Weidner Heating & Air Conditioning Inc

Weidner Heating and Air Conditioning can be found at Perry Hwy 185. The following is offered: Air Conditioning. The entry is present with us since Sep 9, 2010 and was last updated on Nov 14, 2013. In Pittsburgh there are 117 other Air Conditioning. An overview can be found here.

Weidner installed my furnace in February 2006, for the previous owners of my home. In January 2016, the blower went out. I thought about figuring out the repair myself, then called Weidner, and their tech showed up. I asked how much it would cost to fix, and how long it would take.

The technician agreed that the blower motor had gone out. The first price for the repair I got was $450, with the repair being finished on the same day. I thought that was reasonable, and I didn't realize that's how much this guy wanted to charge me JUST for the blower motor, the part that was obviously faulty -- I thought that $450 was the whole repair cost.

The technician went out to his van "to make sure the part was in stock." Knowing what I know now, it was clearly mostly to have a private conversation with his boss and apprentice to figure out how much extra to stick me for. The Weidner tech came back, and he told me that he would also charge me for 1/2 hour of his working time, $100, and the price of the service call, $99. Suddenly, the price for the repair had jumped to $649, over 50% of the cost of a new single-stage 70,000 BTU 80%-efficient Bryant gas furnace like mine (UPDATE: Model ‪#‎311AAV036070‬, available online for $1139 at retail cost), just for a replacement blower motor.

I told the technician that $650 was too much, and without missing a beat he told me that he would still have to charge me for the service call, $99 for coming to my house and looking at my furnace for less than 10 minutes.

I called the Weidner number and insisted that the total repair cost was too steep and the price of the "service call" was very high. The Weidner guy answering the central number insisted in return with that the $99 service call fee under these circumstances was perfectly reasonable.

I did not tell him that before I called this company in the first place, I had tried looking up the price of a replacement blower motor for my furnace model online, and so I knew that the actual prices for the part in question range from $170-$220. (UPDATE: The exact retail price for a new GE/Genteq 1/3 horsepower blower motor model ‪#‎HC41TE114‬ is $238, with shipping, for anyone on the online market, not a Bryant dealer like Weidner). A bit more looking revealed that you can get a generic 1/3 horsepower replacement blower motor with a universal housing for under $100.

And yet the tech had insisted that he was just charging me $100 for labor and the real price for the part.

I ended the call with a laugh and told the guy at the home office to get ready for Weider Heating & Air Conditioning's latest online review.

I don't know if this is how all of Weidner works. For all I know, the company may employ a majority of conscientious, reasonably-priced HVAC professionals who don't PROVABLY, DEMONSTRABLY LIE IN THEIR CUSTOMERS' FACES and pad out their part-replacement bills for, in this case, MORE THAN $200, PROVABLY, DEMONSTRABLY, CHARGING TWO HUNDRED PERCENT OF THE ACTUAL REPLACEMENT PART'S REAL COST. Honest HVAC professionals who do not provably, demonstrably expect to collect SIX HUNDRED DOLLARS PER HOUR BY FAIR MEANS OR FOUL to ply their trade. I do know that I have documented that this is exactly what happened in this case (UPDATE: I have successfully carried out the repair myself).

In this January "service call," the Weidner people I dealt with behaved like little better than outright thieves, the last of the buccaneers, clearly believing that I would unquestioningly pay their extortionate price, certain that I would not be able to find out even in the Internet era how much of a completely overpadded ripoff their quote for the job was, or how simple the job really was.

It is, after all, January. They must have assumed I would be so desperate for heat that I had forgotten how to use my computer.

You have been warned. Think of the $99 fee that I am about to be billed for as a learning cost that you get to avoid.

Weidner Heating & Air Cond Inc is a private company categorized under Warm Air Heating and Air Conditioning Contractor and located in Pittsburgh, PA. Current estimates show this company has an annual revenue of $5 to 10 million and employs a staff of approximately 10 to 19.

Tags

Sales & Service
Quiet Energy Saving Air Conditioners & Heat Pumps
Fully Insured
Air Cleaners & Humidifiers
Air Conditioners & Heat Pumps
Heating & Air Conditioning
Bryant Sales & Service
High Efficiency
Boilers
Quiet Energy Saving
Heating & AC