Dim Dom the Dodgy Tradesmon

Arrrrhhh gotta love the shit head tradies, that come to replace a $10 washer with $250 worth of valve.

My toilet bowl is a little loose - bonded to the slab, screwed down, and the thing was probably sat on and used while the cement was a little soft, thus breaking the bowl loose.

A small mound of cement on the bottom of the bowl and a small crater in the concrete...

The wobbling bowl, when wiping ones arse, means that the bowl wiggles the pipe going to the cistern, which wiggles a bit and loosens the copper pipe fitting to the cistern, which creates a small leak....

Hence the bucket flush....


So I arranged for a plumber to come.....

Only I am fucking smart and this dumb cunt thinks he can put one over me.

My idea... bring a water type pressure cleaner, clean the concrete mound on the bowl base and clean the crater, to remove all dust and loose cement and then use a touch of compressed air to remove all loose water, and then bond the two together with a fast setting silicone, and a stiff brush to work the silicone into the cement surface and stick them back together.....

Maybe add in some new screws to hold it down, at least while the silicone sets and bingo - jobs done.

Before he came I insisted on a call to discuss the job...

So he rings... and part way into describing the issue, this cunt interrupts and says, "Oh we will bring along a new bowl and replace the old one."

This is with no contact with me, no site visit, no inspection of the old bowl and how it's fastened down....

"Ohhhh I'll be bringing a new bowl....."

Me says, "Oh no your not - because there is absolutely nothing wrong with the old bowl...."


The cunt was trying to get away with, "padding the expense account".

A $75 / $120 job, with an extra bowl (cost plus mark ups) and extra costs for fixing down the new bowl, instead of bonding the old one back into place...

And bowls going for between $130 and $460

And then giving the old mint condition bowl a polish and reselling it as a new one, while charging for it's removal....

I told him "NO DEAL".


I'd be as agreeable to this, as he would be, to getting his legs broken, for robbing me.


So I took steps to remove him from my supply line, because I don't invite dumb, pushy, thieving types into my home.


This is how I fucked up the last thieving cunts and bullshit artists that tried his shit on with me:



The letter of complaint.


"Approximately 3 weeks ago, my reverse cycle / split system / air conditioner, ceased working - or heating my unit at around midnight. I think it was on a Thursday night / Friday morning.


I was able to lodge an application for repairs. Eventually an electrician was sent out - which was inappropriate, as a general electrician basically does power points, house wiring and checks that the things that use electricity, are hooked up properly and are getting the power.


They generally do not perform circuit analysis on the devices that the power goes too.

So when he arrived, he opens the "general cover" and pulls out the air filters and comments that they have dust on them, and "WE" establish that the air-con does not heat the unit.
  No other testing or examination of the unit was done. Nor did he attempt to remove, or casually examine any of the internal circuitry by removing any other covers etc...

I explain to him the intricacies of the issue, being that it needs testing to establish if it's an individual component, or an interplay of componets, that need to be attended too. It could be a thermal sensor, it could be a chip on a board, or it could be a relay or a valve. Or it could be the an interplay of components.


This appears to go way over his head.


I also state that we need to get a specialist in these units to examine it, to find where the fault lies and to repair it.


The guy leaves.


Now the lack of heating is supposed to be an urgent repair issue, and while its dragging on for three weeks, I remember my old man yelling at me, saying, "If your cold, put a bloody jumper on - don't sit on your arse in front of the heater all day."

A jumper and a small food warmer running in the corner, takes the chill off the room and I actually don't mind not having the air con running to heat the room/s. As long as my breath is not turning to fog when I exhale, I figure that it's plenty warm. In fact I kind of like the cold weather.


So not having heating is "kind of" fine.... sort of.


But I am kind of feeling a bit out of sorts about the delays in the contractors handling of this matter.


After about one more week of non appearance of the repair people, I contact the Maintenance Manager and the first round of stories from the contractor, is that he has been calling the guy he has on call to do the air conditioning, and leaving messages with him, to "do the air conditioning" but  the guy has not been returning the calls.


That is delay number one.


And getting on towards two weeks after the initial request for repairs, I contact the Maintenance Manager Centre again, and the story from the contractor then evolves that they because the CIRCUIT BOARD of the air conditioner is damaged beyond repair, AND they have to replace the whole air conditioner.


This sets off an alarm bell, in that the electrician did not attempt to access, the circuit board, nor did he access it, nor did he perform any testing or evaluation of the circuit board - and neither did he test any of the componenty or circuits attached too the circuit board.


Further to this, a "common domestic electrician" does not carry the diagnostic equipment to service circuit boards.


