Questions
Eight, and none of them end in call now.
- 01
What is the diagnostic fee?
$135, flat, and it is the same at any hour of any day including holidays. It covers finding the fault and telling you what the repair costs. If you go ahead with a repair that day, it stays on the bill — we do not pretend to waive it and then put it back in the parts price.
- 02
Do you charge extra at night or on a Sunday?
No. There is no after-hours rate here. Everybody else in Wichita has one and we have never managed to explain to a customer why the same work costs more because their furnace picked a bad night to stop.
- 03
Should I repair this or replace it?
Take the age of the unit in years and multiply it by the repair cost. Over $5,000, replace. Under it, repair. That is the rule we use and it is on the repair-or-replace page with worked examples and the three cases where it is wrong. You can do the sum before we get there and check our answer against it.
- 04
How long does a furnace last?
Fifteen to twenty years here, and the two things that decide it are whether the filter got changed and whether it was sized right when it went in. An oversized furnace short-cycles and wears out early, and about a third of what we see in this town is oversized.
- 05
Will you look at a quote somebody else gave me?
Yes. It is the diagnostic fee, $135, refunded in full if we end up doing the work. Bring the quote. We tell people it is fair about half the time and we would rather say that than win the job on a lie.
- 06
How soon can you get here in July?
Same day for no cooling, usually within four hours, and we will tell you a window rather than a day. In a heat wave it can be the next morning and we say so when you ring instead of at six in the evening.
- 07
Do you take payment plans?
For replacements over $3,000, through a third-party lender, and the rate is whatever they quote you. We take no commission on the financing and we will always tell you what the cash price is first.
- 08
Do you work on rentals?
Yes, and about a fifth of our work is landlords with four to twenty units. We invoice the owner and we tell the tenant what we found, which some landlords do not like and which is not negotiable.