Advanced Plumbing

J. K.

I am writing this review due my terrible experience with Advanced Plumbing.
I called Advanced Plumbing to come and service my hot water heater. It was not providing enough hot water.
I had lived in the house for a few years and had never had an issue with the water heater.
The technician said that the water heater needed rebuilt. After he rebuilt it, I had hot water. I paid the invoice of $651.00.
The next day I was walking through the garage to go to work and I noticed water leaking out of the water heater. I took a picture and sent it along with an email to Advanced Plumbing. The responder said that she would talk to the technician. She wrote me back and said that the hot water heater was already like that so it was a preexisting condition and that they would charge me a $60.00 trip charge as well as the cost to fix the water heater. Obviously this was insane. I went back and forth with them for a few weeks and they were uncompromising.
I decided to call another plumbing company. The technician from the new company inspected the water tank and said that it needed replaced.
I told him about the previous service from Advanced Plumbing and he said that it should have never been rebuilt because the bottom was starting to rust.
His view was that they were either incompetent or wanted to make more of a profit by rebuilding the water heater. Due to how they had treated me I went with the latter.
I paid for the new water heater and sent correspondence to Advanced Plumbing telling them what had occurred. They were uninterested and declined to offer me any type of relief or compensation.
I am writing this review in the hopes of warning other potential customers. I never have a problem paying a fair price for services but it really bothers me to be ripped off and taken advantage of. I feel like Advanced Plumbing stole from me.
In case anyone from Advanced Plumbing replies and says that I am referencing another Advanced Plumbing (as I have seen in responses to other complaints) this is the Advanced Plumbing located at: 5324 Distributor Dr. Richmond, VA 23225.

Tom J.

Edit: Responding to the owners condescending response, I am very sure that I used Advanced Plumbing in Richmond, VA. I am not in the database, since it was another household member who made the initial call. I will not be calling back to be harassed again by this company. I will not remove my review.

After seeing others comments of being scammed/overcharged by this company on another social media site, I'm leaving a review from work about a year ago in hopes it may warn others from making the same mistake.

Advanced Plumbing showed up hours late and charged ridiculous diagnostic fees and ultimately unable to diagnose my problem. I hired another plumber that was able to immediately solve my issue and cost a quarter of the fee of Advanced Plumbing's ""diagnostics"".

Advanced Plumbing sent their bill by email but required payment over the phone. Despite numerous attempts of calling over a two week period, I was not able to get through to their line ( all during business hours) although I left voicemails requesting callback for payment. I was eventually called back the same day after I left ANOTHER voicemail and they insinuated they were transferring my account to collections due to lack of payment. Ridiculous. I paid immediately.

At one point they may have had integrity but if you sort by newest on Yelp, you'll see only reviews similar to mine. I would avoid this company.

Jess P.

The guy who came out to give me an estimate was very professional and informative. He gave me some ballpark numbers that seemed fair and said he would email me an estimate with breakdowns for a couple different things I needed done.

I never got an estimate. I called to check on it a week or so later and he sent over a huge price for one minor part of the job, promising the rest soon. That small piece was something I needed urgently, so I had already done it myself by that time using less than $20 worth of parts from Lowe's. His estimate was $650.

I planned to go with this company for replacing the older copper piping but I guess they are too busy to take on any customers.

Edit: Regarding your response, I'm not sure which part of my review you deemed inaccurate. If your notes ""clearly"" state that this work was for future consideration then you didn't take clear notes, as only the half bath was for future. This complaint about Covid after the fact as an excuse for not responding is odd and also not accurate.

Cora J.

We contacted Advanced Plumbing due to a sewage smell in our basement. They arrived 2 hours late, after they called me multiple times to confirm the appointment window, but never called to indicate they would be +2 hours after the appointment time. They quickly identified the smell was a dry drain and had me pour water into it. They spent less than 5 minutes in my home.

This cost me $190.00. - $120 for labor (???), $60 for the trip, and $10 for supplies.

$190.00 for a plumber to be +2hrs late, spend 5 minutes in my house, and for me to put water down my drain. They didn't even take a tool out of their truck. DON'T WASTE YOUR TIME OR MONEY WITH THIS COMPANY.

Cathy B.

It took 3 visits to fix a toilet that would not stop running. Each visit, the plumber stayed about 10-15 minutes, replacing minor inexpensive parts (flapper) each time. I was told I was only charged for one visit. The office manager called a week later to say she was charging me twice, totaling nearly $400 for a running toilet that could have been replaced for that amount. Plumber and assistant were not wearing masks until I asked them to put them on. Unsafe, unprofessional, poor workmanship.

Susan O.

I had gotten two previous estimates for my plumbing issues (toilet replacements, and sink fixture replacements) prior to calling Advanced Plumbing. Those experiences left me really nervous about getting the work done because they both indicated that they ""really couldn't tell what might happen once they got into the floor"". I kept putting it off, and finally I called Advanced one day just because I had seen their trucks around. I spoke directly with Justin, the President of the Company and he arranged to come and do the estimate the very next week. He was very reassuring and indicated that there would be no charge for the estimate. He was thorough and professional when he came to do the estimate, and did not seem to think that the replacements would be anything other than routine. And though I am aware that things can be discovered during routine work that may cause the price to go up, it was reassuring to hear that, rather than expecting something awful to happen.

The day that the plumber came to do the installations everything went smoothly; there was one small glitch that was unforeseen, but easily corrected, and no extra costs. And as it turns out, the work was done for a good bit less than what the other companies estimated.
I have been so happy with the work and also reassured to know that I have someone I can trust to call if plumbing issues arise in the future.

One other thing that may seem small, but meant a lot to me; they went out of their way to be kind and reassuring to my dog, who can get nervous when strange people come into the house.

Tina K.

I have not always had great experiences with contractors, so I tend to be too thorough and am probably a pain to work with, which is why I do not hand out five star ratings lightly. This company repaired a sewer line with tree root intrusion - 6 feet underground in my yard. They jumped through a few extra hoops to work around rainy weather, did the repair professionally at a reasonable price, and were willing to answer all my questions without getting snarky. I recommend them.

Christina N.

Called in the morning, and a technician was at the house that same afternoon. Great customer service!

Liliana R.

Shortly after leaving this review I was contacted by the owner of Advanced Plumbing. I'm changing my review because of their amazing customer service and their dedication to their customers being happy. He explained to me how my service was guaranteed for a year and that they'd gladly come by to replace my toilet for the new one of purchased at no cost. They showed up on time, kept me updated throughout the day and finished the job quickly. Now I have a new functioning toilet so thank you!

Re-update
They misquoted me on the replacement of the 2nd toilet which I had them do at the same time as the other I had issues with. (told me it would be $120-130 and the other one was free of charge) and now charging me $248. Also the bathroom smells SO BAD now. It smells like sewer water.

Jessica K.

We hired Advanced Plumbing to install a tankless hot water system for our home and were absolutely thrilled with the experience. They had us up and running with a Rinnai RUR199IN tankless system in a day and a half with no disruption of service. Their pricing was comparable to other plumbing services in the area but they were able to work withing our tight timeline keeping all other trades involved in our restorations on track. They were prompt, professional, clean, extremely courteous and I would not hesitate to use them again in the future. Absolutely top notch.