Called about malfunctioning AC in spring 2022 . We just bought the house, and this was our first spring living here, so this was our first experience with the AC.
April 22nd - Upon inspection, William said we would need a new control board, and the price wouldn't exceed $500. At the end of the visit, he quoted us exactly $500 and said he needed to leave to fetch the board, but that he would return that same day. We agreed and paid for the board ($450 with discount from purchasing 1 year maintenance plan) along with 1 year of maintenance from Clout ($190). He did not return that day. Our house was 80 degrees with broken AC, but I get it, things happen.
April 23rd - William returned the next day and replaced the control board. We asked to see the old board, and he said he would leave it with us. But he never produced it before leaving, and we never saw it. We texted him right after he left asking about the old board. No response.
One week went by, and the AC was malfunctioning in the exact same manner it was initially. We called Clout and received a callback from Preston stating they would come out in the next few days. We asked for someone other than William, since he failed to fix the issue the first time. We also asked about the old control board. Preston indicated they still had it (as a manner of procedure for situations like this one), and that they would bring it with them.
May 2nd - A new tech we hadn't met yet arrived to take another look at the AC. This time, we were told about a significant amount of mold, and that we should look into replacing the entire system. Also, the current system was not hooked up correctly (note that William had just replaced the control board a week prior). 20 minutes later, who showed up unannounced to give us a lengthy sales pitch about a new $14k system? None other than William, the guy who had already charged us $500 for a new control board, hooked it up incorrectly, and failed to notice the vast amounts of mold. We found this to be in pretty poor taste, especially since we specifically asked for someone else. However, the system appeared to be working with the help of the new guy, so we declined the new system at this time. Still no sign of the old control board we'd been asking to see, so we were starting to get skeptical.
Another week passed, and the AC started to malfunction in the exact same manner once again. We called Preston to schedule another visit. We again asked about the old control board that was replaced (to this day Clout has never been able to actually provide it). Preston's response was to offer us a refund, wanting to "wash his hands of the situation" (his words), and accuse us of playing games. Needless to say, we were surprised to hear this coming from the person whose sales pitch touted integrity and customer satisfaction as core tenets of Clout. It would have been very easy to just return the old control board, like we had been asking - no games necessary. At any rate, summer was approaching, and we just wanted working AC, so we laid off on wanting physical proof of the initial work William did, despite all signs pointing to him jumping the gun in pushing unnecessary repairs on us. We agreed to Preston's suggestion of a more methodical approach to diagnosing the issue with our system. Not sure why this wasn't the goal of the initial "diagnostic" visit, but ok.
Clout visited for a third time, and they determined a likely cause of our issue was a faulty zoning system (our house has 2 zones). They wanted to rule it out by disconnecting it (the zoning system) to see if the system worked without it. Surely this could have been explored before trying to sell us an entirely new system. Up until this point, it had been about a week between visits, so Preston suggested that they would wait a week before checking in to see how things were going.
It is now November, and the system has been working fine following the removal of the zoning system, so I think it's safe to say the core issue has been identified. And the solution won't involve us buying a new $14k system. However, we still haven't received the followup we were promised for next steps, and our two-zone house continues to operate as a single zone until the zoning system can be addressed.
The only reason our rating isn't one star is because Clout did eventually get the AC working, even if it was at the expense of our system running with full functionality. Transparency and communication have been overall pretty bad. Giving us the runaround on the replaced control board was unprofessional - as was the attempt to refund us and back out of actually completing the repair. My experience with this company tells me that if it doesn't involve a quick fix/sale, they don't really want the business. Despite pre-paying a year of maintenance (as of this review I am paid through next spring), I won't be calling them for the remaining visits. read more