Radar Plumbing Operations Inc

I made the mistake of not shopping around, and trusting Radar. I asked for them to install an approriate electric tankless water heater for my 2nd home. They installed one. But it required an electrician to finish. The electrician informed me that the particular heater would require over $2,000 of electrical work. Up to $5,000 if the utility needed to add capacity to the pole. When I brought this to Radar’s attention, they accepted no responsibility for their selection and work. After calling a half dozen other plumbers, I couldn’t find anyone else to help me (No one will come over from the valley). Radar graciously said they would install a more appropriate water heaters and waive $400 of labor. Using this figure, and searching the internet, I learned that they mark up the equipment by about 50% over their cost. They charge $50/hour. After they were finished with me, the extracted a gross profit for the job, after labor and materials, of over $2,300. The new water heater seems to work fine.

We hired radar plumbing to install a new toilet and hook up the plumbing on a new fiberglass tub/shower combo we had already installed at our rental. We were given a fixed bid for $2123. This seemed very high, but he told us because we had such old pipes, there was a chance he would have to chase back the lines due to breakage, which is why it was such a high quote. We were on a time crunch and had tenants moving in and I unfortunately didn't make time to call around for other quotes, or read Radar's other poor reviews online. Radar also included in our bid a line item for some other misc clean up work he would bill us on a time and materials basis. This work was completely over looked and never touched during their time working on the house. The work that we were given a fixed bid for at $2123 was completed. I requested our invoice several times. We received it 3 months later (Yikes! Makes you wonder about their billing department) it was $1060 over our original bid. When we asked Mike, the owner, why it was so much higher he aggressively told us that it was because they had to chase old pipe and it was a lot more work than they had anticipated. He knocked $100 off in material costs after my fiance called them out that they had grossly overcharged us on materials, thus we ended up paying $960 more than our original bid, that was quite high to begin with totaling $3083 for connecting a new toilet and a tub drain, faucet and shower head. A few months later my fiancee, against my wishes, had Radar continue on his project Radar installed a leaking hot water heater. According to Mike there was no way to know it was leaking until it was installed. Then when they came back to install a new hot water heater they sent a lone apprentice who installed a dented unit and billed my fiance's company a second time. After that I was upset and called Mike. I wanted to hear his side of the story, which to his credit he was available for, but during that time it came out that supposedly he was being given differing information from his plumbers than what was actually true. He agreed, after an intense conversation to refund us the $240 for installing the 2nd broken water heater (we didn't request a refund for the leaking unit.) When I followed up on the $240 refund 12 days after we had agreed, I was not surprised to see that Mike once again took the low road. He said the $240 that was owed to my fiancee's company was sitting on his desk, but he would not send it unless I took down my "nasty" review on Angie's list. Then, after I didn't respond the check finally came about 5 days after that. For a moment in time, owner Mike attempted to use the refund that was mutually agreed upon, to leverage as hush money. I would be happy to take down my negative review if Mike humbles himself, apologizes and refunds us the $960 over-charge from our fixed bid on the rental. I doubt he will do this. I would hope that a local business owner would use these opportunities to learn how to better serve his clients rather than see us (especially women) as being out of line and nasty. I had feelings early on in working with Radar that my best interests or my budget weren't on their radar, and for so many homeowners we put so much trust in these companies to help us make smart, economical decisions. This review is written in the hopes that other people do not have to go through what we've gone through and take the time to call around and work with another vendor on the coast, even though at times it feels there are not a lot to choose from. Thank you!

Rapid response. Clear contract language. Fine work. I'll call this company for all my plumbing needs as long as their level of performance remains as it is now.

Took a piece of our plumbing and kept it four day's stateing they had to have it to look for a replacement part. Never did find a replacement part and charged us a lot of money for no results.

Prompt response to drain the flood, diagnose the problem, order and install new pumps

We've called Radar Plumbing for three jobs over the past three years, and have been very happy with them each time. For one of the jobs, another plumber took a look at it and said it would take 2 people and 2 hours, so he didn't do it (he didn't have a second plumber available). We then called Radar, and he was able to do it with one person in one hour, and did a very high quality job. I was pleased with the work theydid for the other jobs as well (installing a water heater and replacing a leaky outdoor faucet). Their rate was $110/hour.

We had trouble with the in-floor heating because they never gave us a manual. They said it would take care of itself, which it doesn't. The thermostats were bad, which they finally changed out. One winter, it shut down completely. We had to call another company, and $2000 and five heatless days later, they were able to make the repairs. We found out later that Radar never even had an installation manual for the system!

I was not happy with them. They were too expensive. If I had continued with them, I would have been paying $200 an hour. I would not use them in the future.

The Friday prior to the service we visited the Radar Plumbing office and showed a digital photograph of the tub and plumbing. We explained to the office attendant what we needed done: removal of a rusted bath shoe strainer and replacement of a 3" tub spout nipple. The following Monday a plumber and his apprentice arrived. They lacked the parts required, despite our having provided such information the previous Friday. So, they left to return to the shop for the required parts and returned 1.5 hours later. Our house is less than 5 minutes from their shop. They then completed the job within fifteen minutes. We were billed for 1.5 hours for two workers, totaling $247.50. With the parts costing $74.04, the grand total was $321.54. We objected in writing to the amount of time billed, the fact that we were not provided with an estimate and the unnecessary assignment of a second worker, the apprentice. We enclosed a check for $184.04 with the invoice and provided a detailed explanation of why and how we arrived at this figure. Subsequently, the check was cashed and deposited by Radar Plumbing. Since we