There is currently a trend among appliance repair companies in the Greater Charleston area, and especially a lot of the newcomers, to try and not repair appliances. To explain better I’ll relate an experience I was told by one of my clients this week.
He had called out one of my competitors to check his refrigerator which wasn’t cooling correctly. He said the technician came in without a toolbag, only carrying a small flashlight. After my client explained the issue, he pulled the refrigerator out from the wall and peered behind it with the light and proclaimed that the compressor was bad and that the refrigerator wasn’t worth repairing. He then collected a 149.00 service charge and was gone.
My client was shocked and angry to say the least, the technician had only been there 15 minutes and the client felt that there was no way he could have done an accurate diagnosis, and I confirmed his suspicions. After a full round of diagnosis, I discovered that the defrost heater on the unit had gone bad and blown the 12v transformer on the control board.
The block of ice that I discovered in the bottom freezer was a result of this. Without being able to defrost the coils on a regular schedule, the unit had frozen up and was unable to circulate air properly into the refrigerator.
When I showed my client the block of ice, which he hadn’t seen, he was amazed. “I hadn’t even noticed that!” he exclaimed. “The other guy didn’t even look in the Frig!” he continued, which was not surprising to me.
While the cost of repairing this unit properly was really too high, because of the age of the unit, and I advised him that his money would be better spent on a new unit (I like to make money as well as anyone, but I like to see my clients get their money worth!). So even though I had to give him some bad news, which I always hate to do, when I left he was relieved to have an accurate assessment of the refrigerator. He was also pleased that my service charge was significantly less than my competitors!
My goal is to repair any appliance that I feel my clients can safely invest their hard earned in, and if I don’t think it’s a wise choice, I will let you know.
So BEWARE any technician who comes into your house without a toolbag and is done in 15 minutes. In fact, I would advise you not pay them and threaten to contact authorities and leave terrible reviews on every platform available. In my opinion, you should not have to pay someone who hasn’t performed a reasonable service. There are companies and individuals who use Google Ads to come into an area and run this sort of scam until they get into trouble and then they move on.
One of the best ways to avoid these kinds of scams is to skip the ads in Google and scroll down till you get to the Organic listings and then be sure to read the reviews. Any company that has been in business for any length of time and that has a professional approach, like mine which has been doing successful repairs for almost 10 years, is going to have an organic listing. It takes time, integrity and patience to show up in the Google results, that’s why you generally won’t find scammers there.
In this past week, I’ve had to send several appliances to the junkyard, however a full 70% of the appliances I looked at I was able to repair. The majority of them on the same or next day. A few of them had to have parts special ordered which I can usually get within 2 to 3 business days.
So if you suspect that a company is trying to rip you off, you’re probably right! If you’d like a second opinion, please give us a call at 843 568 5936, I’ll be glad to help.
Also, if you need help with appliance repair in Mount Pleasant SC, we can help you in that area as well.
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