TOP HAT FIREPLACE & CHIMNEY SPECIALISTS

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good and professional

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My chimney was basically crumbling: the bricks were cracked and the mortar was virtually nonexistent. My hot water heater still vents through the chimney, but there is no fireplace. I set up a time for Dan from Top Hat to come to my home for an estimate. He arrived promptly and was incredibly thorough. He recommended dismantling the chimney and replacing it with a B vent. I had received an estimate from Hanson Brothers as well. Do do the same work, they estimated an $1800+ charge. Top Hat did it for a little over $500. The work was done in about 3 hours by two very nice and professional Top Hat employees. I did have to follow up with Top Hat for the formal estimate as well as scheduling the work, but other than that, the process was incredibly smooth and the company was a delight to work with. I'll be replacing my hot water heater next year, venting it out the side of the house, and I plan to use Top Hat for that job as well.

I thought the price was very reasonable. He was very informative..I learned a lot about what to watch out for and the maintenance of my fireplace, which I thought was of great benefit.

The test of superior client service is determined by how the company reacts when there is a problem. I will give the details below - objectively - and you can decide if this is a company you'd wish to work with. As mentioned above, we loved our Hearthstone wood burner in our old house so much that we decided to buy the same fireplace for our new house. We asked that Top Hat come out and estimate the work, which they did. We were minorly disappointed with this process as we were asking for the estimater to give us some ideas on where to install the unit, and he only came up with one location - smack dab in front of the large picture windows in the room. After thinking about it, we determined a better location for the fireplace. We wanted to make it would work structurally, so we asked Top Hat to come back out and verify the location. The guy came out and looked, but never bothered to poke his head in the attic. We placed and order for a and quot;factory secondand quot; fireplace, at an 18% discount. What we were told to expect is some slight and quot;poolingand quot; of the enamal - basically, some waves or ripples, not to be seen at a distance. We paid for the fireplace itself, and spent several hundred dollars building up a hearthpad with a fieldstone ledge, and slate tile on the wall. On installation day, two guys showed up about 9:15. Two guys, with no equipment, were expected to carry a 440 lb fireplace to the second floor of our house. I felt bad for them that their employer would expect that of them. They get the unit in place, and look up in the attic... only to realize the fireplace cannot be installed per the spec. After much diliberation, they found a way to wind the pipe through the rafters; initially they thought it would not be possible to install in that location. We ended up with a silver pipe sticking out of the front of our cedar house; the original spec had it exiting the back, barely visible from the street. Then I looked at the stove - it had sevearl large chucks out of the enamel, down to the metal. The installers called the damage and quot;substantialand quot; and the manager on the phone told me that typically the factory doesn't sell units with that level of damage. He said they'd and quot;make it rightand quot; and we determined the installation could continue as scheduled. Next, the installers determined the and quot;boxand quot; transition between the exposed and finished areas of the ceiling/attic was damaged. At this point, it's 1 in the afternoon, and the store is 15 minutes away. However, the installer told me, and quot;I'm not working until 7 to get this doneand quot;, do he decided he and his partner were done for the day. They left about 2:00, after cleaning up. I asked if I could expect to see them tomorrow; they said they had other jobs to do. I asked they come next Tueday (my husband was off work), and the manager told me no, they were booked Tuesday but could come out Thursday. He said they like to keep the same crew on the job. So we took another day off work, and they were here on Thursday for the install. Different crew. So I'm not sure why Tuesday or the following Tuesday wouldn't have worked... In summary, we received a severly damaged product, the unit was installed with a chimney on the front sideof the house so we have a gleaming silver chimney, and when the mistakes were caught, the Top Hat guys were more interested in geetting home than fixing my probem. I had to take add'l time off work to accodate their schedules. As a result, I asked for a 10% discount of $550. And they squawked. I ended up with $300 off and an agreement that they will come back with touch-up paint. I don't believe the compensatoin for the damage, placement of the fireplace, and inconvenience of time was fair. As a result, I am warning others of the service the provided to us.

They were responsive and reasonable. They did a thorough job. I left a voice mail and he called me back the next morning. We were able to schedule an appointment within that week. I would use them again and their prices were very competitive. You get what you pay for and they were certainly in the ballpark.

Roy Mjelde, the owner, came out to do our estimate. We weren't sure exactly what we wanted to do, and Roy generously laid out a number of options for us, including pros and cons of each. He also included both manufacturer and energy rebate information. The installation team arrived on time, worked tirelessly while they were here, and cleaned up after themselves better than I do! Bob and Doug were extremely knowledgeable, professional, and polite. They were far more upset than we when the job lasted a couple of days longer than planned. However, they refused to compromise the quality of their work reiterating repeatedly that they weren't finished until the job was done right, and that included extensive education to make sure we had every single question answered and were 100% comfortable with both of our new furnaces operations. Bob even left his personal cell number with us, instructing us to call him anytime with questions. Even though the job lasted 2 days longer than planned, we were not charged extra, and paid only the amount of the original estimate. We recommend TOP HAT FIREPLACE and CHIMNEY SPECIALISTS with complete confidence.

