Southeast Heating & Air Conditioning

A/​C bit the dust last night and I called Southeast based on the Unilocal ratings and I discounted the 1 star because the guy who was complaining wasn’t the guy paying the bill (his landlord) who should have gotten the 1-​star rating as a landlord, not the a/​c guy who was doing what the landlord authorized him to do. At 430pm on Thursday, I called and they called back in about 40 minutes, It was supposed to be 65 last night so I told him today would be fine. He was here this morning, showed me the problem, fixed it and charged me less than $ 90 which was out the door,. He was the nicest guy, very competent and got here early enough that the house was still pretty cool from last night. They were really great and I would recommend them with the highest possible praise. Honest people doing a good job for a fair price is something I thought was never to be see again. My faith is restored and I have one more reason to love my adopted home state of Louisiana. Thank you fellow Unilocalers for helping me find them and thank you Southeast, y’all are the BEST!

I was about to write up a 2 star review, but here’s the full story:
The A/​C went out at the house in the 100+ days of Baton Rouge summer weather. I called early Thursday morning after realizing it was out late Wednesday night, and SEAC said they were going to be able to come by Thursday (same day) late… BUT… they never showed that night, without a call to say why. I called again late that night, and they called back saying some other calls went late… meaning… I, my wife, and my 4 month old son had to wait in a 90+ degree house overnight to have it looked at. My thoughts were that they should have called without my prompting, but they didn’t. At least they called back late that night after I called them again.
Anyway, Friday morning they sent out a tech to look at the unit. The compressor was bad. The unit was older, and the home owner (we rent the house) wanted the compressor replaced versus full unit replacement. So Carl (the owner?) tried to find us a compressor in town. No go. The closest one was in Memphis. They didn’t tell the warehouse to ship it until late Friday, which meant the compressor was going to sit in the warehouse all weekend only to be shipped Monday at 2 pm to supposedly arrive Tuesday.
The part got into town Tuesday as promised. The tech came out to replace it late Tuesday (6:30p) as promised. But he didn’t have the fluid to charge the unit, and so he left without a heads up that he was leaving or if /​when he or anyone else would be back??? So I was forced to call AGAIN (and I’m not a high maintenance guy), because I didn’t know the story of why the air wasn’t working (remember I have a wife and child to report to) and didn’t know why the guy was gone. So after the call, two techs showed to fill the unit with fluid, and at 8:10p the unit was finally pumping cool air into my 92 degree house, finally starting to cool my family.
Here’s what happened next: That night the house never got below 85 degrees. Some time in the middle of the night, the a/​c quit working. So the next morning at 8am I made another call to Southeast A/C’s answering service (really??? you’re so busy that calls run you to after dark and you don’t get in until after 8am?). And so meanwhile… my 5 month old son had developed a f — ing head cold from being in a bedroom that was being cooled by a wall for 6 DAYS!!! He’s not old enough to blow his nose yet, which makes it horrible for the little guy.
So Net-​net: Southeast Heating & Air Conditioning sucked ass on this job. They may be busier than a one armed paper hangers, but that simply makes them overtaxed with work and sloppy with the work they are doing (do they accept too many jobs?). They run around seemingly unorganized, with too many calls to complete before sundown, which does not ensure good quality service the first time around. So proceed with caution.
My thoughts are that before hiring these guys, you should make sure what their work-​load is… and ask specific questions about what the _​probable_​mean time to fix is. I admit that the home owner /​landlord of the house probably added to the delay in wanting the compressor replaced, but if was SEAC that didn’t order it until after ship-​time on Friday. We could have had it Saturday had they been on the ball. And not showing up the first time like they said they would… not fixing the a/​c properly the first time… and not being on top of the whole situation makes me rate them at 1 star vs 2 or 3 stars.
Overall, I think they are good-​intentioned guys, and they seemed to know their stuff… but be careful when hiring them. I’d ask how busy they are first. Ask them to do some math problems for you to see if they can think.
Can’t tell you about price. I didn’t see the bill. Hope this helps.