Adventures in Plumbing

About a year ago, one of Fiona's toys that she was playing with in the shower mysteriously disappeared. We assumed that she lifted the drain cover and the toy went bye-bye.  It was just a small rubber toy and it didn't block anything at the time, so we didn't give it another thought...until about a month ago when the shower started taking forever to drain.  I guess that little toy shifted and blocked the pipe.  Because the tub and the shower drain into the same pipe, the tub was slow to drain as well. 

This little jerk is
the cause of all our
plumbing problems.

We called a local plumber who came out and spent an hour snaking the drain but was unable to clear the blockage.  Thankfully he didn't charge us anything for the work that he did.  As I found out today, most plumbers will charge regardless of whether or not they're able to solve the problem. The plumber made it sound like since he wasn't able to clear the drain with the snake, that it was going to be a huge job involving jack-hammering up the tension slab base that our house is on.  Well that's an expense that we just weren't prepared for - especially since we're moving in a few months anyways.  So, for the past few weeks we've been using the shower in Fiona's bathroom. Not an end-of-the-world-crisis situation, but definitely a bit inconvenient. You don't realize how much you love your master en suite bathroom until you can't use it anymore!

Roto-Ruder.  Boo.

Finally, this weekend, John decided to see if we could find another plumber who might be able to clear the drain.  He went onto Roto-Rooter's website and set up an appointment for first thing this morning.  Well, the appointment window came and went and no Roto-Rooter. I called to find out where our plumber was, and they had no record of our appointment in the system, even though I had a confirmation number.  Well...frustrating, yes...but it's not like I took the morning off work or anything, so I didn't get too bothered about it.  They said they could send someone out within the hour. The hour came and went, and still no plumber.  After an hour and a half they called and said they were backed up and would send someone in about 3 hours.  Hm.  Ok, I was getting a little more frustrated at that point.  Having worked in a lot of customer service jobs, I can't stand poor customer service. I don't like getting jerked around and put off by companies that don't value my time. The plumber showed up around 3:00. He ran the shower for a few minutes and said, "Yep, something's clogged.  I can snake it for $178."  Sooo.  Wow.  That seemed really high to me.  $178 regardless of whether or not he could actually fix the problem. I called John and he agreed that it was much too high and to send the guy on his way.  On his way out the door, the plumber said to me, "Go ahead and try a few other plumbers. Then call us back when you actually want the job done."  Rude.

The only thing that could have made
 our plumber more awesome

I spent the next hour or so calling all the local plumbers and getting quotes.  Every plumber I called wanted to charge $100-$200/hr. Finally, I found one in the phonebook - Top Tier Plumbing - who quoted me $90 to snake the drain, and no charge if he couldn't clear the blockage. Yay!  To my surprise, he said he was just finishing up his last job of the day and would be over here in about 45 minutes.  In the end, he was here for almost 3 hours after the end of his work day, and only charged us the $90, even though he went above and beyond just snaking the drain.  He and John actually had to pull the stove out from the wall in the kitchen (the shower is on the other side of that wall) and cut into the drywall to get to the vent-pipe thingy.  He managed to shove something down into that pipe to send Fiona's lost little toy on it's merry way.  I'm so excited to be able to use our shower (and my big deep soaker tub!) again, but I'm even more excited that we found such an awesome plumber.  Chances of us needing another plumber again before we move are slim, but now I know that if anyone else needs a plumber, he's the person that I'm going to recommend. He was friendly and polite, professional and knowledgeable. He didn't just do the bare minimum like a lot of people would have, and he didn't charge us an arm and a leg like most people would have.  Excellent customer service, excellent plumbing skills, and an all around nice guy. 

Top Tier Plumbing, LLC - "Where Quality Service Matters."
Matt Kartchner - Owner
ROC265715, ROC265717
(520) 466-1200
287 W. Rio Dr. Casa Grande, AZ 85122