Mr. Rooter Plumbing

So I just had a tech from Mr. Rooter leave my house. I was in a panic because my husband and I just bought this house and after 7 weeks of living here our toilet clogged and the main sewer line was backed up. Turns out there were roots growing through the clay pipes in the front of the house. The tech showed up an hour and a half late so I was already peeved. He uses a camera to go down the main line and shows me some roots that are clogging the transition from cast iron to clay pipes. I had a scope done before we bought the house but wasn’t able to be present to watch. I had a video of the scope though and the other tech said it wasn’t terrible. Just needed a scrub, not gutted. The tech from Mr. Rooter said I needed to replace the whole mainline for about 10k. I said no way and he gave me another option; the hyrdoscrub. That would cost me 1800 bucks I said no again and he said he can talk to his boss and bring it down to 1200 bucks. I felt like he was lying and sent him on his way. The process of the snake cost me 349 but I bought their stupid chemical to «stunt the growth of the roots for 50 bucks. I shouldn’t have panicked and gone with another company but the clog was bad and it was flooding my laundry room. I will never call them again. All the reviews sound very similar. Very upset that I spent 400 bucks on a late con artist.

My renter called with leaky hot water heater — Mr Rooter was first to respond. Work was completed on that afternoon and my renter was happy. However, I was overcharged for the service and will never, ever, call them again.

I do an annual preventive maintenance on my sewer line because many of my neighbors have had to replace their lines at considerable expense. My line is 110 feet which means that the inexpensive $ 99 drain companies can’t do the job since they only handle up to 100 feet. I have found sewer companies that will do my drain for $ 150. When I found a Mr. Rooter coupon supposedly knocking $ 50 off any drain job, I gave them a call to find out their cost. The company would not quote me a price over the phone, but said that they would send out a technician for free who would give me a quote. I was shocked to get a quote of $ 349 – clearly a very high price. I told the tech that I could get the job done with another company for $ 150. He immediately offered to drop the price to $ 200. I declined and he next indicated that he would talk to his supervisor to see if he could get the price any lower. So, the tech disappeared into his truck for about 15 minutes and came back with the price of $ 150 (no further discount on the coupon). I let him do the work and as far as I can tell, he did a good, professional job. The tech was polite and professional, but I found the bargaining over the service price was not to my liking and suspect that most people can find other companies to do a professional job for less than half the price that Mr Rooter will try to charge.

If I could give a ZERO star review — I would including a warning to prospective clients to RUN, not WALK, away from this company!
The other review that says CON ARTISTS! is right on! I own a property in CO, my daughter lives there and the plumbing backed up one Sunday. She called this company as they said no special weekend fees/​cheapest, etc and she didn’t check any reviews as she was just relieved to have someone HELP! They put the rotor device down the backyard sewer and it stopped about 30 feet from the house. The tech told her we had a BREAK in our sewer line and that he’d be back in the morning, with his crew, to dig up my backyard to replace it — costs could be up to $ 15K. They wanted payment for that day’s service which was nearly $ 400 AND a deposit for the next day’s dig!
When I got wind of this — I looked at the Unilocal reviews and immediately canceled their service appointment and the credit card. I called another Unilocal reviewed tech and he referred me to Garvin’s. They came out on Monday, 2 hours after my call, scoped the line, chewed up whatever was clogging it and charged me $ 165. Done. NO BREAK. NO thousands of dollars. NO digging up of my yard! No fake photos of a line break!
RUN AWAY FROM Mr. Rooter!

