Southern Air & Electric

What Bobby W went through is extremely similar to what I went through, even the 3 minutes is the same. And I got attitude and rudeness as well and also had my appointment cancelled. You can read below if you want a detailed description of what happened and what the rude jerk of a technician said, but for the short story: Apparently if you don't answer the one phone call they give you in two minutes, they leave and your appointment is cancelled. They are rude and unprofessional when you try to call them back. Don't use them. Use anyone else.

So it started when my water heater went out. I called my home warranty company, and they let me know they contacted Southern Air and Electric. I only wish I had looked up these reviews after I heard that.

So, the home warranty company said they would contact me soon to set up an appointment. Cool. They did call me promptly, and I spoke to April. I don't have anything bad to say about her. She was very timely and helpful. They didn't have any appointments available for the rest of the day, but they could come out "first thing" in the morning. Great. Appointment was set to a 2 hr window of 9-11. Considering the business doesn't even open til 8:30, I assume this was the first appointment. So great, we should be able to get serviced early in the morning and I can then get ready and drive into work. Everything seems great.

Fast forward to today. At 10 o'clock, I call because I haven't heard anything yet. Not necessarily a bad thing. A little odd, since I figured I'm the first appointment of the day, but I'm used to people showing up closer to the end of their 2 hour windows, so I'm fine with it. Again, I spoke to April, and she informed me they had some problems, but he was on his way, he was told I was home, and he would be there by 10:45. Great. Everything seems great again.

Fast forward to 10:45, and I am blazing angry. So, apparently he (I wish I could remember his name. I assume it is Scott, since that's who everyone else says they spoke with, but I don't remember for sure) gets here at 10:37, knocks on the door 3 times, calls me once and my wife once. Since neither of us answered the phone, he leaves at 10:39. TWO MINUTES. He did not try knocking again, he did not call a second time to either of us, he did nothing. He claimed that "the process took a lot longer than 2 minutes", which is clearly a lie, and HE KNEW IT WAS A LIE, because he specifically said on the message on my wife's phone "I arrived here at 10:37 and it's not 10:39. It seems like no one is home, and since your husband didn't answer and you didn't answer, so I'm leaving." Well, 3 phone calls later (funny how if we don't answer the first time, he leaves, but it takes 3 calls to him for him to answer), I finally get a hold of him. He starts with "let me explain how this process works" as if I'm an idiot. He then, as I said above, lied about the process taking a lot longer than 2 minutes. I then say that I was on a call with my work because I'm working from home so I could be there when they come, but called back 2 minutes later. He then starts telling me that he's not going to argue with me, again lies about it being longer than 2 minutes, and telling me that I missed my appointment. I again express that it was ridiculous that he only gave us two minutes to get to him, especially since he acknowledged (through April) that I WAS HOME. He then told me, and I quote, "Well that's what happened, and if you don't like it, answer the door next time. I'm going to hang up now." I am not exaggerating. That is what he said to me, word for word, quoted exactly. It was completely rude and unprofessional, especially considering that I had been calm throughout the phone call. Yes, I used the word "crazy" in describing that he didn't really give us much a chance to answer, but I had not risen my voice, I had not insulted him, I was completely polite. He was beyond rude.

Please, if you want good service, USE SOMEONE ELSE. I could not believe the way this company operates or how rude the technician was that I spoke to. I understand that the technician can't just wait forever for the person to answer, but maybe more than 3 knocks when we have a doorbell, or more than one call. Or heck, more than 2 freaking minutes to let me answer. It took 3 phone calls and 15 minutes to get back in touch with him, but apparently 1 call and 2 minutes is all he was willing to give me to answer. It's absolutely ridiculous. I have never had such a horrible experience, and unless someone wants to deal with crap like this, they should never, ever use this company.

Company cancelled my appointment because I didn't not call back in five minutes. Their phones go straight to VM so I left messages; still no response. I had a terrible experience with Southern Air and Electric in Smyrna on Thursday June 12. I was given an appointment window of 9am-12am, for which they called me about 10am. I missed the call, but heard they voicemail later, where the technician SCOTT, stated that if i did not call him back within 5-10 minutes he would cancel my appointment. I called back promptly (3 minutes later) and he did not answer the phone so I left a voice mail stating that I was here and waiting and missed the call because i was in another room. There was no response for 10 minutes so i called again and again, saying that I was here and for him please to not cancel the appointment because I had taken off of work that day. I even called the 'home office' (some sort of PO Box address in Smyrna) but as his phone did, it went straight to voicemail. Convinced that he was never going to call back, I called one last time and he actually picked up the phone (wow). I told him that I called their numbers several times and there was no response so i hoped he heard the voicemails. He said that the company has a log of all the calls and voicemails and nothing was received but i was 'in luck' because the person that he just scheduled in my spot just cancelled. I told him that there was something wrong with their phones because i called numbers times and that giving my appointment away after just one call was unfair, ( i mean what am i supposed to do, stare at the phone for 3 hours until they called). He was upset because i critiqued their phone lines and customer services practices and cancelled the appointment. I told my insurance company what happened and they said they had received similar complaints from Southern Air and will take them off the service list. In conclusion, customer service at this company is very poor and they could care less about improving it. I would strongly advise anyone reading this to heavily consider other options for their heating/cooling/plumbing needs.