Mr. Rooter Plumbing

In May 2020, I hired Mr. Rooter to snake out my outdoor drain, as things were beginning to back up in my house. I had hired them about 5 years ago to do the same thing as well as to fix a leak with my kitchen sink. The worker was nice and the price was reasonable, so I was happy to bring them out again. After they finished the job, we discussed other work they could do and I ended up hiring them to put in a new hot water heater, bathtub, and shower – all of which had been needing replaced for some time. I also planned to have them install a protective covering inside of my outdoor drain to prevent it from clogging in the future. That drain repair was going to cost $7,000 and the remainder of the repairs would cost about the same. If I had known what was to come, I likely would have stopped with having them snake the drain. Instead, I hired them to do the rest of the repairs as well.

The first thing they came to repair was the shower. One worker was named Darryl. The other I do not remember. They took out my old shower and left the pieces out in my yard. They then said they found mold and made a huge to-do about how it was dangerous and it needed taken care of before they could continue. I was not too worried about the mold, as I could barely see anything. However, as they insisted that they could not work in there until the mold was removed, I had to hire a mold removal company. They recommended Quick Restore LLC run by Devin Carroll. Not knowing much about the process, I went with this company since they claimed they could get the job going that day.

Quick Restore charged me $3,500 to remove the mold. In the process, they also destroyed the floors and walls, including wood trim, in both of my bathrooms. They also broke one of my toilets and did not mention it to me. In their "clean up" of the dry wall and shower pieces outside, they left chunks of plastic, dry wall, and a lot of screws/ nails just laying in the yard. The workers were reckless, unprofessional, and did more damage than good. Furthermore, the construction company I hired to repair all of their damages said that $3,500 was far too much to charge. When I tried to find them online to register my concerns/ complaints, I discovered that they did not even have a website NOR were they registered with the Better Business Bureau. I strongly recommend that no one, anywhere, ever, use the company Quick Restore.

Back to Mr. Rooter, Darryl and the other worker moved on to replacing my hot water heater while the mold was being handled. After the installation, I went to sleep. I woke up around 9-10 at night to a strange sound. It was coming from the hot water heater: one of the pipes had sprung a leak and was spraying water all over the hot water heater, my floor, and my carpet. It took over two hours before Mr. Rooter had someone out to fix this, so I spent those hours using my wet vac to soak up gallons and gallons of water that needed emptied approximately every 5-10 minutes. Aside from this inconvenience, the previous workers did not secure the vent from the hot water heater, show me the shut off valve, give me an instruction manual, or even show me how to turn on the water heater. I was able to find the shut-off valve myself, but unfortunately it no longer worked. An employee named Scott arrived and fixed the leak. He was very friendly and apologetic. I appreciated his honesty in explaining everything to me clearly about what went wrong. Scott was excellent.

After this disaster, Mr. Rooter promised Darryl would not be back and they sent John in his place. John came out to install my shower and tub. Shortly after he arrived, he and another worker left for several hours. I was beyond frustrated at this point, as I did not anticipate that they would be gone for so long. I thought they would be at my property working during this time. Even worse, it turned out that they could not find a shower to fit my bathroom, so they had to order one and it took 8 weeks to come in. The time of the delivery of the shower was not necessarily anyone's fault though. Still, John apologized for the misunderstanding and lack of communication. He was very hard-working, professional, and understanding of my frustrations. He was the primary individual that installed my tub and shower – and the shower ended up being quite a difficult install. John also repaired my shut off valves and installed a new toilet for me as a result of my frustrations with their company. John is a top-quality worker and was great with customer service. He also recommended Bear's Home Improvements to me, which has been beyond incredible in regard to their work and attention to detail. I'd rate John himself from Mr. Rooter as 5/5 stars. Mr. Rooter is lucky to have such a high-quality employee.

Josh, the supervisor, was out with John on the last day of Mr. Rooter's work to help finish the shower install. When the job was almost complete, he explained to me that because of the difference in the coupon they gave me when I was going to have the drain liner installed, that I would actually owe them an additional $1,100+ dollars. I'd already paid Mr. Rooter over $6,800 and had endured a great deal of set backs and frustrations because of them. I could not believe I was being asked to pay MORE. After explaining my frustrations again to Josh, he eventually agreed not to charge anything additional because of the problems that had occurred. At this time, he also disclosed that Darryl was fired from the company because of the mistake with my hot water heater and other issues, and Josh also offered to install a different hot water heater for me if that would make me feel better about the job they did. All of this made me feel much better overall about the process.

In conclusion, I have mixed feelings about Mr. Rooter. Scott and John were both excellent workers that did very well by me. Also, Josh listened to my frustrations and was willing to make concessions as a result. I would still recommend Mr. Rooter for smaller jobs such as fixing leaks or snaking drains. I would not necessarily recommend Mr. Rooter for larger jobs, however, unless you could get someone the quality of John to do the job. I sincerely hope Mr. Rooter reconsiders their partnership with Quick Restore as well. That would go a long way in them establishing themselves as a better company, as those you recommend will always reflect back on you. My overall rating of Mr. Rooter's job would be a score of 65-70% positive. There is undoubtedly room for improvement.

My water heater did not light. I called them for a repair. They send 2 people who were very nice. THEY HAD NO TOOL BAG! Not sure how you do repairs with no tools.

So this s how the scam works. You look at the watewr heater and then say that it's 1 year past the warante period. It's now time to buy a NEW water heater. They didn't try and do any repair. All they did was go into selling mode. I was mad that they didn't even bend down to take a look. They had no flashlight, nothing except an Ipad to write an estimate for a new water heater.

I called the corporate headquarters and spoke to Linda in the customer service department. She was nice and said that the franchisee would call me back. After a few days still no call. This is probably the corporate culture, why do a repair when you can rip off the customer and say that you need a new water heater.

==> THE ESTIMATE (SIT DOWN FOR THIS ONE)
If you give an estimate you let the customer know the make and model number.
Their estimate gave nothing except a price of $1,500.00 This is the scam way of doing business of Mr. Rooter.
The corporate phone number for Mr. Rooter is *******400.