Stan the Hot Water Man

Over the weekend noticed that the hot water was coming out scalding. Use a thermometer to check that it was 180-degrees! Based on reports here, I called "Stan the Hot Water Man." Brent came out the same day that I called, checked out the water heater and luckily it was a simple fix - a broken thermostat. He was done in about half an hour and as near as I can tell did a great job. The water heater works! Brent was friendly and quick and I would recommend and use this company again.

Great! He was in and out in less than an hour. After another plumber came to do a flush and safety inspection, our hot water stopped working (I am pretty sure the guy sabotaged our water heater somehow). We decided to call another plumber (Stan) to fix things.

I called for an estimate, and Dale called back within a few hours and gave me an estimate over the phone. After I checked around to a few other places, I called back and we set up an appointment. He came at the promised time (called to say he was on his way), and completed the work within 90 minutes. When done he took a picture of the work. I asked him about it, and he said if there were ever a question about the work, they could look at the picture first to see if anything was amiss. I thought that was a great idea.

I was delighted that on a Sunday, it would go this smooth and quick.

Polaris is a special water heater. There are not very many plumbers qualified to work on these kind of heaters. I called him because he was the only plumber in Portland that worked on this kind of water heaters. Work was done 3 years ago, however it was not done correctly. After several phone calls, I could never connect with the worker. Finally I contacted the main office and told him there was a slow drip between a connection and a flex pipe. They said they would fix this. I waited 2 weeks for him to call me, and he never called. I called him one morning, waited all morning for them to call me back and they never did. They left me a message that afternoon saying they would fix it. I called them first thing the next morning, and waited another two weeks for them to call me back. I called the owner, who was very rude to me. He was acting like I was going to break the bank with his company by having them come to fix my water heater for free. He was acting like I was lying about the leak. Finally he agreed to fix it. I called him on a Friday afternoon, and he came over the following Tuesday. After the way he chastised me over the phone, which I did not feel was necessary, I did not really want to meet him, however I tried to be friendly and give him an almost-clean slate. I did not think the repair would take more than 15 minutes. There was a leak between the connection to the house and a pipe that connects a flexible coil to the water heater. It took him no more than 10-15 minutes to change the whole thing out. He then called me in to show me his work, and he proceeded to do the same thing in person. He basically looked at my invoice and tried to tell me that the water heater never had to be moved around, and I didn't pay for the flexible pipe in the first place, so his worker never moved it around to begin with. He told me that I was costing his company a lot of money having him come down to fix my repair. At the end of this interaction, when we were both outside my house, he told me that he thought that I needed to reply back to Angie's List and give him a good report. He did fix the repair, but he left a very unsavory customer service memory with me.

I called and left a message, within 20 minutes Brian called me back. He gave me the price (which was less than Home Depot) and said he could schedule it for the next day. Brian was friendly, always smiling and I felt very comfortable with him in our home. He did quality work, he took no short cuts. He went above and beyond what was necessary. He even put in a valve so we could turn the water off inside and a ground for no extra charge. By the end of the 90 minutes I he was a friend. I would recommend Stan the Hot Water Man to everyone, Thank you Brian for the great work you did.

I called at about 7:15 a.m. By 4:00 p.m. that same day, a service man arrived. Within only 15 minutes, he was completely done! He showed me how to light the pilot light, should it ever go out again.

The service representative returned my call, did not commit a repair date until he confirmed a new tank was available. Found the correct 50 gal tank and arrived at my home within 2 hours. Estimated the repair time at 90 min to 2 hrs and took just over 90 minutes to complete. He was effecient and explained all that he was doing. Clean-up and carry-away of debris was done well. I'm very happy with the fast and effective service.

It went well. Nobody else could fix my water heater. The guy from "Stan" showed up, diagnosed it in 5 minutes, fixed it in 20, and all was well. Very nice service.

Very well. We called today (Sunday of Thanksgiving weekend) and this was the only company that not only offered service today but where we talked to Brent the technician directly (the phone number is to an answering service - the technician called us about an hour later). I described the problem, gave him the model and serial number and in discussing what were likely causes of the leak, decided that he should come out and take a look. He did NOT push to come out today, would have been fine having someone come during the work week instead, made sure I knew that if a replacement water heater was needed that the replacement could not be obtained today and also made sure I knew about the additional service charge (for weekend/holiday service). He was able to find the (minor) problem with the piping leading to the water heater and repaired it on the spot.

We were having problems with inconsistent hot water, and I fully expected that we needed a new water heater. I called, talked to a receptionist, and within 15 minutes got a response from a tech. I described the problem, and he suggested I try a few things first and then, if they didn't work, to call back for more help. I tried his suggestions and they solved the problem. Although they could have sold me a new water heater, they earned my everlasting support by not pushing me into the sale.

I read the AngiesList reviews of this company and thought they were too good to be true. I was wrong, they are GOOD. Price: Sweet! Professionalism: Very High! Speed: Who could ask for faster?

Plumber called me back and I gave him address and problem, he quoted me the price and I gave the ok to fix, he fixed the problem and called me after repairs were completed .

Dale came out and solved the problem within a few minutes. The water heater is now performing fine.

