Friendly Plumber

Made an appointment early in the week for a Friday a.m. appointment. Told them my garbage disposal wasn’t working and also water was not draining in my kitchen sink. They confirmed the appointment. Late Thursday afternoon the «plumber» calls and says that he does not fix clogged drains. What?! A plumber that doesn’t plumb. And I had to wait until the end of the week to learn that they would not be coming out. Unreliable. Bad business. I do not recommend.

Left a message two days ago about heater repair. No one called me back.

Prompt, courteous, competent and reasonable. Provided good advice on a toilet replacement. Highly recommended.

Robert M is a great plumber. I was shocked to see that he had so many 5 star reviews that were filtered! He has over 250 reviews! If you are looking for a «friendly» and reliable plumber– contact him today!!! Kudos to Robert for having such a great fan base!

Ok, Robert was AWESOME. I had a broken pipe in my bathroom and a flooded home. I called Friendly Plumber and Robert was out in less than an hour with an extremely good quote AND all the part to fix the broken pipe. He was in and out so fast it was crazy. Oh, and he’s a super nice guy to boot. Highly recommended and will most definitely use again.

Friendly! Excellent service. Reasonable prices and it’s a pleasure to have them come by (imagine saying that about plumbing).

Nice guys, fair pricing and good service. I would definitely use them again. One minor item, they turned off my furnace and did not reactivate it. I was able to go into a crawl space around 11pm and find and fix how they had done it. Some less technical would have spent a very cold Feb night missing a working furnace.
I got a nice follow up call the next day apologizing for the inconvenience around the furnace so it’s all good.
Again would definitely recommend these guys!

I had these guys do a decent amount of plumbing work for me for a washer and dryer I purchased from Best Buy. I was able to quickly get an estimate appointment, and once I spoke with them I was comfortable enough to go ahead and schedule them to do my hookups (I was in a rush to get this completed before I had to return back from the Christmas Holiday).
What they did:
Remove old wash tub from laundry room
Install new wash tub with hot/​cold water
Run hot/​cold water to washer dryer location
Extend drainage lines for the moved wash rub
Extend hot water heater overflow line to wash tub
Run gas line to dryer
Install 2-​feet of exhaust ventilation for dryer
Stack the dryer on top of washer
Summary:
They showed up 2 hours late, and did not reach out to me, relaying the fact that they were running behind schedule (I called them to ensure they were still coming). The total install was supposed to take about 4 hours; it ended up taking about 6 – 7 hours. Yes, they had to take a lunch, but they were still coordinating the delivery of the supplies they needed for my job when they were on-​site.
Although, they may have seemed disorganized and a little lax in their notification of me about running late, I was extremely happy about the quality of the work that they did. I would much rather the job be done completely and to a high-​standard than a shoddy job that only needs to be revisited at a later date.
Total Cost: $ 1.050

I had either a leaky sink or a leaky dishwasher and I could not for the life of me figure out which was leaking because water would randomly start leaking from underneath my wooden cabinets where I couldn’t quite see the source. They are also right next to each other and the water pools around the cabinet bottoms so you can’t see the origin. Argh!
I called Friendly Plumber and Sean responded promptly the next day right within the time bracket we agreed on and was so sweet and helpful. After some testing of the sink pipes and running of the dishwasher (patiently waiting for it to finish it’s eternal cycle, I might add) he determined my dishwater’s filter was clogged up and spewing gritty water back out. …which really made a lot of sense and I kicked myself for not realizing it before. The boys in the house don’t rinse their plates before putting them in, and I never thought of that being a problem until he pointed that out. D’oh!
Super professional and honest to boot! Despite staying almost 2 hours at my house to figure out what’s wrong, I was only charged a modest fee of $ 120, and that was at my insistence! Sean was adamant in trying to find the problem even when both the sink and dishwasher stubbornly refused to show signs of its typical rebellion. That’s really going above and beyond as a lot of people just give up and charge you $$ 75 – 150 for a visit even if it was only 20 minutes.
I will definitely be sending for them again!

I called Friendly based on Unilocal reviews after my usual plumber proclaimed I had the wrong part to fix my bathroom faucet.
After researching it with the faucet manufacturer, it turned out I had the right part, but my plumber couldn’t recognized it and didn’t know how to install it.
Sean came out and was able to figure it out. He did a great job.
Also, if you’re into massive Brit ginges, it’s an exciting way to spend the afternoon.

11 years ago we called Friendly Plumber (install a commercial grade water heater in a 5 unit building) and haven’t stopped calling since. They are expert at fixing plumbing problems (both BIG and small), installations, Robert has done a huge variety plumbing work for us:
— sewer line replacement
— fix a botched installation (by another plumber) on a high end shower (6 body sprays, 3 shower heads, steam, wrapped in Italian glass tile) I am pretty sure there is no one else that could have fixed this problem without messing up the tile.
— install a (re) circulating pump to get hot water fast to the top floor of a 4 story building
And all of the less exotic plumbing issues: back-​ups, faucet replacement, toilet installation, and so forth. Expert at diagnosing problems and fixing them.
Integrity & Honesty, and truly the Friendly Plumber. The best !

