ROYAL FLUSH PLUMBING

Next day service, clear communication and friendly service.

unknown

Everyone on the job was very nice and respectful of my wood floors and the mud they were creating. Cleaned up after themselves very well.

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I've used them back in 2011 to fix up my old house and was very pleased with their work, so decided to contact them again for slightly minor projects that we've postponed with our new house. They had to postpone the original scheduled date of service due to other emergencies, but were able to follow up the week after. Austin came out to do the work and he was very quick and thorough with the work. We didn't get any other bids for this job since we liked them so much last time, so I'm not sure about the fairness of the priciing, but he had to "modify" the pipings to make the new utility sink fit, and with about an hour of labor, I am satisfied with the pricing and the quality of work.

The owner (?), Ted, of Royal Flush Plumbing company was at my house accompanying his father who was about to do other work for me. He asked whether we had any plumbing needs and we did. He said, we know all about that, call the office and make an appointment. A very nice, very capable appearing employee showed up an hour early the next day and within minutes gave the verdict that nothing was amiss with our "hot water to shower" issue. He declared it operator error. Lesson taken. This employee was in the house fewer than ten minutes - half of it with my credit card - the charge was $135. I understand that the days are long past of considering such diagnostics a favor and thus business builders. Everything costs a lot these days - but $135??? I thought perhaps I was just not informed on what such a service costs now, I had not asked ahead of time, so accepted the charge. Today my neighbor who owns apartments asked who my plumber was these days and whether I could recommend him. I told her of my Royal Flush experience and she says the charge seemed out of line to her. Needless to say, he is out of her business. I was highly uncomfortable when we were all in the basement and Ted received a telephone call and proceeded upstairs by himself into my living quarters for his own privacy. (Ted, respect for other people's space matters in business.) The work done by Ted's father's company was done professionally, on time and and reasonably. I will recommend the father's company. Something has been lost between the generations.

We had a steady drip at the cold water line at the front wall of our house, so Royal Flush replaced the line at the wall to below the kitchen. We originally thought that this was a good price for the job until we learned that the work was not done properly and may very well result in a catastrophic leak. Royal Flush used Wirsbo piping, which is an expandable product, but connected the pipe with basic metal crimp rings, which are not expandable. We were told that under pressure (and there can be a lot of pressure at the main line connection), the Wirsbo pipe may expand (as it should) but the metal crimp ring would snap and break under the pressure, resulting in a big nasty flood in our basement. This made quite a bit of sense to me, but I'm no expert. So I called Royal Flush right away. The receptionist informed me that all their plumbers were out on a training that day. I told her I was unhappy with the work that was done and worried it would not hold up and asked that she get someone out immediately. After a bit of back and forth, someone was suddenly on his way to check the work. The odd thing was, the guy who showed up to check the quality of the work was the *same* guy who did the work originally. So - of course - he insisted that the work was done properly and that it all looked good. I asked him why they chose to combine materials which are incompatible but he would not explain anything, but simply insisted than that the job was done right. I told the plumber that I was not happy with that answer and that I wanted them to fix it so that the proper fittings (expandable) were used with the proper piping (ie, Wirsbo pipe with Wirsbo fittings = happy customer). He told me to talk to the owner of the company while he "re-did" the work. So, I had the owner on the phone and I explained my confusion and frustration with the work they did. The owner insisted that those crimp fittings work best for the piping and that he stood by the work (even though he did not even come out to check the work). He felt assured that the guy who did it in the first place, did it right, and that was that. I told him that it did not make sense to me that the manufacturer of the piping would not also design and prescribe the most effective fittings for their pipes, but the owner insisted over the phone that the crimp fittings were fine. He explained that they used the crimp rings because the Wirsbo fittings required glues to install and take a long time to dry and are messy and a hassle. He explained that the crimp fittings were easier, better, and they never had a problem with them before, so why do it the hard way when the easy way works just fine? That explanation just doesn't sit well with me. But the owner stood by the job even though he never bothered to come out and see whether the job was done right and I was never quite happy with his explanation. I told him that despite his personal conviction, I was ultimately unhappy with the work and unhappy with his explanations for the materials used. The owner would offer nothing more than this phone conversation trying to convince me they did the work right. I (the customer) was wrong and they were right. I could not - despite my clear frustration and displeasure with the work - get anyone else at Royal Flush to come out and do a quality check on the work that their plumber did for us. So - going back to the plumber who came out to check the work - while I was speaking with the owner about my complaints, their plumber took a mere 20 minutes replacing the line over again, but he just did the exact same thing over again, using all the same incompatible materials that I was complaining about in the first place, so I'm not sure why he bothered. If a customer orders pancakes at a restaurant and then complains to the chef that they hate the pancakes, why would the chef make the customer more of the same pancakes? Thanks for nothing, Royal Flush. I still have the improper plumb job on the house because I can't afford to have it fixed by anyone else just yet and Royal Flush refuses (or doesn't know how?) to put the correct fittings on. In the meantime, it's held up, but I feel like I'm gambling with every day that it holds. I'm horrified that they charged me $380 for a job that clearly took a single person 20 minutes to do while using cheaper materials and shortcuts, and I'm horrified that they don't care whether the customer is satisfied. I will never gamble (pun fully intended) with that company again, and no one else should either.

At first my experience with this company was good. Ted was nice and knowledgeable and set up an appointment that afternoon. He never showed up or called. The next day he called with a story about another job taking longer than he thought. He apologized and we set an appointment for the next morning for 8 AM. The next day he called at 8:00 and said he would be there in a few minutes. He showed up at 8:35 and set in his car for 10 minutes on the phone before coming to the door. Once he got to me he was very courteous, business-like and knowledgeable. He apologized again for the original appointment and said he would get me an estimate in a few days. Four days later he called to say he was having problems "fighting with the city" to get information about my property and said I would have the estimate by the end of the week. I never heard from him again. Not a good way to run a business.

They were amazing. They were caring about the job that they did and were very easy to get a hold of if I had any questions. They were just very professional and nice.