Today I had my semi annual maintenance check on my HVAC system. The letter I sent to ARS (the company I use) explains my issue..Read it and see if anyone else has the same problem....

Today I had my semi-annual maintenance check. One of my thoughts before the serviceman came was “what are they going to try and sell me this time?” Sure enough, when he came, he tried to pawn off some additional piece of equipment and/or service. One piece of equipment cost $125, the other service was over $400. The second item was absolutely essential he said or the compressor might burn out. Based on what he said I had no choice but to get it.
Here is my issue. I pay over $600 a year in a maintenance contract. In the 7 years I have lived in the house (we had it built so the system was installed then) I have spent a total of $4200 in maintenance fees to your firm. This is almost the total amount I have paid for home insurance for the same period. When you start trying to push additional products/services on me I begin to wonder what the heck the service contract is for. I conversed with your serviceman about my concerns on this matter…he said that the $600 is cheap…that it cost over $250 to flush out the system (per system—I have two of them) if I didn’t have a contract…a job that takes less than 20 minutes. So that is covered, but what else am I getting for my $600+. And if you are charging over $750 per hour for maintenance service functions—if I did not have a contract---then that to me is a huge ripoff. Should I complain to the Fairfax County office of consumer affairs? What am I getting for my $600? Please give me the details.

The whole point of maintenance contracts (in my view) is for preventative maitnenance and to ascertain the problems before your system takes a shit. I have a hard time believing that suddenly you need a whole new piece of eqiupment that you didn't need 6 months ago. They'd sell more of that crap if they sort of primed you a few visits in advance, dropping hints like "you know, if it starts looking like X, then you may need Y. You're not there yet, but you could be. Let's keep an eye on this".

Nope, instead they try to force feed you shit you don't need.

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That's not a ladybug, that's a cannapiller.

Dont waste your time complaining to the FC Consumer affairs.

Just look for another company, get 2 more estimates and compare. He might be right, or they may just be overcharging you.

Theres got to less expensive companys that do the same work, just look for them.

not worth it Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Dont waste your time complaining to the FC
> Consumer affairs.
>
> Just look for another company, get 2 more
> estimates and compare. He might be right, or they
> may just be overcharging you.
>
> Theres got to less expensive companys that do the
> same work, just look for them.

Shop around.

I believe one other thing you are getting is a guarantee that the manufacturers warranty is still valid. If you don't do the routine maintenance they can say the warranty has been voided. I do however feel it is a rip off, they charge you all that money and all they really do is clean the coils and check the temperature of the air coming out. I replaced both the inside and outside unit a few years back and I received two free years of maintenance, each time the tech came he was in my house for about 10 minutes.

See previous thread: http://www.fairfaxunderground.com/forum/read/2/370169/604705.html#msg-604705

I do not wish to slander anyone here so just let me say that my previous experience with ARS and a few others has been bad in my opinion.

Ars was at one time known as General heating, Keenan and a few others that were bought out (a couple times i think) by a huge coperation. Those reliable, honest privately held companies provided a good value for their clients in my personal opinion. You can form your own opinions about the current owners. I now use a contractor from manassas that I love. Advanced heating and air 703-791-6500. Im not sure if they service all of NOVA but they do work in centreville and clifton. The owners name is George.
The down side to using a small contractor is that they dont do 24 hour service and they get backlogged with work in hot weather but at least they are more likely to be straight with you.
I dont like being without A/C so I keep a couple small window A/C units on hand in case of emergency.

Call my cousin and tell him Paul referred ya. 571-287-9454. Best rpices around and he has been doing this for 8 years.

The last time I had a scheduled maintenance check they tried to sell me about 10 different things. Unfortunately, I don't know which of those 10 I really need. One thing they seem to consistently push is duct cleaning. Another is "new and improved" air filters.

BTW, I had to replace both the heating and cooling systems in a property I own a couple of years ago. I found that there is a HUGE discrepancy in prices between different HVAC companies, with the largest and most well know charging the highest. It really does pay to shop around.

If you had Disney plan for roads on your HVAC, you would have seen this coming. Sad you didnt. Shop aroud more.

Had a service contract with crap meta poop, we purchased it because of a leak and they came to patch it or claimed they did. After we signed the contract the freon was low again in a few months, they claimed they fixed it and then come the next year freon was low again. Before we cancelled we had a small company coke out and they said it was obvious the coil had a.leak under warranty. All in all crap meta did was.call every few .months tying to sell items and upgrars. I did a capicator which i oked for 75, then they couldn't find any other upgrades and started recommending things like whole house surge more ridiculous crap.

