Chief Drain & Plumbing

Joan L. C.

We have been using Chief Plumbing for 15 years and dealing with Darryl. He comes night or day and on weekends. We have had numerous plumbing issues since we have two houses on the property and they are old. Each time he has fixed the problem in a timely manner and charged a reasonable fee. We would not feel confident calling anyone else.

He is able to do the simplest job, or most complex and we have had them all.
Joan Check

Erin M.

The only reason I am giving them one star is because it requires at least one.

My water heater went out overnight on Sunday 1/1. I called my home warranty provider who told me they spoke with Daryl at Chief Drain and Plumbing and that he would be calling me shortly. This was at 11:30am on Monday 1/2. A few hours later, when I hadnt heard from him I left him a message. I finally received a call back at 3:30 stating he would be at my house at 8:30 the next morning. Daryl arrived, concluded my water heater had gone bad and made quite a mess of the sheetrock underneath it. He had a new heater unit with him and changed out the bad unit. What he didnt do was take the time to be a decent professional and be honest with me about the proper way to handle the damaged sheetrock. Instead he just dropped the water heater onto the mess of wet sheetrock and told me I would need to contact a sheetrock contractor to deal with that part of the repairs. I asked him specifically if the sheetrock person would have the ability to remove the water heater in order to make the repairs and he told me yes.

When the sheetrock person arrived he said ""A licensed plumber installed the water heater on top of that mess? Wow! Im not going to be able to get under the unit to repair the sheetrock."" With that, I made a phone call to a general contractor, emailed pictures and got the same ""How unprofessional!"" response. I then called another plumber who explained that a ""decent plumber"" would have pulled the bad unit, set the good unit aside until sheetrock repairs were made and then installed the new unit. Had I been given that information and option, I would have gone that route. I suppose I wasnt given that info or option because he wanted to get the job done and not have to come back (see below).

Armed with this information, I contacted the warranty company who agreed that Daryl should return to remove the unit, allow repairs to the sheetrock to be made and then reinstall it. Daryl then called me and when I explained this to him his response was ""The problem is that Im all the way in Modesto and I cant be going back and forth."" Wow! How's that for service!? He followed that up with ""Im going to wait until the warranty people call me back."" I hung up and contacted them myself. They called him only to be told he would return and do the work THE RIGHT WAY for an additional $275.00. Needless to say, I am not about to give another dime to this company. Nor will I ever refer anyone to them.

If you want a quick half assed job done, give them a call. If you want it done right and in a professional manner, I would call someone else.