American Plumbing & Drain

Perry C.

Mario came in through AHS (American Home Shield). He worked fast, explained things, and advocated for my needs with AHS. Also, we're a no-shoes-in-the-house household, he took off his shoes without any prompting, I appreciate that awareness.

Roy V.

AVOID AVOID This company is a sham who uses the AHS as a way to get business - NO ONE SHOULD EVER CALL THIS PLUMBER OVER- does incomplete work in hopes of getting additional work. He installed a garbage disposal and in the process broke a pipe joint. Now he claims that it is a separate issue requiring new service fees.

Allia M.

I have been working with Mario now for the past 4 years and he's excellent. Most recently, he just replaced our leaking water heater but has fixed clogged drains, leaks and just about every faucet in our 71 year old home. He's straight forward, thorough and gets the job done quickly.

Don't ever retire Mario!!!

Melissa T.

My review for Mario bounced between a 5 to a 1 to a 3. I'll put the details below, but overall, I would recommend using someone else.

The 5: My water heater broke and he gave me the lowest quoted price to replace the part he suspected was broken (the thermocouple). Whereas several others immediately suggested I just replace my GE water heater, he sounded confident in knowing that the problem was minor and fixable.

He came out on a weekend, I found him to be friendly and not condescending as many others have. He answered all of my random questions, and fixed the problem quickly and with no disturbance to me.

The 1: The problem was fixed ... for about four hours. Then my heater broke again. He didn't respond to my Sunday calls, but did on Monday. He came back, said it must be something other than the thermocouple and he recommended me replacing it. Without any suggestion from me, he said he would give me a full refund, which delighted me. Except ... he didn't have his checkbook so he'd mail it to me. I didn't get it for two weeks, and he didn't respond to my text or several phone calls.

The 3: I finally received the check, a few days after I finally got him on the phone. He said he'd drop it in my mailbox that day, but it ended up arriving via the mail a few days later. So, I'm thankful he did refund me, though he had to be prodded. In the meantime, I chose someone else to perform the replacement for me (see Hotter Water Heaters)

Raven N.

I'm pretty sure this guy only comes out to get his $75 that AHS pays him out on for attempting to fix a plumbing issue. He has been sent through AHS multiple times, and each time he has been incapable of completing the job. He acts like its a struggle to drain a shower. I called another local plumber and he handled it in 2 minutes without any issues. I had to have AHS block him from every pairing up with me again.

DO NOT HIRE! If AHS sends him, do not book it. Call AHS, block him, and request for a new plumber.

David H.

We had American Plumbing come out as part of our home warranty. They fixed our broken kitchen faucet and fixed another small leak in the kitchen. Overall the service was professional and completed in a reasonable amount of time. There are some restrictions to what we could have installed based on the home warranty but they were reasonable and we're more than happy to have a new working faucet in the kitchen. I would definitely call on them again to help us with whatever future plumbing problems come up.

Move A.

Complete jackass and very unprofessional. He contracts for American Home Shield, which I have found out is one of the worst...

Arrogant, always a mode of deniability, claiming he doesn't know what is covered or not covered, complaining about his long hold times on the phone etc. His statements usually start with a disclaimer ""I am not a carpenter, I am not an insurance guy, I am not a blah blah blah"". Has no useful suggestions for the fixes that he is supposedly qualified and contracted for.

So I had to improvise by asking him, ""so in your opinion, given your experience as a PLUMBER, what do you think..."".

He blames the construction of the house, poor materials used in building the house etc. Not helpful whatsoever.

Refused to do anything useful and initially even refused to call the insurance company. He was condescending during his explanation of the problem ""you're an engineer, right"" he said to me. No shit Sherlock, you're in the SF Bay Area. So stop telling me that you're going to MELT A PORTION of my PVC pipe to fix a tiny hole. Surely, there must be a better way, but then again, he's not sure about what he can or cannot actually do.

He calls AHS and tells them that there is a nail in the pipe!! No nail no hole in the drywall either. So now I'm stuck with two massive openings in my drywall and a rude and unprofessional plumber who wants $600+ to fix a problem that was misreported.

Leslie M.

Water pipe on side of house for our garden hose cracked at base near wall of our house. I had to turn off water into the house to stop the excess pouring out from the wall. I had 2 plumbers on call to come. 1 kept saying he could come and kept calling to delay the day and time. I called the 2nd one that could only come out in 2 days. I called American Plumbing (Mario) who came within the hour (earlier than he told me) and did a quick inspection of the situation. Within 10 minutes, he came to me with different proposed solutions and an estimate of the costs. He was professional and very on top of the matter. We agreed to a repair/cap of the side pipe and a re-running of the pipe to the back of the house (where it should have been in the first place) for a new water spout. He did this within 2 hours and had all the tools/parts necessary and without much ado. This was very impressive. I have used plumbers before with very DIFFERENT experiences that this (delays, return trips, not completely done right). I will call him back for anything plumbing related for sure. Thank you, Mario.

