A/C Installs & Service - Shonkys versus Professionals

[avander]

If you are around the Khao Talo area be aware of shonky A/C supply, Install and services company/s in the area which may look professional on the outside.

 

We had a local, seemingly professional company install all of our A/C units 3 years ago.  They were friendly enough, seemed reasonable in price and appeared to do a good job but I'm no A/C tech....

We have since them back twice for normal "service" and 3 times due to water leaking from the drain pipes of two units.  

One of the A/C units housing started to show signs of corrosion and we had another leak for the 4th time today so sick of the local guy/s we used another A/C service company which this time came recommended.

When they took the outer shell off one of our A/C units the result was shocking.  Instead of fixing the drainage problem/s on previous occasions these guy/s put a piece of denim material into the unit to try to "absorb" some of the water and then just dried out the unit and "cleared" and "adjusted" the PVC drainage pipe obviously hoping that the leak was such that it didn't soak the material too much......

 

By contrast, the guys we got out today today rerouted the pipe at a much better (proper) angle, re-seated and reconnected all the piping making replacements as required and, of course removed the rag.  I clean the removable filters regularly and even though we had paid for service twice previously to the original supplier internally the units were absolutely filthy.  

The new guys cleaned 3 units with a high pressure water hose and what looked like a detergent mix and also applied what looked like an anti-corrosion treatment.  They did this to the units inside out home and were very careful of our furnishings etc. Of course they cleaned and serviced the compressor units also.  All in all a very impressive and professional job at a reasonable cost.  Highly recommended!

 

I've learnt my lesson and pass this on accordingly.  Appropriate advice anywhere but particularly important here:

I. Personal recommendations from someone you trust. 

II. Keep a close eye on the work while it's being done regardless.

 

If you need any info on any of these guys pm me.

 

[OMGImInPattaya]

Is this the place that has the ladyboy installer...I'd love to get her over to service my equipment.

[avander]

1 hour ago, OMGImInPattaya said:

Is this the place that has the ladyboy installer...I'd love to get her over to service my equipment.

Sorry, no. Different business....

[KittenKong]

It's always the same story here: you can get good service one day and the world's most incompetent job the next, often from the same company or person.

 

Numchai installed my aircon and did a good job. But for cleaning they were mediocre at best. The place on Thepprasit did my cleaning three times but on no occasion did they do the outside unit properly and the inside unit was only done properly once, and then only when I complained about the previous job.

 

Next time I will try someone else but I dont hold out much hope.

[avander]

15 minutes ago, KittenKong said:

It's always the same story here: you can get good service one day and the world's most incompetent job the next, often from the same company or person.

 

Numchai installed my aircon and did a good job. But for cleaning they were mediocre at best. The place on Thepprasit did my cleaning three times but on no occasion did they do the outside unit properly and the inside unit was only done properly once, and then only when I complained about the previous job.

 

Next time I will try someone else but I dont hold out much hope.

Agreed "KK"; we've only used these new guys the one time but given it was such a great job and such a reasonable price we'll obviously use them at least one more time.  We can only hope their quality of work and attitude remain as good as it was first time around.   I've heard Numchai are generally good product/price and service wise but yet to test them out on the service side so good to know.

[KittenKong]

Whilst you should be wary of naming companies that do a poor job, I see no reason not to give the contact details of the one that did a good job and also to indicate the price paid.

[craigt3365]

We had a great group doing ours for a few years.  Then, terrible service.  Found another.  Same thing.  Numchai is generally pretty good.  Not perfect, but not terrible!

[johnnybgood]

Can anyone recommend an A/C company on the Darkside?  

[craigt3365]

Numchai

[joepattaya1961]

Consistency is a keyword in any business.

Whether you go to your "regular" restaurant, whether you use your "regular" taxi-driver, whether you use your "regular" a/c guy.......you will never get the same service/product.  

[Guderian]

A year ago I bought a new Panasonic AC unit with inverter for my bedroom from Home Pro. I'd had good experience with Home Works in the past when I bought a new 23 kBTU unit from them and had no complaints about their installers so I expected a similar service from Home Pro. 

 

Some contractors turned up in the morning to remove the old unit and reinstall it in the spare bedroom. That was all done by 11:00 and they left while I waited for Home Pro to deliver and install the new inverter unit. And waited...and waited...

 

I finally got fed up with waiting and called them up and they were most apologetic but the AC they'd sold me didn't in fact exist in their warehouse so they'd have to find one elsewhere and it would be delivered the next day, leaving me with a gaping hole in the wall of my bedroom where the old AC unit had been. My spare bedroom had the old AC, of course, but I was going to buy a new bed for that room so I'd already given the old bed away and it would have meant sleeping on the floor. I know the GF would have been quite happy with that but my ageing farang joints would not have been. And if I'm paying the thick end of 30K Baht for a new AC I don't expect to have to sleep with a fan just because of somebody's stock-keeping incompetence.

 

Anyway, to cut a long story short I drove back out to Home Pro (the new branch on Suk) and played merry hell with the sales staff there. They ended up calling the manager to quiet me down and he was a great guy, he promised that I would have the AC installed that evening. He gave me his personal phone number and checked how it was going every step of the way. It was installed by 22:00 in the evening, better late than never, or certainly better than the next day in this case. I'm happy with the AC and Home Pro's response in the end, and kudos to the Thai manager, though it also shows that it can pay to kick up a stink rather than take the Thai mai pen rai approach.

[avander]

5 hours ago, johnnybgood said:

Can anyone recommend an A/C company on the Darkside?  

The guys I used yesterday are Tana Air.  Number is 086 1136364 but best to have someone who can speak Thai although the lead service guy has a little English.  Price for 3 guys on site for about 4 hours was 1600THB which I thought very reasonable! 

[peeba7]

PK air and somchai and lady seem to be about the best.  Do a search on TV.  Both companies can speak some english. I have tried about 5 different companies.

[KittenKong]

17 hours ago, avander said:

The guys I used yesterday are Tana Air.  Number is 086 1136364 but best to have someone who can speak Thai although the lead service guy has a little English.  Price for 3 guys on site for about 4 hours was 1600THB which I thought very reasonable! 

 

If you take 3 air-con units at about 400B each (the going rate) and then allow another few hundred Baht for the extra work they did that would come to around 1600B, so that sounds fair. Some places also give a discount for doing more than one unit in one trip.

[avander]

On 8/18/2016 at 1:55 PM, avander said:

The guys I used yesterday are Tana Air.  Number is 086 1136364 but best to have someone who can speak Thai although the lead service guy has a little English.  Price for 3 guys on site for about 4 hours was 1600THB which I thought very reasonable! 

A follow-up from my previous post above.  We tried to get these guys back to do some further remedial work and they said "see you tomorrow".  I don't remember how many times we tried to no avail but my wife was very (too much so) patient with them so as indicated by so many TV members here consistency is definitely the key.