before the heat exchanger can be replaced or replace the furnace completely!!! He suggested that it could cost any where between $2000.00 to $4000.00 for the repair (his initial estimate which kind of kept dropping as my inquiry detail increased) and would require two people working the whole day (6-8 hrs) That was an early morning shock for me - However, I did hope for the best and waited for the "senior" technician to arrive. The senior technician arrived and after an inspection ( I wasn't in the room) declared that fractures do exist and ordered another test to confirm - something called pressure test/leak test or whatever it was - It called for shutting down air entering "whatever" parts in the furnace and starting the blower. A meter was attached to a black tube to see if there was a leak - The meter did show a reading of 0.0004 or so on it. This confirmed "their analysis" of the fracture and the "danger" due to carbon monoxide killing our family slowly but surely. Or maybe when the "fracture" widens as it heats in one quick blow. The second technician harped on their training in recognizing such dangers and also emphasized that the furnace was extremely dangerous and must be closed down. Meanwhile, I was getting quickly up to speed on heat exchangers in furnaces on Google. The first few results that came-up when I googled secondary heat exchanger crack was a blog called " Cracked heat exchangers - Scam alert" this made me understand that there is no chance of CO polluting the indoor air in a 80% furnace but there is a possibility in a 90+ furnace which was the kind I had. This led me to ask specific questions on the status of my furnace to the Uptown technicians: a) Is the crack visible and can be shown to me - Answer: Negative - the technicians neither could show it to me or give me a picture b) Are the CO numbers abnormal in testing - Answer: No, normal numbers. c) Is there flame roll out - Answer : No d) are there other parameters that are wrong with the furnace - Answer : No Essentially all testing or metrics proved to be negative that would suggest a crack or failure or problem with the furnace - However, the gentlemen were convinced that they need to close down the furnace and "red tag" it until repaired and they did. The quote also had dropped from where it started to $1310 for replacement of the secondary exchanger. Meanwhile, I had also found out by further research that there was a class action suit against Carrier (Bryant is a brand under it) for secondary heat exchangers failing and the company had extended warranty to 20 years and all LABOR and PARTS were covered - they in fact were paying out customers $270 or so but that was a while back ( ended 2008) Obviously, I wanted a second opinion - so in comes the company that had installed the furnace originally. They were able to find the furnace installation in their records ( I'm the second owner of this home) and immediately confirmed that the specific model I had was not within the recall - However, the warranty still applied for 20 years. An inspection was setup that found that the secondary was functioning as expected all parameters of the furnace were just fine - this was explained to me with readings taken with meter poked in the flue. The tech was able to take a picture of the secondary and showed me that it was not plugged (first symptom of failure) or cracked at all. He also noted that the primary and secondary heat exchangers are usually replaced together - And to top it all their quote to replace both was less than half of what uptown provided ($600) if the repair was required. This opinion is what I went with as this company primarily deals with Bryant and was the original installer and was able to provide me with a picture and metrics to support their diagnosis.

They were great. I had originally been given a block of time when they would be arriving and they called the night before breaking it down to a half hour arrival window. Ian showed up within that time frame and was very courteous, professional and helpful the entire time. In my experience, when you get a deal like these it is so they can nickle and dime you on additional parts/work or upsale large, often unneeded repairs or replacement. That was not the case at all with Uptown. They performed the full inspection/tune up and then Ian sat down and went over everything in detail with me showing what was working well, what was nearing the end of it's usable life and what was no longer functioning. He let me know about options available for updating/upgrading these systems and informed me of the annual service program they offer but I never felt pressured. I am beyond impressed with this service and will certainly use Uptown again and request Ian as my tech in the future.

They called at 3pm. Service was 2-5pm. Said I was out of their area, & not coming. They had my address, should have told me sooner. I took 3 hours PTO, was at home when they called. Waist of PTO. Should have know that long time ago.

Wonderful. It was a complicated deal but they took care of everything.