Circuit boards tend to have two types of damage - overt obvious damage where a component has blown up, arcing, short circuits, cracked boards, burned copper tracks etc.. and they have discrete damage, where an IC (intergrated circuit chip) or similar, has developed an internal fault, and while the board looks fine, they don't actually work, or work with impairment.


So the contractor is lying.


After about 10 or so days without heating, I am getting a little bit ticked off with the delays on the repairs and I would like some instant on heating in the early morning - so I contact Haeir Air Conditioning in Sydney and read them out the serial numbers etc., and we establish that the unit is about 3 and a bit years into a 5 year warranty.


The guy at Haier also asks me to test all the functions.... which the electrician did not do - because he is clueless about air conditioners.


So the known function on the heating cycle is that the external heat exchanger fan is working, and I am assuming that the compressor is as well - but the internal heat exchanger does not heat up, and nor does the internal fan run.


With the additional tests I perfromed, I found that the internal fan runs in fan only mode, and the air conditioner works quite well as an air cooler - with the internal heat exhanger cooling, and the fan blowing air through it.


Basically - the whole system is functioning quite nicely - less the heating cycle.


Additionally the unit is able to be repaired under warranty.


Not being terribly impressed with the contractor lying about the unit, I try to get the unit repaired under warranty - via the Haier service centre.


The first crew, Bumfuck plumbing and air conditioning, make a time to come and repair the unit, about 2 days further down the track, and they promised to arrive between 12 and 2pm on the Thursday.


Come 3 pm they are not in attendance and so I contact them. As they have some shop staff as well as the field workers, when they did not attend, I was rather annoyed that they had "stood me up" and not bothered to call me, to tell me that they would not be coming.


I was also annoyed that they had not bothered to call and to reschedule a time to come at a later date.


It was only when I had contacted them, that the guy said, "Oh oh oh - we had a commercial job come up." and I thought he did not sound very convincing. After I had cornered him, then and only then, did he offer to reschedule to a later date.


After I had nailed him for not turning up and his policy of not operating on a first come first served basis - and his general slovenly business practices - I told him to go fuck himself.


It also turns out that the "good folks" at the Air Con Company - were the people who originally installed the aircon.


The second service agent via Haier was a joker, they were a "professional" Air Conditioning and Plumbing service


From the outset, the guy running this started to gouge and sleaze his way into me paying a whole heap of fees - for his time, for his travelling and for the gas etc., when in fact it's a repair under warranty...
 
I told him to take himself and his bullshit and to seek employment elsewhere.


In getting back to the service contractor in Bendigo, towards the end of the second week or so of non appearance, I again contact the maintenance manager.


The contractors story as told to me, then changes, to they can't get parts for the unit, AND there has been a mice infestation and the mice have eaten away all the insulation on the wires.


To put his lying in plain language.


In order to get the NECESSARY parts, testing and evaluation of the unit, needs be done, to determine what parts are needed.


The "internals" of the unit were not accessed - no examination of them was performed, and no list of parts to be ordered was drawn up.


And it's a bit hard to say that the mice have been inside it, chewing away all the wires, when the wires were not examined.


In essence, we have a functional air conditioning unit, repairable under warranty - that does function - with a part of it's functioning impaired.


We also have a contractor, pulling a swifty in claiming he is going to replace the whole unit and his story about it not working are changing from:

"He has been calling the airconditioning fellow, leaving messages, and the guy has not been getting back to him."


To:


"The circuit board is rooned." (so the whole unit has to be replaced)


To:


"The parts for it are not available." (so the whole unit has to be replaced)


To:


"The mice have infested it and eaten away all the wiring" (so the whole unit has to be replaced)


Everything that this guy is saying, is bullshit. He is lying about everything.


The contractor is scamming us into paying for a whole new air conditioning system, with the markups and grafting - when the one insitu is both functional and repairable under warranty - and this issue of not having any heating, is dragging on for 3 or three and a half weeks now.

I am not happy with his conduct, and I do not like him lying about everything to do with this matter. "


Well that cleaned that fucker up.... 

It turned out that some slag from the pour (copper) got into the ingot, that the copper pipe was drawn from, and that bit of slag, caused a weak spot in the compressors tubing, and it split and leaked all the refrigerant.

Some competent guys came, pulled off the covers of the air con and did an inspection, found the fault and then silver soddered over the crack, which was reasonable under the circumstances, and they regassed it and it works fine.


But Dim Dom the tradesmon, a year or so later, is working for this fucker and apparently the culture of theft and ripping off the system is still in full flight.

Everytime they rip people off, the rents go up, and there is less money to pay for other repairs...

Take a hint - quit being a cunt.

Be a maker and not a taker - and become a hard arse and take active steps to weed the $$$ grabbing dead shits out of the system.