American Home Shield (AHS) has sent these guys out to our home three times in the last years, and the experience has always been bad.
In 2022, my water heater started leaking and needed to be replaced. They made me send them pictures, then came out and looked at it in person. I thought that they would fix it, but instead, they refused and said that the heater was still under warranty, so I would first have to call Rheem to get an RA number. I argued that this was their job, and Todd was very rude and left. So I called Rheem, which admittedly took quite a while, and got the RA number and they finally came back and fixed it after a week without hot water. The installation itself was fine, but their extreme rudeness made it very clear that their customer was AHS, not us.
In 2024, I had water leakage from a drain in my shower. Without spending much more than a minute, Todd "analyzed" that my shower pan was leaking and would need to be replaced, which they couldn't do because it would require removing tiles and basically redoing the whole shower. They said the plumbing itself was covered under AHS, but this was an "access problem", and that's not covered. I could call them to come back when all the tiles and everything had been removed. I asked him how he knew that the problem was the shower pan, and Todd referred to his many years as a "master plumber".
Later, a good friend of ours looked at the problem. He's not a master plumber but likes to tinker, and over the course of several months, was able to fix the leak by working on the drain plumbing alone. So, Todd's "masterful" diagnosis was completely wrong.
This month, the same water heater that Todd had replaced in 2022 broke again. AHS once again assigned these guys. I sent pictures in advance, and was told to call Rheem and get approved for replacement, which I did. However, when Todd came out, he claimed that my Rheem warranty covered not only parts but labor as well, and therefore he could not do the job as part of an AHS claim. I asked why he couldn't just do the job right then and there, since either AHS or Rheem should cover his labor, but he said that Rheem was notoriously bad at reimbursing for labor costs, so he couldn't do that and I would have to find someone else to do it through Rheem. He also sent me an excerpt from the Rheem warranty where supposedly it said that labor was covered. I didn't see where it said that and asked him to show me where, but he couldn't. I asked where he got the information that Rheem covered labor, and he said that he's a master plumber and has been doing this for years, so he knows. Then he left.
I went through the Rheem website to find an approved installer and called them, and they told me that Rheem warranty doesn't cover labor. I called Rheem to confirm this, and they sent it to me in writing.
Could it be that Todd really just doesn't know what he's talking about?
I'm more inclined to think that he is doing this completely intentionally. The last two times he was already on the phone with the AHS dispatcher when he walked in, ready to give them his bogus diagnosis, collect his $75 trip fee, and leave. AHS is probably also pleased, since they end up paying less if he just declines the job rather than does any real work that he could charge for. At least from my experience, Todd's more of a master scam artist than a master plumber. Surely he'd be out of business a long time ago if he wasn't in cahoots with AHS. read more