ATI Plumbing

Tim was recommended by my homebuilder as being his personal plumber, so I believe he must do good work. The first time I called Tim he answered the phone at 6:00 on a Friday before a holiday weekend. I really appreciated him taking my call. On two or three occasions he promised to make time between other jobs to fix the leak beneath my kitchen sink "Wednesday afternoon" or "Friday morning," etc. He did not follow though. however. Tim finally committed to a firm appointment for 9:00 AM. I rearranged my schedule to be available. He did not keep the appointment and did not call. I waited most of the day hoping to hear from him. Eventually I found a highly rated plumber in my neighborhood who agreed to do the work the very next day. (Thank you, Mick's Plumbing! You have earned my business 100%!) As a courtesy I wanted to let Tim know we did not need to reschedule. When I was able to reach him at 6:00 PM the evening of our appointment to tell him someone else was going to fix the leak he apologized and said he had staffing problems that day. Problems come up, for sure. It would have been polite for Tim to make a quick 2 minute phone call to let me know he wasn't coming, however. I really dislike being unable to leave positive reviews for local businesses. I wish I could say he earned a good review, but the truth is his customer service was really disappointing. If you find yourself needing a reliable, responsive, friendly, courteous local plumber who also happens to be affordable call Mick at Mick's plumbing. After a couple of weeks of trying to schedule a time for Tim to fix the leak in my kitchen I did not expect next day service but Mick made it happen. It is great to be able to use the kitchen sink again without worrying about flooding the cabinets!

The work passed inspection and was completed in a professional and timely manner.

ATI was recommended by my general contractor (GC). I still gathered other bids, but ATI had the lowest and with the recommendation of my GC, I awarded the work to ATI. ATI's scope was completed in two phases. The first phase was the underground work to prepare for the new bathroom and wash room and replacing the kitchen sink drain with 3-inch ABS. This phase went well as ATI was coordinating directly with my GC who was responsible for cutting the concrete and replacing the concrete when ATI was finished. After the first phase of work, I paid ATI half of the agreed fee. The second phase began after my GC had finished his scope. ATI was to replace my old CPVC plumbing with PEX and do the rough-in for bathroom and washroom. The first problem was with the bathroom fixtures. ATI offered to buy my bathroom fixtures through their vendor channels. Since I live in an older Craftsman style house, I wanted to match the old style, externally plumbed, shower. I found a shower style I liked and forwarded it to ATI. For the first week, ATI did not respond. Then ATI told me their vendors do not have the shower style I wanted and to call them to find an anti-scalding valve and when I had it, to give them a call and they can begin their work. I had thought ATI would provide this service, but I called the vendor. Thus began a two week odyssey of educating myself about anti-scalding valves and shower fixtures. I visited at least four different plumbing stores and spent many hours reading plumbing codes and web pages trying to understanding the differences between pressure balancing valves, anti-scalding valves, and thermostatic valves. In this journey, ATI was unresponsive. Finally figuring out what my local plumbing code required and buying the appropriate pressure balancing valve and shower, I called ATI and told them I had the valve and to come and begin work. The PEX piping install went smoothly, but the vents did not go well. The shower and washing machine were connected to auto vents. The first issue was the toilet vent. When ATI was out for the estimate, we agreed they would cut into the wall on the upper floor and tie into the 4-inch stack. During the work, ATI did not think this was possible and wanted to route the pipe out the wall and run it up the outside of the house and through the roof. Since this was the "public" side of my house, I did not want to run a pipe vent up the side. With a lot of discussion, we decide we would run it up through an upstairs closet and out the roof. Since it was the end of the day, ATI left and would return to finish the vent piping. A few days went by with no ATI returning. Looking over the vent routing personally, I discovered I could tie the vent into the bathroom sink vent, but it looked rather small. Looking through the plumbing code, I realized it would have to be upsized. I called ATI to give them my idea and asked when they would be back to finish their work. I was given a soft date that was missed. By the weekend I decided I would do the vent myself. I cut the lath & plaster wall in the closet behind the bathroom to expose the vent line, climbed on the roof to pull the small steel pipe out and replaced it with a larger ABS pipe. I drilled the hole through the floor and would have had it finished if I had a right angle drill, but since I didn't, I had to stop. 7:00am Monday morning, ATI called and announced they would be at my house in a few hours. I met them and explained what I had done and asked for a break on the fee since all they had left to do was pipe it up. They took $500 off the fee and did the last bit of work to connect the vent. I called the inspector for the rough-in inspection, which failed due to my state does not allow auto vents. Hence the second issue: ATI was rather indignant, complaining to me that our neighboring state allows auto vents, why doesn't my state and insulted the plumbing inspector, whom I thought was a rather patient, pleasant man. The inspector directed us to remove the auto vents and route the vents through the walls to tie into the vent line that connected up to the sink vent. Fortunately, using the upsized vent would allow enough venting capacity for everything. I expected ATI to be out the next day to make the necessary fixes to pass inspection, but again, ATI was unresponsive. Citing "another project" that was going to take them the rest of the week, I again, took it upon myself to remove the auto vents and route the vent line. By now I had purchased a right-angle drill and proceeded to route the vent line through eight studs, at a slope, but in the process I nicked one of the new PEX lines. On Monday I called the inspector and asked for a re-inspection. He complimented by work and passed me. I called ATI and told them that I had finished the vents, but needed a small repair to the PEX pipe. They said they would be out the next day to fix the PEX pipe and was looking forward to getting called out to do the finishing work. I told them I was planning on doing the finishing work myself. I was at work while ATI repaired the PEX pipe. When I came home, the ATI plumber had tracked mud in through the kitchen, down the basement stairs, and into the bathroom. I was able to deduce the plumber was standing in my shower pan to do the repair work by the large mud puddle left there. At this point, I was done with ATI. With their scope complete, I paid ATI the remainder of the adjusted fee without comment.