spaisley

DO NOT LET THESE PEOPLE IN YOUR HOME. Had sewage backing-up into shower on weekend. Now that we know, should have called the city first since this is a main drain line to the sewer issue. Looked in Yellow Pages and found Service Rooter (this is a trademark and not company name so not listed in BBB or Homestars - the company name is Rapid Rooter (not indicated in Yellow Pages)). Published website in Yellow Pages www.plumber.ca does not work. BBB has warnings against this company based on many many unresolved complaints and court actions against them. All this was found out after-the-fact when we started to feel we had been ripped-off. We couldn't find clean-out in basement so we had to pay extra to remove toilet and rooter work done from there - so far expensive $700 but all agreed to and they appeared professional. I had signed paperwork at original quoted price which was approximately $600 but without toilet removal. Multiple revisions and cross-outs later, prices ballooned and were different than verbally given. They quoted prices out of a binder with what were made out to appear like Government of Ontario rate tables giving credibility to their exhorbinant prices - we questioned what the prices were and were told they are the going rates. After they cleared the drain, they asked us if we wanted to see where the problem was coming from by them doing a video for an extra $350. We wanted to know so we agreed. The plumber showed me the video and that it was roots and explained we had PVC pipe connected to clay pipe and that the roots were growing in the clay pipe. Note he didn't give us a copy of what we viewed on screen. He then asked if we wanted him to locate the problem and this would be another $350 but he wasn't going to charge us whether or not we went with them for excavation and repair. He located problem with some device and marked location. I wanted to know if it was on city property or my property. He said the city's responsibility was at the curb which was completely and totally false ((we had city come in after and not only is there no clay pipe - it's all pvc, the property line is well up our lawn and right by the start of the problem area). They quoted us $7200 + tax for excavation and replacement of clay pipe with up to 12 feet of pvc and said all the work he had done plus $700 repair to a toilet flange would be covered in the $7200 fee. He said it would be a $1200 deposit. He then went off to write everything up. Quite a while later he came back - I was preoccupied with work and presented two credit card bills - one for the deposit (oddly with taxes on it) and the other for the charges. I hadn't done the math in my head and he had withheld the quote paperwork until I had signed the credit card receipts (I had confused the deposit one with the charges one so hadn't realized that he charged over $500 for the video (verbally $350) and charged for the location which he said would be free. After they left, I got around to reviewing the paperwork and realized the discrepencies. We called them twice to indicate to hold off doing the excavation based on the property line issue and we wanted out deposit back. They said the technician would have to call us (the people on the phone indicated they were just an answering service which may be the case part of the time but I'm skeptical it's all the time). The technician never called back and we are out of pocket for $3300 for what the city would have done for about $550 given that we ultimately only had the rootering and video and location done.