Ray Brown Jr

David B.

RIP OFF ARTIST- CONSUMERS BEWARE-should have checked yelp before allowing Ray Brown Jr to come to my home to repair my furnace on New Years Day. Shows up within the hour of my wife's call and leaves his truck running while he takes a look at the furnace. He obviously had no intention on staying long. He assessed the problem as heating oil gelling up in my outside above ground tank due to abnormally cold temperatures.

He left after 5 minutes, after mentioning that he took photos of my furnace which I thought was odd(Will come back to clarify this later in this review).

He said he would be back. Instead, he sends an employee named Matt. Matt sets up a propane heater aimed at the outside tank to try and warm the oil. My tank is fenced in, so he also used a tarp as a roof to help trap in the heat. Matt stayed in his truck to keep warm and periodically checked the heater. Meanwhile, he told me that he is only employed with Ray Brown Jr Plumbing for a week and is not a licensed trained plumber, but experienced more in construction work. Did not make me feel very confident at all. He then proceeded to bleed the oil line and could not get the furnace to keep running. He called Ray to come back.

Next, Ray comes back. After 5 minutes, he said he was going to get 5 gallons of heating fuel and try starting the furnace using this 5 gallon can as the fuel source. He returns, hooks up to the can and determines that the problem is a bad fuel pump. Since our tank was down to a quarter filled, he added this 5 gallons. He tells me that he cant get a pump until the next day, but will come back with another 15 gallons of fuel oil to get us through the night.

He comes back 3 hours later with 3 more 5 gallon cans and rigs up a connection to the furnace. This took him 10 minutes. Afterwards, he gives me an invoice for $830 for the day that also shows an estimate for another $800 in repairs?! I said that you must be kidding! All he did was bleed the oil line a few times, warm the outside tank and bring 20 gallons of fuel....no parts were changed or fuel stabilizer added at this time. He charged service call $180, 3 hours labor at $180 per hour and $5.50 per gallon for heating oil when oil is $2.89 per gallon. He explained that he normally gets $120 an hour, but charged time and a half for the holiday. I paid by check and signed his copy invoice.

Needless to say, the furnace shut off at 1am and me,my wife, kids and dogs were freezing and didnt sleep well. I called Ray at 8am the next morning, January 2nd, to let him know we still had no heat. We were expecting an oil delivery and he said to call him after they deliver and he will come by and install new pump. Oil got here around 4:30pm , then called Ray. He got here around 7pm. I told him to only do the pump repair for his quoted $161 repair and that I didnt want him to repair anything else in his estimate. Again, the pump took 10 minutes to install. He texted me from my driveway and said he was done. I went outside and paid the invoice for $169(This number didnt match the estimate of $161).

I have now paid him $999 for a pump that should have been replaced the first 10 mimutes the previous day. This total repair and oil should have been $350 at most!

The final nail in the coffin was that the furnace was still not working, so called him on January 3rd to come back and fix what he started. I wasnt home, but my wife texted me that he was there for 15-20 minutes. All he did was bleed the line again. He then texts me to see if he should keep an open tab in case he had to keep coming back or pay $84 for this days service??? I saw RED!!!! I texted him back that he was already over paid for this repair, still didnt fix the problem and that I refuse to pay him for this.

He calls me immediately and I told him I was insulted that he charged more money and still fixed nothing. He stated that he was insulted that I wouldnt pay him and blamed me that the furnace wasnt workimg because I refused to follow his other recommendatons costing another $860. He also states that I signed the imvoice from January 1st, which made it a signed contract and that he has photos and video of my furnace. It finally dawned on me why he kept making these comments. He rips people off and tries to cover himself with photos, video and the invoice in case he is sued by victims in small claims court.

His services will NEVER be needed here again and proceed at your own risk!

Fedelmia D.

All I can say is avoid this business at all costs!! I had a 125.00 fireplace cleaning cost turn into 250.00 one with an additional charge of 35.00 per bag for each bag of ash. They don't tell you about any of this in advance.I also asked them to go up on the roof and give me a price for chimney caps. 10 minutes into the guy climbing on the roof I hear a crash the ladder had fallen from the roof and put a huge hole in my deck. Then I'm told there are shingles off my roof and that charge would be 175.00 for repair. I proceed to walk outside and find the shingles laying on the ground either pulled off or ripped off from the fall and tearing of the ladder. At this point I call their boss who says quote ""accidents happen"" and we will fix the deck.. I told him the following weekend we would be having Thanksgiving dinner and he tells me that he highly doubted people would be out on the deck!! Seriously???
I went back and forth with him about the damage and pricing. When all was said and done he did honor the 125.00 chimney cleaning but I paid for the additional bags of ash. I still have the shingles off on my roof and now have to hire a roofer to repair.. Please do yourself a favor and find qualified contractors with good references and reviews. I made a mistake and did not do my homework!!

E L.