Purchased a Big Deal for servicing furnace and water heater for $39. Appointment scheduled quickly. TJ arrived on time and performed the service. I mentioned to him that I had been smelling something "funny" around the furnace and he did find a gas leak. He finished the "tune up" and discussed the pricing of fixing the gas leak. There were 3 different pricing levels from "band-aid" to "gold". I didn't like the name "band-aid" and mentioned that, but was assured this would be quality work repairing the leak. I wanted it fixed right away and chose the "band-aid" price of $417. I did ask about the price and he mentioned the amount of work and time involved replacing the connector in the gas line, relighting pilot lights on my furnace and gas water heater and dryer. He did finish the work in about 45 min to 1 hour. The work he did was perfect and he was very professional and answered all my questions. He did show me the part he replaced and the work he completed. I am very happy with the work. Not quite sure the price of $417 for at the most an hour of work is a normal charge. I spoke to a service rep at the company about the pricing, asking for a detailed invoice. Was told they give a one price for the work, they do not break it down for parts and labor. TJ did do a wonderful job, but have decided I don't like not having the price detailed into parts cost and labor cost.

the technician was very professional. he even changed my furnace filter!

Evan arrived a little ahead of schedule, after the office had called to see if this would be ok. It took him a while (~2 hours) to diagnose the issue with the furnace, but once he had done that he went and picked up the needed part, changed it out, and was done in short order. I was pleasantly surprised to learn that the cost over and above the $39 Big Deal that I had purchased for the tune-up was only $50, given the amount of time that Evan was here. I got the impression that Evan was one of their newer employees, and this could have contributed to him taking a bit longer than I would have expected. Nevertheless, I was glad that he took the time to do the job right, and he was very professional. Everything seems to be working well now.

I called to see if they performed power flushing of boiler systems. I'd been informed by Xcel service technician that my system needed it, but his company didn't do it. It must not be common yet as the first two boiler service places I called did not do it. The person answering the phone, with the greeting "How can I make your day great?" indicated Uptown does indeed perform this service. The procedure is scheduling a technician visit for an estimate, costing $69. If the service can be performed that day, the visit charged is waived for the cost of the service provided. As this is clearly something slightly out of the norm, I asked for a ballpark estimate of what I could expect. My question was "am I looking at something like $100-200 or $1,000-2,000, I have no idea" The person on the phone indicated that is something only the technicians would know. Ok, I understand that. Can I speak with one? No, they are in the field. Ok, can you check with one of them and give me even a ball park estimate before I commit to spending 70 bucks and taking time off to find out this is something I would never do? Well, the only thing we can do is schedule a service visit. 3 separate attempts to get some idea of what this might entail before spending money, and more importantly time on this. In terms of "How can I make your day great," this was a failure. I would love to have been able to rate the actual boiler service, which appears excellent, but the front line help lacked a basic understanding of the importance of time and money. You might say it would take a technician time to consider this. Seems like most types of service have a ballpark amount that is known pretty quickly, always with the qualifications that circumstances in each situation are different so price could vary. I get that, but $150 or $1500. It makes a difference.

Jason was the service tech. Very professional. He went over in detail what he did and found. Will definitely use Uptown again.

This service was great. We are first time home owners, and the service guy was very nice about explaining what he was doing, and recommendations for routine maintenance. Also, he was super nice to our dog!

My experience with Uptown Plumbing, Heating & Cooling was terrific. Everyone was very courteous, friendly and professional. The numerous positive reviews I read on Angie's List helped me make my decision to enlist their services. Plus, the excellent reviews for the techs (installers) , Mikan and Dave, helped sway my choice. They were, as described, excellent. They were friendly, professional and great at their jobs. The job was completed without any unforeseen problems. The cost of the AC units was expensive but comparable to other bids. I'd certainly recommend Uptown to other people and would use their services again.

Jason K. was the service technician. He did an amazing job. He was efficient, friendly, presented my options clearly and even did some extra work above and beyond. He came in, took a look at what I needed done, sat down with me and asked me some questions to give me my options. Once I gave me my options and confirmed what I wanted to do he pulled a permit with the city and started working immediately. He was able to do all the work within 90 minutes. GREAT JOB. I will ask for him specifically again.

They did things they were supposed to do, they were very good and I would definitely call them back. It was such a good experience, they were just nice and they took care of a problem and he knew rightly where the problem was. And I would use them in the future if it happened too.