Rochelle warns you not to call for repairs without confirming contractors’ rates. She attained this hindsight after a 3-minute visit by Roto-Rooter cost her $300.
She writes:
I mistakenly called upon Roto-Rooter to attend to a cut pipe without finding out the charges in advance. My contractor, who was on site at the time of the plumber’s visit, assured me they were in attendance no longer than 3 minutes – they pulled up to the rear yard, entered the premises with the cap for the pipe, installed it and left.The cost of this visit is over $200 – $179 ‘call out’ plus tax. I called and complained. The Roto Rooter representative (Jeff) said their ‘call out’ charge is the industry standard, their service people of the highest caliber, etc, etc. I called around to three different plumbing companies and was given a range of ‘call out’ charges running from $89, $90, to $142. The Roto-Rooter representative suggested that I should have inquired about the price prior to using their service. I agree, I should have checked first. However, I was under some stress, had a cut pipe and a need to get to an appointment. Also, it has been my experience that service companies usually let me know right away, over the phone the charges that I can expect to pay. I anticipated a bill of $50-$60. $200 for three minutes work is outrageous – that works out to $4,000/hour. It also makes me wonder if the next person on the list for service is going to be charged the ‘call out’ charge for the same hour I’ve been billed.
What’s the most unfair you’ve ever been treated by a service technician who made a brief visit?
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I’ve had to call RR to my home twice in two years to fix two problems that were related (one problem the first year, related problem the second). While they were there, they told me I was lucky I didn’t need to have my septic system repaired, because it would cost me upward of $30,000. Within the second year, I had to have an entire leach field installed, and several other things my county required with it (switchbox, etc). I checked with neighbors before calling anyone to fix it, and I found a local man who fixed it perfectly, according to the county inspector, for $3600. Now, I always check with neighbors before I call anyone to do anything.
I’ve had to call RR to my home twice in two years to fix two problems that were related (one problem the first year, related problem the second). While they were there, they told me I was lucky I didn’t need to have my septic system repaired, because it would cost me upward of $30,000. Within the second year, I had to have an entire leach field installed, and several other things my county required with it (switchbox, etc). I checked with neighbors before calling anyone to fix it, and I found a local man who fixed it perfectly, according to the county inspector, for $3600. Now, I always check with neighbors before I call anyone to do anything.
I’ve had to call RR to my home twice in two years to fix two problems that were related (one problem the first year, related problem the second). While they were there, they told me I was lucky I didn’t need to have my septic system repaired, because it would cost me upward of $30,000. Within the second year, I had to have an entire leach field installed, and several other things my county required with it (switchbox, etc). I checked with neighbors before calling anyone to fix it, and I found a local man who fixed it perfectly, according to the county inspector, for $3600. Now, I always check with neighbors before I call anyone to do anything.
What’s an OP?
Original Poster
technically unless you signed a contract up front before they did the work – you have no contract (doesn’t matter if this is “standard practice”) – refuse to pay or dispute the charge on your credit card – make them take you to small claims court or provide documentation of a contract for the stated amount – I would think the court results would be the going rate for the call out charge or similar contractors (i.e. the average of the amounts that you called and got from the other contractors). Of course if you signed something post work stating you would pay then your screwed.
It’s $5 for the part.. and $195 for knowing where, how, when, and why to place the part.
Roto-Rooter is awful. We (my wife and I) called them once to get a drain snaked which proved to be unsnakable and quoted us $1200 dollars to replace the drain. I called a local plumber to compare rates and they quoted $350. Needless to say, we went with the local plumber and paid even less than the quote because it did not take as him long as he thought to replace the drain.
This post is horse shit. You’re paying for their work and expertise, not the amount of time it took. If they ran into complications during the fix and it took a full 8 hour workday and they still charged the $200, I bet you wouldn’t complain then.
Who cut the pipe? maybe they should be the ones to pay anyhow.
Seriously, if your contractor cut the line he should probably pay for it.
Hello, I’m with Roto-Rooter’s corporate headquarters. I’d like to look into this matter a bit more closely but first I need to know the city and state where the work was done. It would be more helpful to have even more specifics such as the date of the service and the address where the service was performed. I realize you may not want to put out this information in a public forum so I invite you to contact our customer satisfaction manager, Pat Swanson, at 866-578-0007. That’s a toll free number. You may also email Pat at Pat.Swanson@rrsc.com
I’d like to point out that Pat and I represent the company-owned locations across the country but not the independent franchises. Company-owned locations (and most franchises) always provide a free, written estimate of charges BEFORE any work is performed. And, with only a few far away or rural exceptions, Roto-Rooter does not typically charge a “trip charge” to come out and take a look at your problem. Furthermore, our service technicians do not charge by the hour, but rather by the job type. They’ll charge you the same price for a particular job type that takes 3 minutes or 3 hours to complete.