Bad Experience - To begin - Ray Brown sends out his minions to assess a situation with my pellet stove. They charge me $100 just for his staff to come out take pictures of it and tell me that ""they don't really know anything about pellet stoves and that Ray Brown would have to come and look at it and fix it"". Why did I have to pay $100 for that? Mr. Brown scheduled an appointment a few days later came out and had to reevaluate the whole thing. I mean really what was the point of sending people to look at my problem that have NO IDEA HOW A PELLET STOVE WORKS? - In any case he ""fixed"" the problem - or so I thought - I cannot confirm this because like Ray Brown's staff I don't really know my way around the pellet stove and I am no expert - BUT..... a few weeks later the stove malfunctioned and caught a part of the stove that isn't supposed to burn on fire, filling my whole house with smoke (I am still cleaning up after it). I don't plan on calling Ray Brown back. - One more thing - it look like 5 or 6 phone calls to schedule the appointments and they cancelled and changed the time on me twice and then still showed up late- Moral to the story stay away...

Sonya M.

How strongly can I advise against hiring Ray Brown, Jr.? The seller's realtor hired him to do chimney masonry work, oil tank replacement, and damper installation in our fireplace before we closed on our home. Brown started the work three days before closing, and finished it the night before closing, having had about 6 weeks to perform the repairs. He installed the oil tanks incorrectly, which was caught in the nick of time by the HVAC company we hired to fix his work. In the process of installing a fan on the oil burner, he removed a large boulder from our 175-year-old home, and replaced it with a thin veneer of hydraulic cement. The boulder is still lying next to the outside wall and we could see daylight through our wall before we filled it. Brown patched the chimney with silicon, and the damper he installed fell out of the wall within weeks. We're out about $3,000 in repair costs for work this man was supposed to have done to code. None of it met code. In case you're wondering, yes we sued him, and no, he hasn't paid us a dime.

Joe C.

I recently rented a very large and tall(4 floors) apartment with my roommates. Our landlord was unsure if the fireplace was safe/working and left it up to us to have it inspected/swept if we wished to use it. I saw Ray's advertisement on a light pole on my way home and as another reviewer pointed out there are not many reviews whatsoever for chimney sweepers in this area. I gave Ray a call, actually 2, as I only took down the number off the sign and found him on Yelp as well and he promptly returned both calls! I discussed with him the price of $125 for the cleaning and also mentioned that I have a wood stove insert and he openly explained to me that if the service tech who came out needed to remove it that it would be around $25 - $45 extra but that they would clean it and replace it. I went ahead and scheduled my appointment for 8AM - Noon that same Friday and left Ray with some extensive instructions that our doorbell was broken and it is hard to hear the front door so calling my cell was really the only way to get in touch - we've had problems in the past with answering the door.... Ray's tech, Russell, gave me a 15 minute heads up call just after 8, arrived exactly at 8:15 as he stated, promptly came in, assessed the stove, managed to sweep the chimney without removing the stove, was super polite and clean, taught me what he was looking for and explained very easily how everything worked with the draft etc., and when he was finished he even left me with a magnet and some nice pens in addition to a receipt that explained everything he just did. I was very impressed considering our chimney is over 30ft tall. I read all of the other reviews and can't speak to those specific instances but I deal with contractors on a daily basis and Ray and his staff that I met were very easy to work with, knowledgable, and open about all of my questions. I highly recommend Ray and his team.

Vic and Kate S.

He worked fast. That was his only upside. He lost the check we gave him and then hounded my wife on Facebook while we went through the process of canceling it. When we cashed out an account to keep the check from being fraudulently cashed, he found it and tried cashing it without telling us. He then again went through Facebook to harass my wife about the situation and accusing us of purposefully not paying him.(It was a cashier style check) In the end I refunded the account the check was for and he was paid the next day. I will not be using him again. He is condescending, rude and uses social media to harass customers.

Ron S.

Ray is great at hiring top notch workers who do clean, conscientious and professional grade work. Used them for chimney and fireplace services. Had them out to house twice and really liked the workmanship. Toughest part was getting these folks on the phone. It took 4 phone calls to get a price quote on work needed. The issue wasn't the office workers blowing me off, it was Ray himself who caused the delay by not allowing his people to give quotes and then leaving them in limbo while I kept calling for a simple answer. This is a good business and has competent people who just need to be empowered by their manager. Other customers would have given up and gone somewhere else.

James B.

Ray Brown's service was as good as it gets. On time. Neat. Perfect. His employees were friendly, polite and included me in the process every step of the way.
I will absolutely use thier services again.

Evan S.

The lack of reviews here (or anywhere) for chimney cleaners was certainly frustrating when trying to find one.
I ended up going with Ray Brown Jr. based solely on the fact that his ""Services"" business is BBB accredited and I lacked any other guidance.

Anyway, I called to schedule an appointment without incident or trouble. I was able to make an appointment on the week day I wanted and was given a time frame of between 8 and 10 AM. I asked about weekend hours and was told they can do Saturdays but there's a bit of a price price premium as they try to give the guys weekends off. I can appreciate that so I scheduled for a Wednesday when I could be home.

Two men showed up around 8:30/9. They went onto the roof to inspect the chimney and liner. They informed the the liner was installed incorrectly so they fixed that.
They then removed my wood-burning insert from the fireplace to clean the chimney. They also cleaned the insert thoroughly and re-installed it without incident.

Ultimately, everything appeared to be done well, thoroughly, and legitimately. I had no way of confirming the liner was somehow installed incorrectly, but I certainly have no reason to not believe them.