BUYER BEWARE! THIS HAS BECOME A SCAM POOL COMPANY!…read more
Sound harsh? NO! It's 100% SPOT ON! Owner: Larry Robbin
Florida does NOT investigate companies that falsify water tests, trying to get you to buy uneccessary chemicals!
For 14 years I maintained my (designed) pool (50'x25'x10' deep 44,000 gal salt water pool) with crystal clear water.
March 2022 I had them test & recommend chems for my pool, as I was having surgery with an expected 30 day recovery, so I wanted to get my pool right before surgery.
I know about chemical reactions in pools. What I DIDN'T KNOW is that if your STABILIZER is high - outside the recommended range, IT WILL KILL YOUR CHLORENE - period. Even SHOCK won't work.
Pensacola Pools prescribed, INTENTIONALLY, double the amount of chlorene stabilizer I needed, not once, (I wouldn't have figured it out.... but TWICE, ... allowing me to "catch them in the act".
29 March 2022 they prescribed 21# of stabilizer, when a maximum of 10# was needed. Salt chlorene generators do not produce stabilizer, so from time to time you have to add chlorene stabilizer. I took their advice, put in 20# and had HIP REPLACEMENT SURGERY. 3 days later my pool was GREEN, first time in 14 years!
Over the following month, while using a dipstick daily showing showing everything was within normal limits (WNL) - What can be bad about normal-high stabilizer?
Over the next month, 3 days after having a hip replacement I needed to shock the pool & brush the "green" down to the deep end DAILY, despite the 105 degree heat.
I spent over $500 in chemicals - shock & clarifier, and salt attempting to get rid of the green algae. SHOCK should have taken care of it in 1-2 treatments, but no results. Thinking my Polaris was not working efficiently (after all, the chemicals were "correct" according to Pensacola Pools & my daily dipsticks) I rebuilt the Polaris with a rebuild kit (@$200). No joy. Replaced the cleaner hose swivels ($20) - no joy. Replaced the wall blow-out valve & backup valve (from Pensacola Pools) - no joy. Thinking the only thing left was maybe the pump wasn't sending enough water to the cleaner, I replaced the PB-4 booster pump ($450 + $150 to install) and still no joy. Finally I replaced the 4 paper filter cartridges thinking they may be not filtering (old) the algae, but again no joy. So now we are at 3 weeks in. 5 May 2022 the new booster pump was installed, and I took the water to be tested at 2 different pool companies - Pensacola Pools & Pinch-a-Penny Pools. Stabilizer @ 40-46 PPM (showing low due to the 3 weeks time) - pool still green. called to add 10-11#; added 8#. Had to divert my attention to a job, shocked pool 13 May. Still green. May 25-26 we had 8" of rain! (Measured with my rain gauge). Pool still green, so I cleaned the filter cartridges on the 28th.
29 May 2022 I had the water retested due to the previous rain. Up to this point. Pinch-a-Penny showed stabilizer @ 40 PPM (add 10# stabilizer); Pensacola Pools... AGAIN measured stabillizer at 41 PPM recommending 21# AGAIN! I added 20# and got CHLORENE LOCKOUT once again. Shocked the pool, cleaned the filters again.
1 June 2022 replaced the pool cleaner filters with (4x) NEW FILTERS ($200) as I thought they weren't working. 2 June 2022, perplexed, I had the water tested again. Pinch-a-Penny measured stabilizer @ 100 PPM, Pensacola Pools measured it @ 106 PPM. Both said I had to dump 2-3 feet of water out of the pool & fill it back up with tap water to dilute the stabilizer.
NOW it became apparent what had happened. Pensacola Pools DELIBERATELY prescribed double the stabilizer TO GET ME TO BUY CHEMICALS I didn't need in the first place! (You'll see why below).
3 June 2022 - I dumped 15,000 gallons of water & replaced with tap water.
4 June 2022 - Shocked & added clarifier - 7 June 2022 - pool was clearing up, added 6 bags of salt; pool is crystal clear again, as usuial. Has stayed that way through present day.
KNOW THIS: All... I mean ALL ... Pensacola Pools previous tests were done using the "eyeball" method (non-computerized) with the recommended chemicals figured from a chart in a book. Often, they would not put the date and name of the person testing the water on the test results! No accountability, plausable deniability. Thats EXACTLY what happened.
When I spoke to the "Store Manager", Ms. Debbie Welsh, she initially blew me off to her floor staff saying, "I'll put you in the pile (of to-do's) and get to you when I get things done". This was unacceptable, so I met her in person.
Well, she immediately tried to make excuses, using chemical excuse probabilities which were immediately debunked. Then she tried to insist they ALWAYS use the computer to test chems - I have the handwritten tests proving that a lie. She tried to make issue of me not buying my chems there. Debunked again. ADMITTED to overprescribing stabilizer. Said they would give $124 in "Store Credit". BS! Lost $1,400 because of them.