Oct 20, 2020 I'd been calling around for a wk about a Sewage back up in the house: flush the toilet, it backed up into the tub; flush the other toilet and the stall shower Pan started filling; then the toilet stopped flushing. The home warranty company assigned a company that wasn't going to come for 8 days but recommended that I call around to find my own plumber, send them the bill after paying out of pocket while unemployed and having zero income/told me that they'd reimburse me : Max spend $500.
He came at 9:29pm, about 15 mins after my distress call; I was very grateful. I made the mistake of telling him the spending limit per the insurance co. was and his eyes lit up like $ signs and that is what he charged me. I asked for rates for a blockage service and he wouldn't give any. Said he was just trying to get us up and running so we could use the toilet and at least bathe. Cool right? Except that that's not what happened at all.
He went under the house in the crawl space, looked for an additional clean out, said we're supposed to have 2, but found nothing out of the ordinary. Didn't take any photos because he brought his son with him who was sitting in the car watching videos on his phone. Cool, family business, I guess. Recommended some liquid drain maintenance stuff.
Last yr this happened, the plumber that came used a metal snake on a wheel, plugged it in, snaked the clean-out all the way to the back of the house and got all the blockage out. You could see that it was like a dam had burst and all the water was flowing freely.
Well he didn't use that metal snake like the last plumbers. He hooked up my Waterhose to something with a rubber bubble on the end, put the water on full blast after stuffing it into the cleanout. Then had me go flush the toilets&run the water in all the sinks/tub. He said most plumbers use that metal snake are doing more work than they need to. The tub and shower trickled down the drain a little but I flushed each one a 2nd time and the tub&shower started filling up again. Ran out to tell him before he left and he said that then blockage was behind the sink in the garage, since that was running out. Brainstormed/decided to snake the garage sink, since the blockage was 'approximately in that area'. He removed the garage sinks p-trap to put the snake in and "cleared the blockage that way" but now all off the blockage and sewage, plus the water that he blasted in with that bubble thing up front were flooding the garage, under the sink, washer, and dryer, under moms antique wooden dresser and chest... and had his friend try to siphon the flooding water into the lawn area with a hose... He said 3x the blockage was clear, ok to use the showers/toilets but don't use the laundry/garage sink since the pipe wasn't connected in the wall. Found a flange or something in the truck but it didn't help put the pipe back on. "But at least everything is up and running right?" Tipped him and his friend $40 in cash for coming out so late and gave the 3 of them each a water bottle. They left and we cleaned up all the flooded sewage in the garage as best as we could and hung those towels out in the yard since we weren't allowed to use the laundry...but the more I thought about it, it didn't sound right. So I asked again the next day if it's ok to use the showers/sinks, he said yes it is clear. But if there's a hole where the pipe was now broken... wouldn't that mean that the water flowing down the drains would go out the hole??? He said no, it flows clear out.
The insurance had to send someone else out to fix what he "fixed". Their Plumber called and recommended NOT using any of the facilities. Great. And then when HE came ELEVEN DAYS LATER!!!(because they were still backed up&now I was at the end of the service line since my original call was cancelled because The Plumbing Two "fixed" it) he found that the drainage pipe that The Plumbing Two had snaked from the garage was completely cracked off the main line under the house, made a giant hole, and caused flooding under the house. So I had to pay for excavation under the house ($600) for the other company to come cut and fix/replace the pipes that these guys broke, plus an extra fee for them to fix the garage sink from where The Plumbing Two broke off the p-trap / pipe that goes into the wall and couldn't get it back on.
I asked about needing a second cleanout and the other plumber explained that based on the square feet of the house that one in the front was sufficient and what was required by code. Ok then!!!
Pretty bad experience. Felt taken advantage of. Took the money, f'd up the plumbing even worse than it was than when they got here, and high tailed it out of here with my money, and we still couldn't use anything with a drain in the house. Nothing. For 11 more days.
I'm sure he's probably capable as a plumber since he's licensed and all, but definitely wasn't a right fit for our needs.
1 star for quick response and coming after hours. read more