Austin J. A.

I liked that Mario took his shoes off when entering the castle, without even being asked. I liked that he showed up on time for both of his service appointments, without even having to race through the level wearing a Tanuki suit.

I liked that he didn't particularly enjoy my home warranty company, as much as I didn't. I liked that he contacted them several times in order to work out the details of the covered versus not-covered plumbing repairs. I liked that he swapped a pipe for me under warranty, despite the fact that there was probably a Piranha Plant in there.

I liked that he explained a few things to me, suggested a whole-house fix that, while costly (and out-of-pocket, since my warranty wouldn't cover it), was commensurate with the average local price for this work (which I found online after he gave me his written estimate), and was a necessary home maintenance item that performed as promised. I liked how Mario explained some plumbing standards for a few tests he performed on my plumbing, all while dodging Lakitu's dastardly spinies.

However.

I did not like how completely stupid he made me feel, from the moment he showed up and arrogantly informed me that my street entranceway was locked (it was not, but I had to literally shepherd him onto the property, as if I hadn't already turned 3D and found all the secret level keys). I did not like how he breezed through my service issues and straight-up told me that air coming up my toilet from the sewer was actually coming from a completely different source inside the toilet itself (you can see the bubbles coming from deep in the toilet), and didn't care about the low water level. That might have been a tricky set of problems without Luigi there to help him, and I'm sure he didn't want to deal with it, and I felt hustled. I did not like that he told me that he didn't really care if I used him for the paid install or not, because I guess he's so busy on his Kart or has so many clients that he can afford to be aggressively blasé. Meanwhile, he came two whole days apart, and the ascending sequential numbers on his two invoices were only seven apart for those two entire days. Seven invoices in two days isn't very many, even for a guy who spends 99% of his time squashing Goombas.

I did not like how he said to me that the job I had done on a pipe I temporarily replaced (since no plumber would show up for weeks until I was finally assigned to Mario) ""wasn't so bad, I've seen guys do a worse job,"" after which he uttered a loud ""wah-HOO,"" and jumped through one of my oversized paintings. I think a lot of my feelings about his attitude were caused by his cissexist/sexist reaction to my existence; if I was read as a cisguy, and specifically, a straight cisguy, I would have had a far better, Sunshiney experience.

I did not appreciate his bizarre comments to my partner, Princess Daisy, about my and my partner's sexual orientation, which he decided to assess and discuss based on photos of us. He told my partner that he, ""like all guys, wonders which one is the man."" Whoops, I'm afraid your princess is in another castle! (And I'm pretty sure that her name is Mimi.)

Mario twirled his mustache, hooked his thumbs into his red overall straps, and beamed with pride after he finished installing our water pressure regulator. How proud of himself he was! Unfortunately, he must not have eaten any 1UP mushrooms before he did his job, because the pressure regulator began to leak soon after. I'm a self-rescuing princess, but this job was under warranty, so I called him back to come fix his shoddy work. ""Princess Peach,"" he said, ""I certainly don't have to fix this for FREE, that's not how plumbing works."" After a slew of back-and-forth phone calls from Daisy and me, and a basic tutorial on what ""in-hand, written one-year-warranty"" means (give the guy a break, English isn't his first language!), Mario finally came back and stopped the leak. He didn't clean up the mess he left, and rather than properly leaving the pressure valve turned upward, he turned the valve to a strange angle, making it impossible to store anything against the garage wall in that spot any longer. It felt like I was in a warp pipe to hell.

The cherry - excuse me, peach - on this cake? Ever since he came over to ""fix"" the p-trap/bend in the bathroom, there's been this foul, musty, mildewy smell underneath the bathroom sink. Princess Daisy and I called Luma over to shed some light onto the subject, but we haven't been able to identify the source of the smell. We figured it out: Mario's ""professional"" p-trap replacement was leaking into our wall! He messed up the angle, and left the compression fittings as loose as a Bob-omb's blast radius.

So misogyny, homophobia, transmisogyny, arrogance, condescension, and two Bowser-grade installs. I wouldn't give him one star (Yelp requires it), and I bet his travels through the Galaxy don't net him many more, either. Mario, you'll NEVER be invited to this Party again!

Ellie S.

0 STARS!!! 0 0 0 0 0 STARS!! Had a plumbing issue in the upstairs that caused flooding and water to come through the ceiling. Worked through American Home Shield (WHOLE 'nother story) to get a plumber out. This guy walks in and says he won't touch anything because there's water damage. There was no professionalism either. He acted like we were going to poison him.

What?! What? ARE YOU NOT A PLUMBER?? OF COURSE there's a high probability there is water damage! We even told him he didn't have to be anywhere near the ceiling with the water damage. We just wanted him to check out the bathroom upstairs.

Really, I just can't believe there's a plumber out there who doesn't work if there's any water damage.