Universal Mechanical Service Co Inc

We have used Universal Mechanical for a regular furnace tune-up twice in recent years: the last time in October 2012. Both times, we felt they did a good and professional job. Yesterday, my furnace stopped working because the igniter was becoming weak. I called Universal today morning and they sent someone this afternoon. I had agreed to a $129.99 charge for a diagnostic call. The repairman arrived on time, and soon was able to get the furnace restarted in a few minutes with the same igniter. He did advise replacing the igniter. I asked if he had the part with him and he said he will check. He returned in 15-20 minutes and presented me a bill of $460, which included $288 + taxes for replacement of the igniter. He had not advised me what it would cost or obtained my okay to carry out the repairs. The replacement igniter is a generic part that retails for around $20. A long and unpleasant conversation with the manager (Ms. Lenora) followed. Lenora declined first to tell me what the breakdown of $288 was in terms of parts or labor. Eventually, she said that she would reduce the replacement charge to $95 for the half hour of extra labor to replace the part and $96 for the part. Rather than prolong an acrimonious conversation, or be left with a cold home, I agreed to pay. There are many igniter models and there is no question that this is one of the cheapest, standard, generic type that sells for around $20 retail. I hate to give any provider a bad review but I do feel I will not be able to trust this firm -- Universal Mechanical Services -- again for honest repairs. For others in a similar situation, I have two suggestions. If you use this or other firms for tune-up, ask them specifically if the igniter (which generally doesn't last more than 3-5 years) is worn out. I felt that the last serviceman during his tune-up should have advised me and done the repair at that time. Second, if you use Universal or another firm, make sure that they advise you of repair costs before they carry out the repair.

polite on phone but high cost estimate

Rhett Meyer, arrived on time, explained what he was doing and highlighted what might need to be done down the road. His job was clean, thorough and professional at both houses.

The only thing I would have done different was call quicker to schedule the appointment.

My AC is broken, the fan doesn't spin up itself, it needs a push and then working for a while, and stops again. I thought it's just need some tune up and lubricating, then I bought the $59 tune up coupon, however it turned out that the resister is broken. They did the tune up service, and made me a quote of $6xx for replacing the whole motor, later on they came to repair it, the technician found that it's not the motor's problem, my motor is good, just need to replace the resister, then the quote becomes just $3xx, I am happy to take this new quote and the AC was as good as before. Nice job.

Service people were prompt, extremely professional, and courteous. When I was having the furnace serviced prior to winter, the technician noticed that our thermostat was loose on the wall. He tightened it at no charge and also explained that I could upgrade the thermostat if needed to include a fan only option. Work was done quickly and well! We were very impressed so called the company back to enlarge our cold air return upstairs. The technician made a small error when installing the new cold air return which was discovered after he left. Universal was extremely prompt and gracious about fixing the error and our air conditioning works much better upstairs. Overall, this is a great company that offers excellent service and is highly recommended!

I called and set up an appointment. The serviceman arrived on the scheduled day and was very professional. He didn't take very long to do the job and cleaned up after he was done. I would use them again.

It's relatively easy to get an appointment and the technician got here on time. He cleaned the furnace and checked it. He highly suggests we replace it with a new more energy-saving model and left some pamphlets. We are not interested right now, so he suggested getting a chimney sweep service and we declined. Later we found a deal with a better price. After the technician left, we noticed that he didn't replace the filters in the furnace, which some other service companies do.

They were here on time and did the work in about 1/2 hour and then left. Everything went as expected.

This company was great to deal with. Very easy to set up service and professional. Everyone was on time and I even was given the tech's cell phone number for contact. Assessment of furnace and central air went well, and I was pleased overall with the service provided. The quality grade slipped to a "B" grade because the tech did forget to re plug in my condensation pump, causing a tiny bit of water to overflow. I did notice this early on, and called the tech on his cell and he immediately new his mistake and I was able to simply plug the cord back in. We are all human, and the tech was apologetic and professional, so no big deal.

Great, they arrive on time, did the tune up and were professional.

Rhett arrived promptly at 2:00. He spent an hour going over the entire workings of the furnace. He also gave a quick look at the A/C unit. He answered all my questions and gave tips for keeping it working at optimal performance. Even gave me a website to get a decent filter.

I had my furnace maintained and checked for performance during the winter last year. The guy that came was on time, polite, friendly, efficient and didn't try to sell me anything. My furnace got a clean bill of health and I got important advice on how to keep my furnace running efficiently. For instance I need to wash my electro-static filters once a month, and was told not to close off any heating vents because it puts pressure on the furnace when it can't blow the heat into my small house freely since my furnace is actually bigger and more powerful than this house needs. I purchased an on-line coupon for service for this year and when I called the office to make an appt in the Fall the woman checked and found out it had been less than a year since I had the maintenance done so I didn't need an appt yet. Great customer service!

