Mr. Appliance of Brenham and Bryan/College Station, TX — Local services in Brenham

This is a long, but detailed review. Due to space limits, I had to add screenshots of the last half of my review. Use this company if you want no diagnosis and feel like giving someone $125.00 for driving to your house. So here is what happened with my 84 y.o. MIL (mother n law) who lives in a different town than I do: My MIL’s electric range (stove/oven) would not work on Labor Day. The “on” light worked and the back left burner would turn on for a few seconds then go off. Nothing else worked. She called a company but they did not repair stoves. So on Thursday I set up an appointment for service on the following Monday with Mr. Appliance. They sent an email and text Friday confirming the appt and the time - between 8am and 10am on Monday and that the technician, Darrick, would text when he is on the way. No text came. At 11:46am I called the number on the text and asked if there was a problem. Jimmy said, I’m glad you called, the tech that was supposed to come to your house for service called in sick. Let me try to get you another tech. So, unless I called, I guess they were just gonna let me fly in the wind. But, they did get me another tech between 1230pm and 330pm. They texted me at 1225 to say he was on his way. My MIL calls me to say that the tech, Melvin, said that it would be $320.00 for him to touch the unit. If he could fix it then, $320, but if it needed parts that would be additional. I spoke to Melvin by phone and indeed, he said that if he touched the unit, it would cost $320.00 plus any needed parts. He also proceeded to say that he thought the problem could be electrical. He said to have an electrician check it out and if the electrical was fine, we could have him come back out without paying “an additional” $125.00, but we would have to pay the $125.00 service charge. I told Melvin not to touch the unit and he was paid the service charge. I called an electrician friend about the situation. The breakers were not tripped, but I turned them off and back on. That didn’t help. There was power to the unit, but the burners or oven weren't working. He agreed that it didn't seem to be electrical. Later in the day, it hit me; what did my MIL get for her “ service charge”? She didn't get a diagnosis. The guy said it would cost $320 for him to touch it. How can you diagnose a unit without touching it? My sister and BIL live a few miles away and he said he would take a look the next day. He pulled the unit out and unplugged it. Then checked to see if it was getting the correct power to the plug (what Melvin could have done and made $320.00). It was. He plugged it back in and now it works fine. If I would have left the breaker off longer, it likely would have reset itself like it did with my BIL. I googled how to reset a frigidaire range and it said leave the breaker off for 1-5 minutes. So the next day I called Mr. Appliance and explained the situation and asked, what do I get for the $125 service charge? She said a disgnosis. Well, we didn't get one. All we got was, you can pay $320 for me to try and fix it, or, you can pay me $125 for making the drive to your house. She said she could reschedule us for the following day. I told her I don't need you now. It's fixed. It just needed to be reset. I guess if the tech would have done that, they would have charged $320. But instead, he did zero. No diagnosis. And expected $125. She said she would see what she could do and call me back. Cont'd...

The initial process was very good. From taking phone calls, keeping me updated of the progress on the appointment schedule. And very quick response to questions and inquiries prior to service date. However, i was completely disappointed after the technician Samuel came. The Samsung refrigerator was not cooling, and i explained the freezer is working but the refrigerator side is not cooling. The person i spoke on the phone to schedule the appointment mentioned that's a good news since it is a sign that the compressor is working. However, Samuel just opened the door, put his hand in for a second, walked around the fridge, and went back to his truck without even checking any internal components, then came back after a few minutes to tell me that his diagnose is done, and that i had to change the compressor, and the estimate is over $1100. I asked how he knows without taking any reading, just looking at the fridge. He said that 90 percent of the time, it is the compressor. So i asked then why the freezer is working fine. He said because my unit is dual compressor. And he didn't even open the cover in the back of the cooler. Prior to this technician's visit, i called to ask if they work on gas range. They said they do, and told me to ask the technician the problem when he arrives. So i asked Samuel if he can adjust the range to reduce the orange flame. He didn't do anything but turn the range on off a couple of times, then walked away to his truck. When he came back he said he diagnosed both units. And that for the gas range i would need to call the Gas company since he is not licensed to work on gas. But then he charged me $125 for diagnose. I paid $250 for this guy to show up, spend 2 minutes staring at the two units, walk out to his truck and come back 10 minutes later to tell me i need to spend over $1100 to fix the fridge and that he can't work on the gas range. I understand that there is a dispatch travel fee for a technician to even show up. But never heard that for someone to tell me he can't work on the unit is also a diagnose fee of $125. I didn't only feel i got ripped off, i felt insulted. Now, i called another appliance repair person. Someone who works out of Bryan. He came, and this person actually opened to get to the internal parts of the fridge, and told me the evaporator fan was bad. He came back a few days later, and he fixed the refrigerator for $250 for the 2 trips, and $39 for the fan. Very disappointed at Mr. Appliance...

My washing machine had an issue a couple weeks ago. I was pretty busy at the time and thought I’d call a professional instead of attempting to diagnose the problem myself. Mr. Appliance answered my call and was available on the day I called. I did appreciate the promptness which is why I rated this experience 2 stars instead of 1. The representative on the phone told me that the technician would give me a quote and if I decided not to do the work, I would be charged a $125 diagnostic fee. I agreed. The technician arrived on time, spent a few minutes looking at the washer, and said the motor needed replacing. I told him that didn’t sound right to me because the washer worked in all cycles, just not the spin cycle. I asked him, “if the motor was broken, wouldn’t the washer not work in any cycle?” His answer was hard to understand and he spent about 15 minutes writing up a $780 quote to replace the motor. Since the washer costs about that new, I declined and payed the $125 diagnostic fee instead. A couple days later, I searched YouTube for about 15 minutes and found several videos on the exact error code and same symptoms for my make and model. These videos were consistent in describing the problem was in a $10 part, which I bought on Amazon. A couple days later, the part arrived and I followed the installation instructions on one of the videos, which took me about 20 minutes. It has been working perfectly since.

I shared this story with the owner so he would know the situation. He seemed genuinely concerned, but was surprised that I was disappointed in the overall experience. I explained to him that I would have expected a professional to be more competent than me at performing a diagnosis, or at least capable to do the same YouTube searches that I did. If the motor did indeed need replacing, I would have perceived the correct diagnosis as worth the $125 fee. But the diagnosis was incorrect so I received no value for the fee I incurred. I didn’t ask, but the owner did not offer me a refund.

I do understand that a company that performs diagnostic and repair services for homeowners need to be compensated for their effort when repairs are not feasible for some reason. And I understand that nobody is perfect and learning on the job is legitimate. But I also think customers should get some sort of value for fees they incur, and that didn’t happen...