CON ARTISTS! I called them out for a main sewer line that was backing up when large amounts of water (large laundry loads, plus shower etc) went through. No trouble w/​low-​level use including shower, toilet etc, so didn’t think it was an emergency, just time to get it done. I’ve had roots in the line previously, so this was not a new situation. MR ROOTER employee MAURICIO VARGAS arrived, quoted me a $ 349 price, minus my $ 50 coupon, for a total of $ 299. Thought that was high, but hey, I needed it done. 30min later, he tells me «there’s a problem» and said his cable was stuck in the line. Supervisor ALAN BEGYN arrived. They were able to get the cable back, and then gave me a «free scope» view. They went to 37ft, then the camera went black. Alan said this was my transition point, and indicated the line was compromised at that point. Alan said I needed to have a backhoe come into my front yard, dig 8 – 9 ft down to the line, and replace this «transition point». Alan also warned me that this might not solve the problem, as there were 20 or so more «transition points» from my home out to the street, and each one might be split apart. He said he would have the work start the following day, and that I would need to stay in a hotel or other home, as I could not use ANY water in my home until the repair was complete. Oh, and the first repair would be approx. $ 5,000, with a potential cost of $ 10,000 — $ 15,000 if the main line had to be replaced.
I freaked out. This was not the «maintenance» I had asked for. I told Alan I wanted to just speak with a different professional in the field to ask their opinion. Alan said he needed to schedule the work immediately, but would give me a few minutes, and stepped outside, as I made one of the most important phone calls of my life. I spoke with Dan from «See Inside Sewer Scope» and he told me, «GET THEM OUT OF YOUR HOUSE — THEY ARE LYING TO YOU.» He recommended I get a second clean-​out scheduled, and gave a referral of Chris, from ²⁴⁄₇ plumbing. He came out, charged only $ 130, and easily went through not only the «37ft point», but the entire 100ft plus line. He said he did hit some roots, at about 80ft out, but was able to get through with minimal effort. He was at my house less than 45min. NO line repair warranted or needed. The line is open and fine.
So, I asked if there was ANY POSSIBLE EXPLANATION as to why Mr Rooter had almost charged me several thousand dollars for an unnecessary job. I was told they use a standard 2″ blade, whereas all clay piping is 4″, and that was «maybe» why they hit a blockage when Chris, with his 4″ blade equipment, went easily through. There truly was no other even remotely possible explanation, other than what is almost 90% sure: MR ROOTER LIES TO THEIR CUSTOMERS ABOUT NEEDING MAJOR REPAIRS.
Main office: 3801 Godding Hollow Parkway, Frederick, CO
Do NOT use this company. For anything, ever. Zero integrity.

I wasted my entire morning waiting for a technician who never showed up. The following day someone called me to apologize and offered me a 10% discount in case I was still interested in having them installing my new gas water heater. No thanks, I am not interested. Two stars for this company because the person who called was very apologetic and made me feel bad about the whole situation.

Called at 5:00 pm on a Sunday to get a drain line snaked in an apartment building. They said they could get someone there between 7 and 9 pm and refused to give me any rough idea of the cost before the guy got there. I get a call at 9:20 pm that it would cost $ 675. I know it’s after-​hours, so I expected it might cost double the normal cost of $ 100-​$ 200. I did not expect it to cost 3.5 times the normal cost! Highway robbery. This guy drove from Denver to Longmont and I just said sent him on his way. If they just quoted reasonable charges, then they might make a better profit because people would actually accept their bids. I’m glad it wasn’t a real emergency. Stay away from this company.

I called Mr Rooter to ask how much it would be to install a new gas water heater and take away the old one. The nice woman on the phone told me they can’t price it out over the phone because they don’t know what it looks like and what it needs (fair enough) but she said they could send a technician out here for free to tell me and quote me a price, so I thought «what a great service.» Of course I agreed, because she said it was free. Well, turns out it’s NOT free. The technician says later that coming out TO THE HOUSE is free, but DIAGNOSTICS and telling me what I actually need to get the job done costs $ 75. Well of course I refused to pay that, the woman didn’t mention anything about a diagnostics fee. Is that just something they conveniently forget and slam the customer with later? Or an honest mistake? I won’t venture to guess, but after a call to his manager, the company waived the diagnostics fee. So I decided to give it 3 stars, because they were professional and it may have been a misunderstanding and the company did not force the charge, but I didn’t give it 4 or 5 stars because it was quite a HUGE charge to install the water heater. So expensive to say the least. But it was professional of them to waive the fee since I was never told about it to begin with. Otherwise I NEVER would have agreed for a technician to come out.
HOWEVER, the technician did laugh at me when I said I’ve gotten quotes for $ 150-​$ 200 for installation. NOT professional there. But he didn’t seem like someone who had much in terms of people skills.