Plumber Scams – Be Vigilant
Getting plumbing work done can be a source of stress for you if your home is facing issues and you’re not very well-trained in anything to do with plumbing. There are indeed a few select strategies that you might employ if you are trying to take care of the pipes in your home without getting taken to the cleaners.
Get Multiple Estimates: You might feel really great about the first plumbing contractor you meet, but that doesn’t mean that you’ve met the best company for the job. Common sense is able to work more naturally if it has the benefit of a scientific study. If your strategy was to shoot in the dark and hope to get lucky, you deserve whatever outcome results.
The Material Swap: It is not uncommon for plumbing contractors to charge homeowners for the higher-end materials for a specific job and then perform a swap last minute and use lower-quality materials in order to pocket the difference. The way around this scam is to ask for a materials list from your contractor. Then, take that list to a local home improvement store and see how that list and its prices match up with what is on the shelves at the store. If the markup seems reasonable, then continue with the job. If the markup makes no sense, you have to decide if you can even continue after a productive conversation about honesty.
The Random Rate: Typically speaking, there aren’t often any legal restrictions on the rates a plumber may charge a given client. Nothing suggests that a plumbing contractor must charge the same hourly rate for each client. If you are looking for a great way to know how to avoid plumber scams consider parking your luxury car down the block, if you have one. Cues like this and a large home in general can land you an estimate based on an hourly rate far higher than the contractor’s real floor. Cross-shopping and comparison shopping are the ways to alleviate this problem.
Too Many Cooks in the Kitchen: With this scam, the contractor hires too many workers to complete a job. This adds unnecessary labor costs to the final job and the contractor then has a way of justifying it by the appearance of so many people actively toiling away on the site. If you think too many people are on the job, stop the project and ask the contractor to explain why so many people are needed. If the answers are not satisfactory, call off the project and look for another plumber.
Final thoughts: If you are a homeowner that wants to understand how to avoid plumber scams, you should take notice of some of these strategies. The next time the y pick up the phone to call a local plumber, make sure you have this blog post at hand. If you are able to get the needed work completed quickly, correctly and professionally, it will have paid off to have spent a bit of time in advance learning about some of the most common plumbing scams out there. More information on this website