My landlord is one picky bastard. I love him for it and when he recommended that I call Friendly Plumber to come out and fix my sink I had no doubt in my mind that they would do the best job possible.
Rob was professional, courteous and left me with some helpful advice that can potentially help prevent another late night disaster.

Just got done with my first visit from the Friendly Plumber. After fully disassembling my bathroom drain to retrieve a ring my wife dropped, I discovered the pipes were damaged and in need of replacement. I figured I could handle this up until the point I discovered the pipe into the wall was frozen into place. I decide this was one of those points where it would be easy to do serious damage so I decided to call in a professional.
Friendly Plumber was able to squeeze me in the same day. They arrived at my house and were not bothered by the fact that I had started the job on my own and bought replacement pipes. My decision to call in professional help was vindicated by the fact that they really had to whale on the pipe to get it out. Less than an hour later, I had a working sink again. I couldn’t ask for a better experience.

I’d give 6 stars if I could. I wanted to get a new toilet and looked on Unilocal for a good plumber. Rob’s high reviews are deserved. I called him and and he talked me through how to determine the right size to order. I ordered, a few weeks later arranged for him to install.
The install went great but there was a leak in the tank. I got a new valve assy from the mfg and he came back to install it. Also gave me great references for other trade professionals for other work I needed. I’m sure I’ll hire them in the future!

BUYER BEWARE
I would never recommend these people for anything and here’s why: I had them in for a leaky bathtub faucet. They gave me a quote for work that was going to cost me about $ 600 for them to replace the tub and shower fixtures and another $ 500 for the contractor to rebuild the wall. I called a handyman friend to ask for advice. He changed the rubber gasket in the faucet for **less than a dollar** and the problem was solved. That was months ago and it hasn’t leaked since.
Oh, and why was the faucet leaking in the first place? Because Atlas plumbing had put in the wrong kind of gasket a few months before that, probably knowing it would soon fail.
From now on, I call my friend first.
EDIT: Okay, I’ll give more details about why I object so much. I think they should have seen that the immediate problem was with one small part failing because it was the wrong kind, rather than a serious failure of the system requiring complete replacement. The valve per se did not fail, the gasket did.
It seems that they did not look closely enough into the matter before making a very costly recommendation; that’s my main objection, and to me, that’s a very serious one. Regardless of their intentions, I felt as though they were trying to take advantage of me. It’s like going to the doctor for a splinter and being told the whole finger has to come off.
Maybe it was an honest mistake, but I’d rather have a plumber who investigates the simple solutions first. To me, this would demonstrate that that they have my interests in mind.
(Just for accuracy’s sake, it was more than a free estimate I got. I paid about $ 75 to have the faucet capped to stop the leak; I am not complaining about that, it was my choice. I can imagine that an alternate temporary fix he could have offered for a similar price would have been a new gasket, but it was never mentioned because he never looked.)

Just what I needed.
After several months of struggling to understand why my garbage disposer was incorrectly installed, and constantly leaking, Robert fixed the problem with ease.
He arrived on time, lived up to the name, and was fast and affordable. He was also very clean and thorough, making sure everything worked perfectly before leaving. He also explained everything that was done incorrectly so I wouldn’t make the same mistake again.
It was a simple job, but enough to prompt me to Unilocal for the first time in awhile. I will certainly use his services again next time.

Wow. I called and asked how much it would be to snake out a toilet. Robert gave me a price but said «If it’s not the toilet that’s broken you can get an auger at the hardware store and do it yourself.»
I can’t believe he gave me a reason not to fork cash over. When I thanked him saying as much he laughed and said «I don’t like wasting people’s time.» Fantastic. Hopefully I can take care of it but I’ll be sure to give him a call if I ever need something.

I agree with the reviews that Robert is knowledgeable and knows that people want to save as much $ as possible on home repairs.
We had a leaky shower and got 3 estimates that all said cut the wall and replace the valve. Robert was the only one who suggested we buy the valve online (found a really good brand that was discontinued) and we could cut open the wall ourselves. He also knew we were on a time crunch and came in Saturday to do it AND had a great drywall guy come in to repair the wall. All in one day. Yay!

Yay for Friendly Plumber!!! I reccommend then 500 billion + times over.
Robert is a super guys and gets the job done!!!
Choose them.

Hot water heaters aren’t cheap in San Francisco, and neither is installing one. So, rather than a smoking deal, what you should expect for your money is reliability, prompt service, good advice, safety considerations, professional work and a guarantee. That description is Robert. It’s hard to think of a more professional plumber. He spent an hour discussing different kinds of hot water heaters and which ones would best suit our family in terms of capacity, recovery, safety and efficiency. And he work was top notch, from soldering all the old pipes, moving the gas valves, putting in a new flue, and earthquake proofing it with triple straps and a custom bracket. Plus, that dude is really friendly!
There’s another plumber on Unilocal with more reviews than Friendly, but I had a bad experience with that outfit. They tried to pull a fast one on me, and then I went with Friendly.