The company was very professional and performed exactly what I had expected. The cost without the Deal coupon would have been too much for me, so I would not choose this firm without such a deal. I had later checked with the company to price out a replacement motherboard for the furnance as the board was fried later as some water dropped on the electrical components.

We were thrilled to be given an honest evaluation of our furnace - yes it was older, yes it had some parts that were becoming worn, but Universal was excellent in advising us about future repairs rather than encouraging us to hurry and make those repairs immediately just so they would have more services to perform. We will definitely hire them again when we do need service.

We purchased this as a deal. We had expected the work to cost $99 but ended up spending close to $400 in total when adding the additional vents and other add-ons. The deal was misleading. That being said, the work was performed well.

They were punctual, courteous and very efficient. They installed the valve, restarted the appropriate pilot lights and then ensured that the overall system was working correctly. They also explained the functionality of the shutoff valve and how to reset it in the event of it being tripped. I would definitely use them again for other heating jobs.

during the initial inspection, liquid was discovered inside the fan housing area. The liquid was misdiagnosed as water. We received a second opinion which traced the cause to another source.

We purchased the Big Deal Angie's List offers with this company for a furnace tune-up and inspection. Upon calling the company, they told us that we would not be able to secure an appointment until February. This didn't work for us, as we need an inspection due to selling our home in the next month. They then told us that if we wanted someone to come out right away, the price increases to $199. They noted they had an incredible response to this $59 offer, and only had 2 technicians available to manage all the $59 appointments. Apparently the technicians they have that you pay $199 for are not able to assist - interesting. Regardless, wanted to share our experience, as we were very disappointed with the way this was handled, and wanted to give fair warning to anyone else who purchased this deal. This could have been handled much better rather than to be put off for 3 months, in my opinion. We won't be using nor recommending this company based on our experience.

Technician was on time, pleasant and knowledgeable. Also looked at our gas hot water heater. I would use this company again in the future.

Rhett, our service tech, was very thorough, very courteous, and did a wonderful job of communicating with us. Our appoint was late morning, and he gave us a courtesy call about an hour and a half earlier, to let us know he was running about 15 min. late. He showed up at the time he said he would and let us know the work would take about 1/2 hour. When he was finished, he let us know everything was running fine and had also checked out our water heater for proper operation. He went above and beyond by installing aluminum duct tape over the joint between return air duct and the furnace, to provide a better seal, at no charge. He also advised us of some furnace installation concerns, regarding the condensate pump (not wired to shut off furnace if it quits working, and hot wired into system [should have installed a separate 110v outlet, outside of furnace]), and the exhaust piping outlet was located closer than recommended to the whole house ventilation fan duct intake. While we chose not to change any of these items, we certainly appreciate his bringing them to our attention! Based on this and previous experience with UMS, we highly recommend them to anyone considering having maintenance or repairs performed on their heating system!!!

Good. Rhett arrived on time, checked furnace, found a cracked heat exchange, gave options, estimates for repair, replacement of furnace part also for tankless gas water heater and options for moving water heater.

I contact the company due to the reviews and the service coupon they were providing. The technician arrived the day of the appointment approximately 20 min late. He immediately went to work. I'm not sure what was done because I did not watch over his shoulder. I'm sure he checked the heat exchanger because he told me it had been replaced which i already knew. The filter was changed and the furnace was given a good bill of health in approximately 45 min. When the technician left I handed him the pre-purchased coupon from Angies list and off he went. No extra charges.

Arrived as promised and did a quick install.

The overall experience was wonderful! I called UMS because they were highly rated on Angie's List and they were able to come out that day. This was very important because it was in December and we were without heat. Ignacio Lopez diagnosed the problem and explained everything to me in detail. He told me it would be about $900 to get it running. ( This price included the $129.95 diagnostic fee.) We weighed the pros & cons of fixing vs. replacing and decided on repairing. ( I was impressed that he didn't try to talk us into a new furnace.) Ignacio didn't have a inducer on his truck and UMS didn't have any back at the shop. Fortunately for us, he started calling local suppliers and found one. He came right back, installed the part and we had heat! Premium service and wonderful technician. Ignacio had all of the qualities that you hope to find in a technician. He was smart, friendly, and trustworthy. If we are in need of any HVAC service in the future, we'll call UMS and ask specifically for Ignacio Lopez.