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Report: #1340952

Complaint Review: HMS National - Nationwide

  • Submitted:
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  • Reported By: Jose Flores — Huffman Texas USA
  • Author Confirmed What's this?
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  • HMS National Nationwide USA

HMS National Denied claim, unresponsive, unreasonable, bureacratic maze, confused Nationwide

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  • On Saturday, 11/19/16 the hot water heater went out and began leaking at a property we owned which is being rented out in Virginia. Our property manager immediately called someone to stop the leaking then informed us. We reminded them to use the home warranty, so he immediately called HMS who assigned a contractor.
  • The contractor was called repeatedly but did not respond until Monday, stating he could go out Tuesday, which he did. Upon arriving, the contractor saw that someone else had capped and drained the water heater (to minimize damage), informed HMS, and the claim was immediately denied because a non-HMS contractor had altered the water heater. Our property manager informed us of HMS’ decision.
  • We disagreed with HMS’s decision. The water heater could be diagnosed by simply removing the cap, opening the water valve, and seeing where the leak was occurring. I made 4 phone calls to HMS on Tuesday 11/22 to speak to someone about this, as our tenants had been without hot water for 3 days at this point and overnight lows in northern Virginia were below freezing. I was told a note was put in my file for a manager to call me within 24 hours.
  • On Wednesday, 11/23 called HMS again, as I had not heard back. After complaining, I was eventually connected to a claims manager, Lisa Thomas, who stated she would personally handle this. What she needed was the invoice of the original plumber who capped and drained the water heater. This was the first and last time we ever heard from Lisa Thomas.
  • I called and eventually received the invoice the day after Thanksgiving (11/25) and immediately sent it to Lisa. My wife and I made 5 calls on Friday to the HMS main line and Lisa’s direct line (which, it turns out, was not actually connected, and you can’t look her up in the HMS directory by last name either), attempting to get ahold of someone that could make decisions. Again, we were left with just a note in our file that a manager would contact us. Our tenants had been without hot water for a full 7 days at this point, and there was no one we could talk to at HMS about this.
  • That same day, my wife decided to email Mr. Douglas Stein, President of HMS informing him of everything we had been through. We later received a vague response stating someone would look into it.
  • On Saturday, 11/26 my wife made 4 more calls to HMS attempting to get ahold of Lisa or another manager (I couldn’t call HMS anymore without just yelling and cursing). She eventually was allowed to talk to another manager, Heidi Lindsey, who stated we needed the original plumber to go out to remove the cap so HMS’s contractor could do the diagnosis (perhaps this is a liability issue, but is it really that difficult to see that a line is capped, remove the cap, and do the diagnosis?). We contacted the original plumber, who stated he could do that, but the main water valve might not hold and he would not be liable for the damage. We immediately called and emailed Ms. Lindsey (cc’ing Lisa Thomas), and was told she was out for the rest of the day. The HMS main line told us the next time a manager would be available would be Monday,
  • On Sunday, 11/27 we gave up on HMS and ordered a plumber to install a hot water heater so our tenants would not be suffering any more. This was 8 days after our tenants lost hot water. The plumber started and finished the job the very same day, in contrast to the snail’s pace of HMS for even the simplest things.
  • On Monday, 11/28 we did receive a phone call from a third manager, Sheryl Howell, who left a message. I called her back a few minutes after receiving the call and it went to voicemail. I told her we intended to cancel our HMS warranty, we had already purchased a water heater out of pocket because HMS made almost zero effort to actually work with us, but I would still like to speak with her so please call me back. To date (12/1), I have not heard back from Sheryl Howell, Heidi Lindsey, Lisa Thomas, or anyone else at HMS.

After 18 phone calls totaling over 2 hours on the phone, we made zero progress in altering the initial decision HMS made to deny the claim because they would not remove a small piece of plastic (cap) from a water line, and our tenants were left in limbo for 9 days before having hot water was turned back on. I have requested our warranty be canceled immediately.

This report was posted on Ripoff Report on 12/01/2016 08:14 PM and is a permanent record located here: https://www.ripoffreport.com/reports/hms-national/nationwide/hms-national-denied-claim-unresponsive-unreasonable-bureacratic-maze-confused-nationw-1340952. The posting time indicated is Arizona local time. Arizona does not observe daylight savings so the post time may be Mountain or Pacific depending on the time of year. Ripoff Report has an exclusive license to this report. It may not be copied without the written permission of Ripoff Report. READ: Foreign websites steal our content

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