Home Depot/Black Hills Inc. Home Depot/Black Hills Inc Carbon monoxide poisoning Ripoff Olympia Washington

I'm going to send you the letter I sent Home Depot. I have been dealing with them and Black Hills Inc since the furnace was installed back in Septmember of 2006.

This is the third time I have written the home depot customer care department. Below is the original email I sent.


September 14th, 2006

Guy and Susan Richardson
911 Miller Street SW
Tumwater, WA 98512
(360) 357-7499

To: Black Hills, Inc.
Subject: Dissatisfaction with furnace installation by Home Depot contractor Black Hills, Inc.

We purchased a gas furnace through Home Dep ot from Black Hills, Inc. (BH). BH was supposed to come out and start work on the furnace on the morning of September 7th. My wife took off work and waited and waited, but no one came. She called BH and they said they were running late, but would be there soon. She waited some more but they never came. She called back again and rescheduled for the next week. The next week, she took off work again. BH showed up, but they were a couple of hours late. My wife ended up going to work after they said it would take all day and that they would call her when they were getting close to finishing up. They never called her, but told my kids that we needed to call the gas company to turn on the gas and left. We had to wait until the next day to find out what he meant, and then called the gas company. The gas company came out, but couldn??t turn the gas on because the permit had not been posted. Someone from BH came back by that afternoon an d dropped off the permit, but they didn??t post it, they just left it in the dirt by the meter. My wife called the gas company to let them know the permit was there and they came out again to unlock the meter.

We had to call BH back to schedule them to come and finish up installing the thermostat. We also had to request that they fix the exhaust pipe coming out the top of the chimney because they didn??t cap it. We also requested that they cover up the large hole where the furnace exhaust vented into the chimney. They came out once and fixed the cap on the top of the chimney, but didn??t cover the large hole where the pipe went into the chimney. We called again, and they came back again on September 22nd to finish hooking up the furnace. They called to tell us that there was no elect rical running to it and that we would need run new electrical line to the furnace or they could do it for a fee. We thought this seemed really weird because our old furnace (in the exact same place) had working electrical. When I got home, our dishwasher and garbage disposal weren??t working. I went to our electrical box and noticed a breaker had been tripped. I reset the breaker but there was still no power to the furnace. After looking closer at the furnace, I noticed that a fuse had blown on a switch that was connected to the old furnace. I replaced the fuse and the power was restored to the furnace. When BH installed the furnace they must have blown the fuse and tripped the breaker when they tried to hook it. I??m just lucky I didn??t?? follow their advice or I would have been out more money.

They did finally get the furnace working and the thermostat in. The y made a mess in our living room installing the thermostat, and just left it. They also left garbage outside by the gas meter. After more phone calls, they came out again to cover the hole where the exhaust went into the chimney next to the furnace in the basement, but they didn??t fix anything and just left. They came back again on Thursday the 28th of September and finally did a shotty job patching up the hole. During the process they disconnected the exhaust pipe from the furnace. Again, they just left without calling. When we got home we called BH again to let them know that the furnace was exhausting into our house. They said they would come out on Friday, but never did. BH did not give us any instructions about making sure the furnace was off, but I turned it off because I didn??t think it was safe for it to be venting into our house. Sunday night it was cold and somehow our furnace kicked on. We woke up the morning of Monday October 2nd and heard it, so I went and turned it off again. My wife called BH again and restated that the furnace was exhausting into our house. The sales person and the manager came out and finally fixed it. Both of us were extremely sick all day with nausea, severe headaches, and dizziness. I believe we were experiencing carbon dioxide poisoning from the furnace exhaust. My wife suffered from exacerbated asthma symptoms and headaches all week. Our bedroom is in the basement, right next to the room with the furnace. We were very lucky that the furnace was off most of the time and we did not suffer any more serious side effects from the exhaust.

Dean Faust, the sales representative from BH, was extremely apologetic and gave us a $50 gift certificate to a local restaurant. While we apprecia ted his sincerity and the gesture, we are still very dissatisfied with the service we received. It is highly unlikely that we will ever consider going through Home Depot for any installations in the future. Please feel free to contact me if you have any questions about our experience.

Sincerely,

Guy XXXXXXXXXX

Since this letter Home depot has offered us a $350 store credit. For the life of me I don' t know why they think I would want to shop at their store or that this is a reasonable refund.

-------------- Original message --------------
From: gwrman@comcast.net



-------------- Original message --------------
From: gwrman@comcast.net

I have not received a response to my complaint.
What is the average turn around time?

Guy XXXXXXXXXX (LASTNAME REDACTED)


-------------- Original message --------------
From: Consumer Affairs

Hello,

We appreciate your feedback. Listening to our customers is very important to us. Your information has been received by Home Depot's Customer Care Department and will be responded to as soon as possible.


Customer Care will create a record of your feedback and ensure it is given to the appropriate individuals for review. If further action on our part is needed, a Customer Care Professional, or a member of our Home Depot store's management will be in contact with you.

Again, thank you for providing us with your comments.

Sincerely,

Home Depot
Customer Care Department

Guy
tumwater, Washington
U.S.A.

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