Talk of The Villages Florida - Follow up to Pat the Plumber scam

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- Contractors and Services (https://www.talkofthevillages.com/forums/contractors-services-91/)

- - Follow up to Pat the Plumber scam (https://www.talkofthevillages.com/forums/contractors-services-91/follow-up-pat-plumber-scam-32479/)

They tried to scam us and we threw them out of our house. How do they stay in business?

Quote:

Originally Posted by Nana18 (Post 299663)

They tried to scam us and we threw them out of our house. How do they stay in business?

Unfortunately, not everyone in TV reads and posts on TOTV. They don't have the knowledge and experience of so many wonderful people to help them.

Why not contact angie's list

Maybe The Villagers can work with Angie's List to start of local version or just go bare and set up our own. Publishing is cheap. Constant updates can go on a website and distribution can be done village by village. There are organizers already available who represent the POA or VHOA. (I may have the initials wrong). Virginia Trace already has a list of recommended vendors on their website: www.virginiatrace.com
under Good Services List on the upper right hand side of the home page.

This is great information, the sad part is we hear this all the time in so many industries. Lets not even get started with golf car repair companies. I went thru 4 before I found a great one.

Looks like P the P will not be getting my business.

Quote:

Originally Posted by loonlovers (Post 298684)

Our friends were enroute to The Villages last week when they received a call that a leak had been detected outside their home and their water had been turned off. Since they had used Pat the Plumber before (for a very expensive gray pipe job) they decided to call him. About 15 minutes after I read your initial thread on the plumbing scam, they called me and told me that they were having Pat the Plumber do their repair and that the estimate was between $650 and $3,000! And, P the P had already charged their credit card $500 without even starting the work! I told them that TOTV members had listed numerous negative experiences and that they maybe should rethink their decision to use P the P.

They called TV Warranty Department for advice and the response was "Oh NO...do not let them in the door". The Warranty Department recommended a plumber who responded within an hour or so. The job was repaired with a foot of PVC piping replacing the section that was leaking. P the P estimate for a "quick job was $650 but he recommended the "full job" which involved digging up the yard from the road to the house which would run between $2500 - $3000.

Mike Scott Plumbing repaired their leak for $96 and advised them to use the $10 coupon from The Villages phonebook. He also recommended they report their experience to Seniors vs Crime.

Thanks again Laura and other TOTV members for helping save our friends a lot of money.

Mike Scott Plumbing is great. (Sorry, couldn't find the I Agree sign)

We have had this company do many jobs for us and have been very satisfied with the results. They are expensive, but give the price up front.

When we saw their rep recently, we asked about the complaint mentioned here. He said that the big price was for exchanging the "stops" to all of the water lines going to all water fixtures in the house. The replacement valves are more reliable and will prevent flooding caused by the eventual failure of the stop. He said that the stops tend to leak after they have been pulled and pushed a few times.

He also said that a retractment of the original complaint had been posted because this complaint was without merit (unless this was a different complaint).

Below is an explanation of the job as I found it on the internet.

Accor Plastic Angle Stop Valve
These valves were used in my kitchen and all three of my bathrooms, twin sinks in the master bath, so ten of these cheapo things. These seem to be very popular with builders & plumbing contractors who tout the 10 year warranty, I think its because they can just push them onto the copper stub, connect to the fixture and call it good. A little more money and effort during construction for good old compression valves would have suited me. Well I can say from experience that I really don't care for these plastic stop valves. Everytime I looked at one crosswise, it starts leaking and not a single one actually stopped flow to allow replacing a faucet, so as I upgraded each faucet, these were the first to go.

Shut off the house water supply and diconnect the hose from the faucet. You can then just unscew them counterclockwise to remove them, hose and all since they were crimped onto the valve. But because the copper gets cut by this action and there is a corroded ring left were the seal was, I've ended up up using a stubby tube cutter right below were the seal was to have a clean stub of copper to put a compression valve on.
You only lose about an inch of copper, so unless they really short changed you on the stub, this is the way to go.
If you don't like compression fittings, you could sweat on a male thread adapter and use a threaded valve instead.

Here is another dig at these Accor's, the only place in my house these weren't installed, for whatever reason, was at each toillet, these are standard chrome angle valves. Granted my house is almost 2x older than the 10 year warranty of the Accor's, but all three of the original cheapo chrome angle valves still work perfectly, same age, same water supply that rendered every single Accor in my house useless for shut-off. I even broke a couple of the cheap little knobs trying to "snap" them out to the closed position. Nuff said!
-Dvisr

tropicalkaren:

While I welcome you to TOTV, I must warn all newcomers that your support of Pat the Plumber is probably unwarranted!

My one experience with PtP was certainly expensive! I think that I might have actually made the required repair myself for less than $50, but I paid out close to $200! The "get it done, now!" attitude prevailed, unfortunately!

My next need for a plumber will NOT be answered by Pat The Plumber. Of that, you may rest assured!

SWR
:beer3:

Quote:

Originally Posted by gary42651 (Post 297875)

I am surprised to hear the Pat the Plumber is still in business. There is no reason to do this type of test on a tub in a residential home. If the tub doesn`t hold water just adjust the cable, or clean out under the pop-up. I bet there was no problem with the waste and overflow holding water. A test kit to do this for commerical applications cost $27.00. I have been a plumber (i hate to say) for 40 years, and have had my own business for 32 years, I have never heard of anyone ever doing this type of test on a residential tub. It would have been alot cheaper to just replace the waste and overflow. It has been my experience that most waste and overflow units on residential tubs last around 20 years.
I am happy to say that I just sold my Plumbing business in NJ and will be living full time in the Villages in a couple of weeks. If anyone needs plumbing advice feel free to contact me anytime, but I did hang up the tools....

Welcome to TV. Another nice guy....you'll fit right in! Thanks for the professional advice.

You posted previously that PtP agreed to refund all your uncle's money and that your issue was not with the quality of his work. Was that incorrect? I am not a fan of PtP but would just like to figure out what happened since that post indicated something different than your current thread. He tried to sell us an expensive hot water heater and came in under the guise of a "federally sponsored energy audit." When I learned who he was, after questioning his affiliation, I told him about the thread on ToTV. He promptly pulled out a copy of your email stating the situation was rectified. If it is not, then he may be using that email to try to clean up the bad rep he got from ToTV when it just isn't the truth.