I had a furnce guy fix my furnace. He repaired it fine (update:no it wasn't repaired fine. the same problem came back again about a month later see below). But he also said the exhaust ducting was illegal and that he would have to report it to Enbridge Gas company who would send me a letter that says I have to replace my exhaust venting within 45 days or else they would shut off my gas. Is this true ? He also told me he could fix it for a $1000 dollars. It’s true that it is a bad installation but it has been there since before I bought the house 12 years ago and was installed by the previous owners.
I have never had somene come to the house to do repairs and then report me. Is this for real? (Incidently, I realized that he added the parts about my having to fix the furnace to code, after i had already signed the invoice. He added it later.Tricky guy)
I have to say that when the furnace was installed, it received an inspection sticker that it passed. this means that it passed !! so although there may have been building code changes since that time, I should not be fixing things everytime the building code changes. only when I change out my whole furnace.
By the way, if this furnace repair man was an honest person, he would have told me that he believes that the venting is not to code and prob. should be replaced. Then he should have told me what was wrong with my furnace in the first place and told me the cost. Instead, he had already replaced the pressure switch when he started telling me that my venting was not to code and needed to be replaced too. If he was honest he would have told me that right from the start and told me that he would not touch my furnace until the venting was going to be replaced too because it could be dangerous. Instead, he made sure he made his money and then told me that I had to get something else fixed. I would say that this was a bit tricky and not very honestly looking out for me. I do have CO detectors by the way.
By the way, there were never any a or b or red tag’s given to me or fastened to the furnace. When I found the ’consumer’s gas’ inspection sticker on the side of the furnace dating back to the installation, I knew that it had to be fine
UPDATE JANUARY 2011:
My furnace stopped working again just like originally. It just stops and doesn’t come back on again. Same problem again. I was ripped off! This time I re-read the flashing red light on the furnace panel inside which corresponds to a code. The code says on the panel that one possible problem could be oxidization on the flame sensor and to rub it off with sandpaper. Seems resasonable. I did some googling. And in fact found my furnace on a chat forum. SOmeone else had a similar problem and said sanding would work. I tried it. It was fairly easy to find the flame sensor. Right where the flames should be. It did feel like it had some corrosion on it. I sanded it. Then turned my furnace back on and voila! Working just fine again. The furnace guy never bothered to look at the codes at all. Let’s face it , he couldn’t charge me extra for cleaning the flame sensor. But he COULD charge me extra for another part which I didnt even need. VEry very tricky and I will write this up on this site.
Oh by the way, there were never any calls from Enbridge gas company for me to fix my furnace. another bold faced untruth by the furnace repair guy.
Bottom line is that you can not trust at all any of the HVAC people who come to your house. They are not your doctor. You have to first establish a good working relationship with someone who does a good and honest job before you can even begin to trust.
