Deml

Have just booked the third appointment for my furnace maintenance under the Home service protection plan. A "no show" for the first appointment in November. I was told I must have written down the wrong date. Todays appointment (60 days later was the earliest available) "was not dispatched properly"?? I am booked again for tomorrow. Let's see what happens...
I had issues with both a new (re-packaged)air conditioner (it still vibrates too loudly) and replaced water heater (pipes banging against the duct work)installed two years ago. I am assuming there is a customer "hit list" for those who protest too loudly.
Who does provide customer service anymore?

I scheduled an Annual Maintenance Check with Direct Energy on Tuesday January 12, 2010. I was able to get an appointment for Friday January 15, 2010 at the time I requested. The Service Technician showed up promptly on the appointment date. He was courteous and very professional. I was there as he serviced the furnace in a professional and efficient manner. At the end he informed me of his findings and gave some pointers on how to maximize my furnaces operation.

I'd just like to share with everyone a terrible experience I recently had with Direct Energy.

Monday:

Late Monday evening our furnace started to make aweful sounds whenever it would start up. I decided to call Direct Energy (DE) figuring it's a large company and that they'd have plenty of knowledgeable staff and would be able to service this quickly. Within minutes of the call I received an appointment for the following day between 9 AM and 1 PM.

Tuesday:

Early Tuesday morning (around 2 AM) the furnace stops working. We are notified of this by our newborn waking up and crying. We check the temperature and its about 16C in the house. Luckily I called for a service appointment the night before. Wife and child have gone to stay with family since it's about 15C in the house and will likely just get colder as the day progresses.

It's now about 12:30 PM and I receive a call of DE and they assure me that a technician is on their way, but will be running a little late. After waiting 'til 2:30 PM I decide to give them a call and see what the status is. The DE rep says that my appointment has been pushed to a 12 PM to 4 PM timeslot and that somebody would be there shortly.

At 3:30 PM I receive a call and they assume me somebody will be there shortly... but again, they're running little late. By 5:30 PM I'm freaking out. I call them back again to check on the status. I tell them that I need somebody soon because I fear that they'll need a part and they won't be able to get it in time. They tell me that they have the make and model of my furnace and that it's a common furnace and that everything will be fine. Oh, and my appointment was set back to 4 PM to 8 PM.

Finally somebody arrives at my door at approximately 7:30 PM. The technician goes to the basement and takes exactly 2 minutes to diagnose that I'll need a new ventor motor and will have to wait until tomorrow to get the part. The part will be delivered to the door and I will have to book another service call.

Wednesday:

I wake up around 7:00 AM and to my surprise the part is already here. By the way it's now 11.5C in the house. I then call the number that the technician left me and tell the rep on the phone that I'd like to get the part installed. She looks everything up and then tells me that the next available appointment is Thursday... at this point I am very unhappy. She tells me that there's nothing she can do and that she can possibly talk to "Planning" to see if anything can be done.

It's now Wednesday 10 AM and I'm still waiting to hear back.

We have a furnace plan and everything. What happened to the "font of the line" previleges? I can safely say I will never use or refer Direct Energy again.

B.

The service provided from first phone contact to completion of service call was excellent ... courteous, efficient and knowledgeable.

This visit was to determine the cause of insufficient hot water provision. The visit occured Jan. 11, 2009 and the case number was 13624912-1.

The technician arrived promptly at the time scheduled for the visit.
After checking out the water heater he told us that the issue was a plumbing problem and not a problem with the water heater itself. He then very patiently and thoroughly described what the problem was and made suggestions for how we might further explore it and eventually possibly remediate it. He was very professional and personable.

Thanks to DirectEnergy for excelent customer service.

Its so disappointing that Direct Energy charges all the big bucks but wash their hands off after the expiry of 90 days (110 days in my case). They are not able to stand by something as simple as a defrost sensor. The fridge worked for 100 odd days but the same problem of the ice accumulation on the freezer came back inspite of the fact that the technician spent two hours to troubleshoot and find the root cause of the problem. Now after repeated calling they want me to go through the same circle (diagonstics, parts etc) of bull crap. Wouldn't fall for this again and would never buy a GE again.

We had a newly installed high efficiency furnace in November.
Sells person was very knowlegeble and we were impressed by
services provided by company.We were assured that Amana high efficiency furnace is the best in the market,and in case we needed
services the Direct Energy has 700 crews to provide immediate
services. Month after installation there was gas smell coming from
furnace.
Embridge technician arrived promtly ,stating that Gas Valve is leaking.He shout down the gas and instructed us to call Direct Energy to make neccessary repair. We called Direct Energy customer
service, and asked to send us technician to repair the valve
in newly installed furnace.Ww were informed that we will have to
wait till tomorrow as they have high volume calls today.
We explained that it is emergency for us as it is extremely
called and we have small children at home.Not only it, we were
informed that we need to pay for technician services, depends
on technician's decision, despite the furnace is on warranty.
Stay away from Direct Energy!!!!!

I have an older hot-water heating system with a boiler. I had cold rads, even though I bled the air from them. The Direct Energy technician came in at the time the dispatcher said he would, and quickly diagnosed the problem as a flooded expansion tank, and fixed it. He answered my many questions about the set-up, and demonstrated insight and competence. He was polite and very personable. All in all, a very favorable experience.

Long over due for a furnace replacement. Although, it may seem pricey to some. I feel good about the product and the professional job they did. They were on time and pretty fast. They could have sealed things a little better.

My old furnace broke in the middle of the night. It wasn't too cold out yet but cold enough that it needed immediate fixing. I called them to get a diagnosis. They came and put a 'red tag' on it deeming it unsafe to use and took a part so it couldn't be turned on. I asked when they could deal with it. They said they'd call. 3 days later I get no call. By now my house is very cold (and I have infant twins). I call them to find out what's going on. Someone talks to me on that call. To my surprise, they try selling me a furnace that would have been about middle of the road as far as efficiency goes. They actually told me that I needed to do it right away because by 2010, the government is only going to allow high-efficiency furnaces but if I install that week, I could sneak by with it. I asked why they suggested a furnace that in 3 weeks would be illegal to install because it wouldn't meet government standards for efficiency. They said because it was cheaper. I'm not sure why, but they never even offered the more expensive (more efficient) route. Maybe it's because I look younger or because they have a bunch of them in stock they they desperately need to move before they are garbage. Either way, I am super disappointed in them and never had them complete the job. Though they did charge me $100 to tell me it was broken. Don't waste your time even having them come over. They should take some of the money they use on advertising and put it into better staff. Just a shameful group over there.

We had Greg come from Direct Energy come out to our home to diagnose and repair our washing machine. He did a quick and efficient job. Greg was very informative about our options and represented his company well.