ARS / Rescue Rooter Raleigh

The Home Depot had a deal with ARS for a check up and Chris Conley arrived in the provided time window. Very friendly, informative, and thorough, Chris perform the check up spot on. Chris identified two capacitors that would need future attention and found a blocked drainage and traced it down to the crawlspace to clear it, all covered in the check up visit. I was with Chris for most of the service and he was kindly sharing a play-​by-​play with insightful information. Very pleased with the service and Chris’ professional and friendly demeanor. Thanks Chris!

Jerry was a tremendous help with getting the new water tank we needed. The service and dedication we received from this company was truly remarkable. I am so glad to have hot water again!

Clay is knowledgeable, friendly and a fast worker. ARS plumbing has done good work for me and I recommend them as well as their heating and cooling services.

On ARS’s advice, my mother signed a contract for service on our air conditioner. Soon after this, we had a technician come out for service, but this technician (#290) apparently did not realize that this contract was signed (and paid for). This technician charged my mother $ 225, which is apparently the out-​of-​contract fee with a note that we did not seek the «HSP service», which is what we had already paid for.
My mother realized the mistake after she paid the $ 225, and promptly contacted ARS customer service to get the refund. So, calls and calls and calls and the best info we have gotten back from one «Nistha Fishastion» is that she could not make a decision on it until she «had the invoice in front of her.» My mother was happy to provide all of the details from her copy of the invoice, but Nistha’s reply was that «[she] needed her copy in front of her.»
OK? Follow so far? It’s been a month of calling and leaving messages, yet «her copy» has either not materialized or my mother’s calls are just being tuned out.
So, what gives, ARS? Why give shitty service to someone that is actually following ARS’s advice on signing the contract in the first place?
EDIT: Phone call received by Nistha Fishastion, apologies made, refund issued, and gift certificate for future services provided. Review raised from 1 star to 3.

They gave me a 5 hour window. FIVE HOURS. After waiting 7 hours I called and canceled. They may have the best technicians in the world and do absolutely amazing things but I’ll never know. I was a new customer (or was going to be) but I won’t call them back.

Kerry came out today to do an AC service check on my two units. I told him I wanted to learn a little about what he was looking for and what sort of preventive maintenance to perform. He was very friendly and extremely helpful and thorough. He really took the time to make sure I understood everything and my options. Absolutely amazing contractor experience.

I will call ARS again when needed!

ARS installed two complete HVAC systems, both the furnaces and the condensors. They showed up on time, worked hard, and got the job done in a day. Jaime was thorough in explaining the thermostat, showing me the furnace, safety features, etc. It wasn’t 5 star because I’m having trouble connecting to the wifi of the thermostat for remote programming.
Also, Kerry was the service technician that pointed out my defects in my systems before I decided to replace them. Very thorough, not pushy. Easy to work with.

First time using ARS. The technician was thorough and courtious. Arrived in a timely fashion. Will definitely use again.

I can not give a lengthy review on how good the service with this company was. I recently purchased an older home and the furnace was not working. I was looking for an upgrade. The entire estimating process was very simple. I am a firm believer in Consumer Reports and their ongoing testing of home products. I would have normally looked up the systems and their ratings after getting an estimate from any contractor. The ARS representative did this for me, he was completely confident in the products the are installing. I had the heat and A/​C units installed the next day. It’s been two weeks and I have had no concerns with the install. Looking forward to a cold winter this year!

Actually, all the reviews prior to mine are pretty much spot on. Recurring theme of ineptitude. A lot of contractors seem to work with them, but their service department leaves much to be desired. We have had multiple visits for underperforming (not cooling) HVAC for our 2^nd floor which they installed. They have sent multiple different technicians and really all they did was adjust the vents … again, and again, and again. Clearly did not solve the problem.

Today marks appointment FIVE in a one and a half week span, due to one of our A/​C units malfunctioning. We are renting our house, and our landlord has a contract with ARS, so alas, we’re stuck with them for the time being.
The first appointment I was given a window of 12−6pm. So I sat. And sat. And waited. And at 5:30pm called the dispatcher for an update. She basically said she has no way of knowing when they’ll come, and she couldn’t confirm they’d be there before 6. Awesome! Glad you have such a sophisticated system. Guy showed up at about 5 minutes to 6pm and was there for about an hour. Claimed to have fixed the problem, but… TWO DAYS LATER, system malfunctions again.
The second appointment, the guy who showed up did not really have such a great explanation as to what the problem was. He was here for about an hour, claimed to have «fixed the problem!» And was on his way. Until that evening, when the system malfunctioned again. Winning.
The next day, I get a call as I’m headed to a client mtg that ARS is outside of my house and no one is home. Well damn right no one was home — we were not confirmed an appointment time — why would I think someone would be showing up? So, thankfully, my husband was able to rush home and meet the guy. He was there for TWO HOURS before my husband threw his hands up and said he had to go back to work. Guy left with no resolution.
The NEXT morning, the supervisor comes out to diagnose the problem. After about 2 hours, he determines that a piece needs to be replaced. Oh, wow. Good. At least we’re making progress here. Another guy shows up during this appointment, they are here together trying to figure things out… it’s like I’m hosting a constant ARS party up in here.
A few days later, the guy shows up to install the part. He arrives at about 10am. I AGAIN am shackled to the house for another appointment here, over this stupid AC. I think, this won’t be so bad. He’s got the part, they’ve diagnosed the problem. The guy was here for FOUR HOURS. FML!!!
The amount of TIME wasted with all of these appointments I can’t ever get back. so thank you, ARS. Let’s see if we can keep this AC working this time… at least for more than 24 hrs.

