Rapid Plumbing

Tony N.

I previously posted an excellent review of Rapid Plumbing. Unfortunately, (like many companies), their business has changed for the worse, forcing me to delete it in the interests of honesty.
I have had Rapid Plumbing at my house previously to repair a leaking gas line behind my stove a couple of years ago. On that visit, the job was completed on the same day and the cost was reasonable - around $275.00.
On 10-14-17, the handle on my shower faucet wouldn't turn the water on. Then, when I kept turning it, the water came on but wouldn't turn off. I phoned Rapid Plumbing for the repair. Their technician looked at the job & said, ""It will cost you $185.00 for me to take off the handle & look at it. Then, if the cartridge is bad, it will cost $395.00."" I found that outrageous, because I had already removed the handle - which involves turning one screw...but I didn't want to shop around while the water was flowing out of the faucet full blast. The cartridge is a very inexpensive part. In fact, I phoned the cartridge's manufacturer--Moen-- & asked about the part's price. It is so inexpensive, they sent me another cartridge at NO charge.
The technician left to get the cartridge & returned & replaced it in less than five minutes. The same job costs between $175.00 - $285.00 maximum with any other plumber (I checked nine plumbing companies).

I also had the technician check my bathtub drain to see why it was slow. He suggested replacing the 65-year-old drain pipes for the tub & gave me an estimate - for $1,900.00. Yesterday, I had another plumber do it for $1,050.00 with a written lifetime warranty.

It is interesting that I received an e-mail from Rapid Plumbing, thanking me for my business & also complaining that customers will post bad reviews without first contacting the company with their concerns & they don't think that is fair. I replied to them, hoping to discuss their outrageous pricing, but they don't care enough to respond. Apparently, they don't realize that they'll only rip off a customer once because he will never call them again & word will get around.
Note the many low-rated reviews for Rapid Plumbing. They are well deserved.

Kristy S.

If I could give lower than one star I would. My mother (who is 90) had a magnet advertising and called Rapid Plumbing. They took advantage of her and broke the main bathtub and shower control, plus the line going up to the shower head and broke a copper water line under the house. For this work they charged her $490.

They wanted to repair everything they broke in the shower and to re-pipe the sewer from the house to the front yard, that didn't need to be repaired for the small amount of $6,000. They used scare tactics telling her she couldn't flush the toilet until the sewer was fixed, and they could start right away.

She called me and I had our plumber go over and repair everything that was broken, it cost $900. Again, there was nothing wrong with the sewer.

My recommendation: If you have older parents living alone, check their magnet advertising and through them away, or you could end up cleaning up a bigger mess.

J S.

Disappointing service - the manager Alvin is just as uncaring and unresponsive as the staff.

Terry F.

This company gets one star only because I can't give them less. I called them yesterday to come out and fix my tankless water heater, was told they'd be out shortly. Hours later in the evening they called and said they didn't have a serviceman after all and rescheduled for the next day. Delay after delay, calls and promises that the guy was on his way, this evening they finally said they still didn't have anyone available for the job. So here we are now, day 2 without hot water and with house guests visiting nonetheless. This company is the epitome of crappy ""service"", call at your own risk.

Bob L.

Company gave quote between 6600 and 7400 for main line repair. After quote my wife presented 10% off coupon. They said they would honor. The final bill was 7400, spoke with Alvin who stated that it was taken off price. I'm not convinced.
In the company defense they did what they said they would do. Ralph is fantastic. The crew was great, cleaned up area no complaints. I'm sure they are premium priced but worked looked great. Just issue with quote and discount, felt oily.

Caryn B.

I was very happy with the service and the fact that they helped us solve quite a mystery as to what was backing up our pipe-- toilet wax ring flange fell off and went down drainpipe!! With video camera we were able to have section cut out, extract, flange -- away we flow.

Ivan was our plumber for most of the job -- he was FANTASTIC! Thank you Ivan!!! Thank you Alfonso & Albin too!

Was a tad pricey though.

Joy L.

DON'T WASTE YOUR $$$. used 3 times over years. Always disappointed. They DO get out within a couple of hrs. Of your call ( which is why I use them recently) HOWEVER. ...the clog is never totally reaolved. They told me the blockage was from the house to the street. They. ground up roots and flushed. Said they were done. Fee charged was twice as much as estimate. They were aware that inside drains were still clogged. They would not come inside. Without extensive additional fees. Their advice to me was to use hot water. Big deal. Had to call another plumber in order to completely eliminate stoppage.

Alfred S.

Had a gas leak. The gas company shut off our gas leaving us without heat/hot water during the cold spell. These guys came out and gave us a quote of 15k to fix the line. We went ahead and after two days of work we came home to find not only no heat but no water. The workman had ""forgotten "" to turn it back on. We made them come back and turn it on. After another day of work, they declared it finished. SoCal gas came out and not only was the leak not fixed, it was 10 times the flow as before. The SoCal gas guy said a pipe had to be wide open to get that kind of flow. Back comes rapid and works another day. Back comes SoCal gas. Still leaking. Rapid foreman suggests replumbing the house. That is, either these guys are incompetent or scammers out to extract as much money as possible. Either way, I strongly advise against using them.

Ayreen S.

Was very worried when a bib broke and my water went out. Much thanks to Christian from Rapid Plumbing who fixed it in no time. Very satisfied.

Adam C.

Positives: The plumber that responded was very friendly and professional. He was able to resolve my backup problem and then ordered in a video unit to further analyze what went wrong at no additional cost. It was determined that a pipe separated underground and we would need more extensive work to get it fixed. However, without his extra effort with the video, we may not have known that we had a much bigger issue lurking and more damage may have been done. I really appreciated this extra effort.

Negatives: Response time was about an hour and 45 minutes which, for a Sunday, I think is still very good. However the advertisement in the phone-book does say that most responses usually are within an hour. Furthermore I got charged an extra charge for a Sunday call when the phone-book advertisement said they do not charge extra for weekends. For the work they did, however, I felt the price was still reasonable.