What to have ready when you call
Four things shorten almost every call. What the system is actually doing, in plain words: no cold air, warm air from the registers, water on the floor, a noise that started this week, a breaker that keeps tripping. Roughly how old the equipment is, or the model and serial number off the rating plate if you can reach it, because that is what tells us whether a part is still available.
Where the equipment lives: basement, attic, closet, crawl space, or a roof or balcony in a condo. And whether anything changed recently, such as a filter swap, a thermostat replacement, a power outage or work done by somebody else.
If you are in a condominium or a cooperative, tell us the building name when you book. Many buildings want a certificate of insurance on file, some restrict work to weekday hours, and roof or balcony access usually runs through a building engineer rather than a key. We can sort all of that before the visit instead of stalling at a front desk.
When to call instead of using the form
Call if you have no heat in cold weather, no cooling in a heat wave, water coming from the equipment, a breaker that will not stay on, or a carbon monoxide alarm sounding. The form goes to an inbox and gets answered in business hours; the phone gets a person and 24 hour emergency service covers nights, weekends and holidays.
One exception overrides everything on this page. If you smell gas, leave the house first and call Washington Gas from outside, before you call us. Do not switch anything on or off on the way out, including light switches. Once the gas utility has made the property safe, call us and we will find what caused it and repair the appliance side.
What happens after you get in touch
We ask a few questions on the phone, because some of them can be answered there and save you a call-out entirely. On site, the technician measures before recommending anything: static pressure, temperature split, refrigerant charge by superheat and subcool, and combustion figures on anything that burns gas. Then you get told what is wrong, what it takes to fix, and what it costs, before anybody picks up a tool.
You get the price in writing before work begins and it does not move afterward unless we find something that could not have been seen and you agree to it first. If the honest answer is that a repair will hold for another few seasons, that is the answer you get. Every job is backed by our satisfaction guarantee, and military members and senior citizens receive 10% off any HVAC repair.
Hours, and what they actually mean
Regular appointments run Monday through Friday from 7:30 AM to 7 PM and Saturday from 9 AM to 4 PM. Emergency service runs 24 hours, every day of the year, including holidays. What we will not do is promise you an arrival window we cannot hold.
On the first ninety degree stretch in June and the first single digit morning in January, every company in the county is triaging, so call early rather than waiting to see whether it recovers overnight, and tell us if there are elderly occupants, small children or no alternative heating or cooling in the house.