Radiantplumbing

This review is in reference to service from February, but I've just gotten time to write it. In short, DO NOT USE RADIANT UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES if you like your money.

This is long, but PLEASE READ THIS IF YOU'RE CONSIDERING RADIANT: On Feb 9, our neighbors alerted my husband to water bubbling up from our front yard. This was the Tuesday before the massive freeze that knocked everyone out of commission for a week or more in Texas. Since we knew the freezing temperatures were coming, we called Radiant because they had a large fleet and we were hoping they'd make it out quickly. They came out the following Thursday, February 11.

The first tech who came out did an initial inspection, advised me it was a leak and we needed a couple feet of pipe replaced, and estimated between $2000-$4000 for the repairs. I needed to sign for him to start work, and he presented me a tablet with a line to sign, no invoice or estimate. Being that I was recovering from surgery and we needed that pipe fixed before the freeze, I signed to begin the work. He was there all day until 4 pm and couldn't find the source of the leak. He came back the next day and was STILL unable to find the leak, so he called another tech to assist. That tech came out with a leak finder on Friday afternoon, only a couple of hours before the freeze.

The second tech then came to the door, again with a tablet with no estimate and only a line to sign, and advised my husband that it was $6000 to fix the pipe. That seemed very high, but we were in a bind, so he signed. Just after signing, the tech said something that prompted my husband to say "Wait, $6000 total, right" to which the tech replied no, 6K additional. THEY WERE CHARGING US OVER $11,000 TO FIX 2 FEET OF PIPE. Under the circumstances we had to get it fixed though, so they did the repairs and left, and we emailed Radiant for the invoice.

The first invoice was laughable. No breakdown, no itemization, just "we fixed your pipe and it costs this much". I then asked for a real, itemized invoice, and was told they only invoice under "lump sum" contracts. I responded that a lump sum implied parts, and I wanted to know what we were paying for. They sent back a second invoice, again laughable, with a partial breakdown but no real "x item at y qty = x amount" that clarified all charges. I did some math, and discovered not only were we GROSSLY overcharged for parts, they were charging something like $1400/hr for labor. The worst miscalculation was for excavation - when they calculate the trench size, instead of multiplying the linear feet, they multiplied the area by a full square foot. So instead of invoicing us for a 25'x3' trench, they were charging us for a 17'x17' excavation area (charging us for 289 sq ft instead of the 66 sq ft they actually excavated). This was on the narrow side of our yard mind you, which, according to their math, meant the excavation would have gone both under our driveway and into the neighbor's yard. It was beyond outrageous.

After getting much lower, more reasonable quotes from two experts, and after going back and forth with Radiant for several weeks (with us threatening to contact local news over price gouging us during the freeze), they finally brought the invoiced amount down to just over $7k. (the math errors were never corrected - they listed the reduction on the invoice as a "forgiveness of debt"). The finance company then contacted us for total approval, only it's almost $1K more than the invoiced amount. I called Radiant again, and was informed that there was a SECOND INVOICE I hadn't been told about. When I asked why I wasn't told about it, the response was (this is a direct quote): "You didn't ask about the second invoice," the way a lying child would respond. We did not pay the second invoice.

We were grotesquely overcharged during a crisis, and repeatedly treated like liars, ignored, and dismissed. It was a terrible experience with a terrible company. They were shamelessly greedy and shady, and everyone should avoid them at all costs.