I was planning on writing up a bunch of stuff here......I've been a residential HVAC service technician sine 1992......but then I remembered this site I saw recently:

top ten marketing lies from the HVAC industry

Its not spam or a virus or anything.....but I put it on that line in that format so you can copy/paste that line into google first, and check it out!

That guy pretty much says exactly the real truth!

Later!

Maintenance contracts are a waste of money. Do you really think two service inspections a year will cost you more than $600? Don't be stupid.

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http://bible.cc/1_corinthians/13-11.htm

Duct cleaning is BS. A Con.


If you use air filters in your HVAC, which you should, nothing downstream should be dirty.

We have a 15-year-old system (with 25-year-old ductwork), and I poked my head in, and everything downstream of the air filter looks great. I even pulled out the floor vents and looked at the ductwork with a mirror, and they looked impeccable (we had circulation issues that were later diagnosed as a hidden damper that was partially closed). The only areas that were dirty were the immediate area underneath the vent, where dirt, cat food, etc., could fall down into the ductwork. If you were to base your inspection on a cursory glance into the floor vent, then you might think that the whole ductwork was filthy, when it wasn't.

The one area that was a little dirty was the return air ductwork. I had to add a return air vent to the basement (the former owners neglected to do that when they finished the basement), so I got a good look at the return air ductwork coming from the ground and 2nd floors. Yes, they were dirty, but really not too bad for 15-25 years of use.

But, hey, I'm the kinda guy who vacuums the return air grilles once a month. In addition, I use a Roomba several times a week (while at work), and I think that has a far greater impact on dust buildup in the house than the HVAC does.

WE live in Arizona. When we bought our present home we were informed that the heat pump was about 5 years old. Now almost 10 years later the heat pump still heats the house in winter and cools it in summer and uses the same kwhs that it did when we moved in. The only maintenance it has had is an internal fuse replacement needed because the lawn service cut a control wire. I am not real religious about replacing filters.

We have lived in AZ of 45 years and have never had an AC tune up. The only heat pump we have ever replaced was to up grade a 20 year old SEER 5 to a higher efficiency unit.

Duct cleaning- Probably less that one house in 50,000 need it. If you could check air particle counts before and one hour after a duct cleaning they would almost always be the same.

I have a maintenance contract but it's only about 200 per year. No sales pressure when they come for the inspections.

The main reason I have the contract: When it's 100 degrees and the A/C takes a shit, my service call gets priority over a non-contract customer. The company swears this is the case, and the time that it actually happened, they were there within a few hours. So I believe it.

Here's my take on Maintenance agreements and HVAC systems in general. 15 years HVAC experience in the Atlanta market.

The #1 factor in how well your system performs and the life of your unit comes down to Installation. Was it installed correctly from the beginning. Was short cuts made, was everything sealed properly, was ductwork ran correctly, refrigerant lines leak checked, refrigerant charged correctly, etc.

If maintenance agreements are preformed/priced correctly then they provide value. In the southeast these agreements should around $200 per system/per year.

At minimum after the normal checks they should provide:
At least 10% off parts
Priority service over non-agreement calls
No after hour/emergency call fee (standard service fee)

The job of a good Tech is to check the entire system out while there.
Educate the customers
Notify customer of any issues found and let the customer decide if they would like each issue fixed or wait until another time.
I do not believe in pushing un-needed/un-wanted products

If I do all the above correctly, educate you, find real issues, save you money, make you completely happy then I should have you as a long term customer.

There are techs that go on calls and only look at/fix what the main issue was. By not looking over the whole system while there is cutting the customer short-You did pay to have a Tech come out to your house after all.

Weather he finds multiple issues or none, he provided a better service for that service call fee. You may not want to pay more for other issues but at least you're aware of them now.

If your system is 3 years or less in age, I wouldn't recommend a Service agreement.

...but warranties should cover virtually everything for the first X years. My HVAC company will not sell a service contract on a unit until the warranty has expired. After that, I pay about $275 annually for each of two separate A/C systems and one heating system for a 3000 sqft house. That includes one free inspection per system each year, and it also includes free parts and labor on any system that needs any sort of service at all during the year. These things do eventually wear out and need to be replaced. That's where they make their money. As for add-ons, surge protectors on the main electrical panel and each major HVAC device might be a good idea. Particularly if your area gets a lot of lightning strikes.