If one of our service technicians did something wrong, we want to know about and we will make it right.
Regards,
Paul Abrams
public relations manager
Roto-Rooter Services Company
Yep,,it’s expensive because it is a specialized service. Lesson learned. Next time ask. But it really makes no difference unless you know how to do it yourself.
I called them once because my tub wouldn’t drain and was backing up. They sent some yahoo out who looked at the tub, said “I’ll have to come back in a few,” and never returned. The next person came back twice, snaked out the pipe and hammered the hell out of my tub, and accomplished nothing.
They did not charge me anything for those visits, thank God, because I would have fought them. I called someone else who came out, actually went under the house to see where the pipes ran, opened my pipe outside and found the clog and in three hours, had everything running smoothly. Yay for competence!
Call them to and advise you still have an additional 57-minutes of work for them to attend to and its gonna be dirty so Suit UP….!
I’m a plumber. Now i know never to call roto rooter. But the OP i wrong on this. its not the 3 mins it takes to do the job you have to advertise the job $, pay all the insurance$ , pay for the wages $ , take the time to get to the job $ , train your guys $ , and all the other over head. yes franchise companys do charge more and a lot of times there guys are not as good as other. no respectful plumber would work for mr. rooter, roto rooter any of the rooters. but you should have asked before doing the job what it would cost.
that being said if you do want your money back send them a certifed letter if it has less than 3 days. you have a federal right to recind. also some states have a longer time period check with our state. the right to recind or cooling off period is your right to cancle any work performed at your house within 3 bussiness days of work being done.
We once had a flooding toilet that was backing up sewage onto our floor. It was a Sunday morning, and the only plumber that we could find charged us $200 for a snake drill that took less than 5 minutes to complete. The plumber told us to our faces that he was charging us more money because he knew we wouldn’t be able to find someone else who could do the job that morning. We weren’t pleased with the amount, but supply and demand, I suppose.
I bought my first house in 2007 and had them come and fix a problem I was having. I wanted to replace the pressure valve on copper piping but I couldn’t get the one end loose to remove the old one. I have never sweated copper pipes before and was frustrated after a 15 minutes or so. After they came and seen what I wanted done, it probably would have taken them 5 minutes tops to do because I already had everything laid out I just need to get the old one off and the new one put back on. After they looked at it they gave me a price of I believe was $225 and it blew me away what they wanted, they really didn’t even have to do much. I told him that was too much and I can’t pay that, I have all the parts and everything laid out, someone experienced can have it done in under 5 minutes. He called his manager and they went down to $175. The manager was on the phone I could here him since he was on a cell and the manager said inform the customer that your time is important as well as ours and its a fair price. After I heard that I said I’m sorry guys but I’m not paying that. I guess I have to learn some patients. After they left I cut the pipe with a dremel tool and put the new one on in about 5 minutes. The problem was a little water and it just wouldn’t heat up enough to loosen up. Oh well, I learned not to ever call them and I recommend no one else does either. I can’t imagine what they would charge on a larger job.
So OP called Roto-Rooter and, by her own admission, made no inquiries about the cost of the service or minimum service charge.
I assume this call was made as an emergency, which means that most likely it had to be shoe-horned into other scheduled service calls. The plumber had to drive to OPs location, install the cap, then get back to their schedule.
OP says “$200 for three minutes work is outrageous” but what she may not realize is that may have been the charge regardless how long the problem took to fix, or it could have been their minimum charge for an emergency call.
Sorry, no sympathy here.
this is a lame story…the homeowner should have a) checked the price and b) called around. Instead, they got EMERGENCY service by a reputable company that showed up on time and fixed the problem. This job should not be judged by ‘how long it took’, but by ‘how much time did it save me having to do it myself’. Roto Rooter has to have people available, trucks, insurance, parts, etc. Plus, her expectations are low, expects to pay $50-$60 to have someone come out and fix her pipe. Everyone she called was at least $89!
So, most people seem to think that its completely her fault and she deserves no refund. The common reason given is that she should have shopped around. By this logic, if the bill was one million dollars, she would still be liable. Clearly this isn’t right.
Yes, the OP should have gotten prices first, but she still has a right to be protected from price gouging. $200 for 3 minutes work plus millage (assuming they drove less than 15 miles) is excessive.
It is her fault I think she should have got the price first. But for 3 minutes of work at $200 is ridicules!!
this falls on the op. she should have inquired about prices before having them(rotor rooter) come out.
didn’t matter if they took 3 minutes. she’s paying on the whole hour.