The crew arrived on schedule and replaced the wood-stove in the basement rec room with a pellet stove. They then installed custom fireplace doors on my over-sized wood-burning fireplace in the living room. Everything went smoothly. Everyone with whom I dealt (office staff, salespeople, crew) were knowledgeable, friendly and professional. They were honest with positives and negatives as well as all options before the sale was made. The crew showed me proper use and maintenance of both the stove and new doors. They thoroughly cleaned all areas before leaving.

After a traumatic and costly experience attempting to work with another local firm (Hansen and Sons), I was hesitant to work with chimney specialists ever again. I finally called Top Hat. They performed the chimney cleaning at a fair price and performed repair on the chimney cap at no charge since they had to remove it to complete the cleaning anyway. Crew leader, Kyle, was incredibly helpful to me, inspecting every inch of my chimney system and thoroughly explaining strengths and weaknesses with the system and recommending work I could consider in the future to address the weaknesses. An absolute pleasure to work with!!

Top Hat was very professional and they did an excellent job cleaning and inspecting the chimney. They cleaned up promptly, there was no mess. The sweeper was very knowledgeable about many different types of chimneys.

We walked into their showroom knowing little about getting a gas stove unit to act as a fireplace in our living room. Erik was EXTREMELY knowledgable about the products, and explained everything thoroughly. We left with confidence about what we wanted, and feeling like we had been taken care of. We went to another local showroom to compare prices, and encountered a salesperson that knew nothing about the products - and the prices for similar units were very comparable. We went with Top Hat and couldn't be happier.

Kyle called and asked if he could show up ahead of schedule. He was quick, thorough and professional. I learned a lot about my chimney/fireplace. Kyle was very responsive to all the questions I had. I thought the price was very fair for the information I received. I would definitely use Top Hat again in the future.

No call because of phone problems from field crew, come on.

The inspector came out to a home I am in the process of purchasing to inspect the chimney, he did a great job, took the time to explain the minor details that I asked about and really gave me the confidence that the chimney (which the inspector questioned) was in good working condition for being 70+ years old. They are a little disorganized as far as call backs (I had to call again), and as far as getting the pricing nailed down (not in a bad way, the price kept getting lower than the original estimate, but I expected to be able to write a check at service, and will have to mail it in to them).

We ended up not doing anything. Our fireplace was in good enough condition for small occasional use and did not require immediate attention.

Start to finish, Top Hat was absolutely great. They did a beautiful job of installing the insert, and obviously cared about making sure I was completely satisfied with everything they did.

It went very well. We went to TH's Madison store and talked with the manager (Gary), who gave us some materials to take home and gave us a rough cost estimate (which turned out to be within 10% of the final cost). After we got back to them with our selection, another employee came out and took detailed measurements. About three weeks after that, the electrician came out to run a line from the basement to the fireplace to power the fans (additional cost - not done by TH). The next day two TH guys came out and did the whole installation in less than half a day - quick, neat, and pleasant. Of course since it was August we haven't had a chance to try it out, but we expect it will all work as promised. It sure looks good (see photo).

I called the Madison, WI office on two consecutive mornings to schedule an appointment for a chimney sweep. On the first morning the receptionist said the person who schedules appointments was not available but would return my call. On the second morning the receptionist put me through to the scheduler's voice mail where I left a detailed message and my phone number. I never received a return call.

When we bought our 1877 house in Nov 2007, it just had a hole where a fireplace used to be. Three other local fireplace companies came by to assess it but just threw up their hands and left when they saw the complexity of our chimney situation. No one was able to figure it out. We thought it was hopeless until we were driving by Top Hat one day and decided to stop in. Without even seeing our home, Eric knew exactly what we were talking about and precisely what we needed. In fact, he told us we had several options! Top Hat reps (who, by the way are grown men with tons of experience vs. the kids we had been dealing with at other companies) came over THREE times to accommodate our style indecisiveness. We are not usually ultra-picky, but had to consider maintaining the historic character of our home and they were incredibly sensitive to that. Once, the owner himself came by during an ice storm and stood in six feet of snow while holding up a vent to the side of our house so we could decide whether we liked it or not. They had busy schedules and seemed to be doing booming business, so it was purely out of their devotion to customers that they were so responsive to us. There was no extra charge for all this, and they were always on time and stayed as long as we had questions for them. We went back and forth on the phone for at least a month with Top Hat as they coached us through what they needed from us, our electricians and masons in order to install. Finally, they installed the fireplace in a single morning, called to follow up about our satisfaction, then came back for a checkup to make sure it was working okay. I've even called with a couple quick questions, and they are so knowledgeable and willing to help. Their work was immaculate and service outstanding. We have worked with many contractors and companies in the process of restoring our home, and Top Hat was by far the best. Their showroom is awesome, too.

Top Hat did an great job of coordinating the project with the electrician and mason. Because we wanted to extend the width of the hearth, our carpet had to be pulled up during the masonry work. Top Hat arranged for a carpet company to stretch and cut the carpeting at no additional cost.