I’m glad to see that the manager from ARS does respond to these reviews and post his same and phone number. However, the response came 9 months too late. As it happened, my wife called ARS, spoke to another service rep who resolved it. She also extended our service contract for another year before consulting me.
I did not for no reason refuse the first service technician’s recommendation to install a UV air cleaner at the point where the cooled air leaves the heat heat exchanger. He could not explain to me how having the UV at the outlet of the air exchanger was going to kill all the mold in all the duct work and provide me with mold-​free air.
My last A/​C tuneup service by ARS was May 10 this year. On June 30 (Saturday), during one of the 100+ days, our downstair A/​C unit stopped working. True, I’ve yet to act on ARS recommendation to replace the A/​C and I have also rejected the recommendation to add a pound of coolant to both upstairs and downstairs unit since they were low. I called up an A/​C service company my neighbor uses because they were already scheduled to have a service visit by the company. The nice folks called me back the same day and agreed to service our A/​C during the same visit too. It’s nice that these small family business are more understanding of their customer.
I watched as the service technician (the company owner’s son) removed a side panel of the compressor and he immediately found a problem. He showed me how one of the wires connected to a large capacitor (about the size of a beer can) was covered with black soot-​like powder. He decided the capacitor is blown. He replaced the capacitor and cool air immediately start coming out of the floor vents (also called registers). The technician labeled the problem as «a bad capacitor and worn wire». Being educated as an Electrical Engineer in college, I tend to think the problem leading to the charred wire has been around for a while. I’m disappointed that an A/​C unit inspection on May 10 this year fail to find such problems. If this is to be expected, what good is a service contract?
While I may be happy that the service technicians can make apparently sound recommendations on preventative equipment replacements, I’m definitely very disturbed that the annual tune-​ups fail to catch a soot-​covered (worn) electrical wire in the compressor unit.

Brit and I had our heating system go out just before we headed out for vacation. We were leaving on Wednesday and the system died on Saturday.
ARS came recommended and I gave them a call. We decided to opt for Monday since we had alternate heat. A weekend visit was quoted at $ 180, and a weekday visit was $ 90. They told me that they would be over afternoon on Monday. I took the afternoon off to wait for them. I called their office at 5:00pm to find out where their tech was. The office told me that the tech was out on calls still and would get to us as soon as he could. She did add a caveat that if it started snowing, they would get to us the next day.
The tech showed up at 6:00pm and spent 10 minutes in my house. He stated that our circuit board was fried, and he didn’t have one on board his truck. He told me that his service guy would call me in the morning.
Tuesday was a mild snow storm, and I called their office. No answering machine, no one was there. I called their national line and was informed that their office was closed. Some customer service that is. I was charged for services I was yet to receive, and they didn’t bother letting me know that they were closed. I called their national line and spoke to a corporate call center rep and had them addend the account to have them contact a relative who would be available for the install.
Since the weather was going to be bad, Brit and I jumped the gun on our vacation and headed to Miami early Wednesday morning i.e. 2:00am. I called ARS at 8:00, when we hit Jacksonville and was forwarded to a call center in Dallas. They told me that the office was closed again. Now I was pissed off. I called corporate’s customer service line and inquired if ARS would pay for my burst pipes and any damages incurred due to their inability to contact customers and their apparent disregard of persons. My biggest question was, what if we didn’t have alternate heat?
The corporate customer service manager Tonya called me, and she said she’d contact me in 15 minutes to confirm service for the day. 4 hours later I called her again. I left another voice mail. 20 minutes later the Raleigh office called me and said that a tech was scheduled to come out and install the board. The rep that called then read me off two quotes of what I would owe. Seeing as how I’d already paid them I was more than a little peeved that they didn’t have it on record since I saw the charge on my credit card.
I have yet to speak to them again since my return, and will addend my review once I get further clarification on things. I am going to cancel my service contract with them and will never deal with them again due to their apparent lack of responsibility to clients. There are many HVAC companies out there, and one with such sheer disregard of their patrons and poor customer service will definitely cause me to go elsewhere.
Brit’s mom met the installation tech and the one question I asked her to pose to the installing tech was, if the board burned out, what was the root cause? He stated loose wires and left it at that. I need further clarification that the wires were routed correctly and that there’s little to no chance of this happening again as I don’t trust them to honor their warranty, nor want them to ever set foot in our house again.