Our eight-year-old Rheem hot water tank had been leaking for awhile (at least a month) but got worse. We called the Appliance Guys (who don't do hot water heaters) and they recommended Stan the Hot Water Man. Brent came out and inspected the tank while my wife was home. The leak was welling up from inside the hot water tank and coming out the top. Brent figured this was due to a poor weld coating and explained the situation to my wife. My understanding was that fixing an internal leak would mean rebuilding the tank. We replaced the tank instead with a quote of $700. My wife checked Angie's List and found good grades, so we went ahead with the work. Brent was able to come out at 9am the next day and was done in under 90 minutes. During the replacement he discovered that the hot and cold had been plumbed wrong (reversed) on the old heater. He added hardware to the pipes to so that the hot and cold went in the right place (see picture) and explained how the heater had been working and how it would be working now. We still came in $1 under quote. Thanks to Bret we now have a hot water heater that doesn't leak and is hot at a 50% lower gas setting than the old one. I expect the new tank to last a lot longer than eight years.

We discovered on a Thursday afternoon that we had no hot water and called to schedule an appointment. We asked for and got an appointment the next morning. The technician called before he came to ask a few questions so he would be prepared with parts. He arrived, diagnosed, and repaired in less than an hour and we had hot water again.

I believe Steve is skilled at his job but does not pay attention to detail. I was unimpressed that he did not show up when he said he would nor did he call to tell me he would be late. I called the office and they had him call me. I don't know why he could not have called me prior to my calling. He finally showed up 2 1/2 hours after the original predicted start time of 9 a.m. I don't believe he should have left until he determined if the water would stop dripping from the external pipe, nor should he have left the final time before turning the water back on.

Stan the Hot Water Man (Brian) did a fine job of replacing our old water heater (23 yrs old!) with a new electric Bradford White water heater. Brian really knew his stuff; he was very pleasant and professional to work with; and got the job done in just under 2 hours as promised, and at the rate promised ($595). And, when he left he took our old hot water heater with him. We couldn't have asked for more.

He forgot my appointment. I showed up at the house, and I had to wait for him. I called him, and he realized he had doublebooked himself. I had to drive across town to wait for him, which I found unprofessional. We talked about how I was going to be receiving a certain kind of water heater, and then he installed another. I asked him to clean up his muddy shoe prints, and he told me he didn't have a rag. I had to clean up after him!

Damon was professional and efficient. He did some extra research for me on hot water heaters and got back to me promptly with answers. The new hot water heater is working great and we're very happy with it.

I was impressed with his skill and experience and he allowed me to watch him do the work. He work efficiently and allowed me to ask questions. He needed my input on several decisions he needed and was professional and curteious. He arrived at 10am and left at 11:30.

He was very responsive, honest and professional. He was very easy to work with and I would highly recommend him to others.

We have a big water heater so it's a bit more expensive. They knew we were going out of town and they were very responsive. They even expedited the service and didn't charge us for it. I was very thrilled.

I had arranged for another company to come look at my water heater and fix it if they could or replace it with another water heater. When the serviceman showed up he told me he didn't work on Powervent water heaters (and couldn't replace it) and to call Stan the Hot Water Man. I called and gave my information over the phone to the receptionist and told her the nature of the problem (the powervent would come on and the ignition would spark, but the pilot light wouldn't light). She told me one of the repairman that works on Powervent water heaters would call me back within about an hour. After two hours he hadn't called so I called them back to give them my cell phone number because I couldn't wait around the house any longer. But the serviceman (Randy) called back immediately and promised to be out between 3-5pm. He showed up in a timely fashion, checked out the water heater and quickly diagnosed a malfunctioning gas control valve. Unfortunately he did not have the spare part on his truck so he would have to come back the next day. This was my only slight criticism of the job the company did. Having explained my problem to the receptionist it would seem that they could have been better prepared to fix my water heater by having the parts with them. On the other hand, I also recognize that Randy was already out in the field and so it may not have been practical for him to go back to the store to get spare parts. So it's understandable. While he was here I also asked him about our recirculating pump for the hot water, which the previous owners of the house told us did not work. He told me what was needed and recommended fixing it because it would provide instant hot water upstairs. We made arrangements for him to come back the next day between 3-5pm. He showed up toward the end of that time window and did all the work in about 2 hours and got everything working well. He had to do some re-plumbing of the recirculation pump, adding a check valve and two ball valves. In the end, the installation of the pump cost more than I was expecting, largely because it took longer than I thought it would and the parts (fittings and valves) were expensive. Overall the cost seemed a little high, but not unfairly so. I was charged both for the 1st trip to diagnose the problem and then for 2 hours labor for the 2nd trip (when the repairs were actually made). In the end, however, I am extremely pleased with the work. I watched everything that Randy did and he really was very careful and thorough. Randy is very friendly and happy to explain what he was doing. He really gave me complete confidence in the work he did.

On Monday morning we found that we were getting only lukewarm water. We reset the water heater which in turn did start to heat up, but stopped heating again. When we called for service on Tuesday, we told Damon that if he couldn't come out that day, we can wait until Wednesday. He said he'll fit us in between 4-5 pm. He was here at 5, cleaned up the area around the thermostat and found that the igniter had shorted out on the plate mesh. He fixed the problem and said we shouldn't have that same problem again. He even took the time to explain how the system worked and how to perform maintenance care.