I hired Chimney Champs in October 2015 to clean two chimneys at my residence for the advertised price of $99 each. On the day of the job, I was at work and my wife was home to let them in. I was on the phone with the contractor while he was at my house. He stated that the two chimneys were too dirty and the price to clean them would be a total of $638.10. I reluctantly agreed.
When I came home, my wife told me that the Chimney Champs' representative told her he had broken the smoke pipe to one of the stoves. He had apologized to my wife and said that he would come back one week later to repair the pipe. When I inspected the two chimneys and stoves, I found that that smoke pipe to the other stove had been broken as well, although it was still usable.
One week later, a different representative returned. Again, I was at work. He told my wife that he didn't have the right parts to repair the first smoke pipe, and said he would be back in another week to finish the repair. My wife told him no, and that they needed to fix the problem before another week had passed, because of the impending cold weather. He stated that he would come back the next day, and would call to confirm.
We received no call, and no one came. My wife called Chimney Champs later that day. She spoke to the receptionist, Unique, who stated she would put it on the work order for the following week. My wife again responded that we were not willing to wait for another week.
The owner Charles Jasmine came three days later to make the repair himself. After he left, I came home and found that the first smoke pipe had been repaired. But the stove itself was completely off center, crooked, and in the incorrect position of the fireplace.
I attempted to call Mr. Jasmine to find out what went wrong. I left messages with the receptionist for a month, each time she said he would call me back later that same day, but he never did.
After threatening a report to the Better Business Bureau, Mr. Jasmine did eventually call me back. He again apologized. He stated that he left the stove wrongly positioned because he couldn't figure out how to make the smoke pipes fit correctly with the flu. He then said that he wasn't supposed to hook the stoves back up for safety reasons because I didn't have liners in the chimneys, but he did so anyway. Although the first Chimney Champs' representative had offered to sell me the liners, this was the first indication by Mr. Jasmine or any of his employees that hooking the stoves back up might not be safe, or that they were doing me some kind of favor by doing so.
Subsequently, I recorded video showing large amounts of soot in my chimneys that Chimney Champs claimed to have removed. The amount of soot in the chimneys could not have accumulated in the short time I have used it since Chimney Champs claims to have performed its service.
Mr. Jasmine said he would review my case and get back to me with some kind of resolution. I left many messages for him asking for updates throughout November but the whole month nearly went by without a call back from him.
Eventually, he called me back and said he would refund half of the $638.10. Yet again, I had to call back multiple times over the next month before finally, on January 6, I received a check from Chimney Champs, dated 12/21/2015, in an envelope post marked 1/4/2016 for $300, $19.05 short of the $319.05 he said he was going to refund me. I consider that a partial refund that does not even take into account the damage done to both smoke pipes.
On 12/29/2015, I filed a complaint on Chimney Champs with the Better Business Bureau. As a BBB Accredited company, it is mandatory for Chimney Champs to respond to these complaints. However, Chimney Champs completely ignored my complaint. BBB informed me "BBB contacted the above referenced company on multiple occasions regarding your complaint. To date, we have not received a reply; therefore, BBB is obligated to close your complaint as a 'no response,' which will be reported to the public for the next three years." Chimney Champs failed to do the job I paid them to do. First, they failed to honor their advertised price of $99 per chimney, and then they failed to actually clean my chimneys even after convincing me that I would have to pay over three times more than the advertised price. Worse, they damaged my property when they moved my stoves to make it appear that they were doing their job. They regularly failed to respond to me for weeks at a time and even ignored the Better Business Bureau. The business owner acknowledged that the job Chimney Champs did was incomplete and inadequate, and tried to appease me by promising to refund 50% of the price and eventually sending a check for a bit less than what he promised.
Chimney Champs should refund the full amount of $638.10 to me because not only do I need to fix my smoke pipes correctly, but I still need to have my chimneys cleaned. read more