Drain Works Plumbing

Overall, very pleasant experience. This is the second time using this company after having poor experience with one of their competitors previously. Our first time was 3 years ago (2009). Friendly, courteous staff, carefully brought equipment in, laid down tarps, cleaned thoroughly afterward, etc. This was simple precaution snaking as we had previously had back-up, and all went as planned on time, etc. Company calls ahead to give delivery time window, and individual tradesman showed up on time. My only slight concern was tradesman's desire to upsell services. I understand this from a business perspective, but if I wasn't here and say my wife were to have been on her own for this visit, I feel she may have ended up with additional unnecessary camera scope work (+$300), but if you're confident in the work you need done & tell them that, they left it there. I should note my main reason for writing this review is the financial benefit in doing so. The company offers a $25 cheque back to you for writing this. You can say good or bad. Another nice touch, as we're choosing to do is to donate to Sick Kids foundation (you can keep yourself too) which apparently comes with full reciept of proof etc. Anyways, overall I would highly recommend this company & I have no personal ties in anyway to them.

Last year Phil came and fixed my faucet. he was also the same guy from drainworks who hooked up my new sink.

Phil is very friendly, and smart. He does an awesome job, always tells me what he is doing and provides the honest truth.

This morning the faucet that was replaced last year was leaking. He fixed it in 10 minutes!

I was impressed and able to get on with my day

Service was excellent. The triage person on the phone was courteous and explained things clearly. Matt was the technician sent to our house the same evening. He was professional and also very detailed in his explanation. He guessed the problem was from a large tree root encroaching on our pipes. After using the camera, this confirmed his experienced instinct! He also localized the problem and explained to us the different options as the next steps would involve the City since it was a City pipe problem. Would highly recommend DrainWorks!

How would you like to deal with a company whose owner SWEARS at you. Well, Eddie (Drainworks VP/GM) who said he was the owner (which is strange in itself since their website says Terry is the owner!!)....swore to myself and my wife on the phone. He said the F-word a number of times. We were astonished that such verbal abuse was happening from a supposedly reputable company. We had called Drainworks for an easy job...just needed our dishwasher pulled out for something to be retrieved, and then re-hooked up. As soon as the Drainworks technician reinstalled our dishwasher and ran the dishwasher test cycle there was water leaking out of the door. Never in the 6+ years living in our house has our dishwasher ever leaked! The Drainworks technician said there was nothing he could do, collected $304, and left. We had to call other Appliance specialists to help with the dishwasher leak, and they said the Drainworks plumber who did the job did not level the dishwasher properly when he re-installed it back and also damaged the door seal when pulling it out. We simply called Drainworks back to discuss this situation with someone in a senior position. First, Eddie (Drainworks VP/GM) was abusive to my wife because I was on speaker phone while she was in the room (I do not like having the cell phone right beside my ear). He was saying things to her such as "GET OFF THE PHONE, this is a conversation between your husband and I, you do not matter". Well Eddie, she does matter because she's a co-owner on the credit card which the $304 was made on. And that is not how to talk to people. He was extremely rude and shockingly abusive. I told him that was not the way to speak to customers and hung up. I immediately called Drainworks back again hoping to talk to Eddie after he had a chance to calm down, Eddie picked up the phone and immediately SWORE at me multiple times and also said "you are not a customer, you are a rat!....F-word, F-word". I did not even raise my voice during the phone conversation (my wife heard the entire call from the speaker phone), and we were quite shocked at what was happening. Thankfully our toddler and newborn baby were not in the same room to hear such foul language. DO NOT USE THIS COMPANY!!!!

They charged $304 for such an easy job. If you were to buy a completely new dishwasher from somewhere reputable, and had it delivered, installed, and the old appliance removed....it would typically cost you $140-$170. Drainworks charged more than DOUBLE for a simple unhook and re-hook of the dishwasher (very simple job...no new dishwasher needed to be delivered and no old one to be taken away). And on top of that, they SWEAR at customers. Go with someone else.

Please note, we have a newborn baby at home. So time is really a luxury for us. I am using what limited free time I have to write this review (whereas I could be spending this time playing with my kids) because it is important for HomeStars readers to know about this situation. Do not be simply swayed by their "10" ratings. It's easy to give a company a "10" when a job goes right. The most important thing is to see how a company reacts to its customers when a job does not go 100% right. That is a true testament to a company's customer service. I wish I spent more time reading the "0" reviews. If you browse on the Drainworks Homestars reviews, you will find a few different "0" reviews...I encourage you to read those reviews and more importantly read how Drainworks responds to them. My wife and I both work for large Fortune 500 companies, and never would our customer service department or a VP for that matter respond to people in such manner.

Hope this is helpful for others!

** Update July 7'12 in response to Drainworks' comments: Funny Drainworks should say my review is not accurate. That is exactly what they did for all the other "0" reviews, never is it their fault, always the customers. Have a read of Chantelle's review of them on Jan 4, 2012 (you'll have to scroll through a few pages to get there). She copied/pasted an email from Eddie, read the tone of the email and the words used. I wish I had taken my time to read her review and the other "0" reviews before hiring this company. Drainworks response and tone to these customers were very telling. Well, my cell phone records easily show that on July 3'12 I made only two calls to Drainworks. The first one was the one I mentioned above where Eddie was berating my wife who happened to be on speaker phone in the same room. I hung up on him (yes, I admitted to hanging up on my original review) because that was not the way to speak to a woman or anyone for that matter. I called Drainworks back a 2nd time hoping to speak to someone in charge, to which Eddie picked up and immediately knew it was me (guess they have call display) and said "who the F-word do you think you are!!" and then multiple F-words after that. That's also when he said "I AM the boss!". He knows exactly what happened on the call and what words were used. If Drainworks had a recording, great, that would validate what happened. Or maybe Drainworks does not have a recording of the 2nd time I called when Eddie swore...if he's the boss, he may know how to turn off the phone recording. Good thing video recording on cell phones are so easily available now!! We were so surprised at what was going on during the 2nd call, a cell phone was whipped out. Yes, it did take about a week's worth of phone tag with Eddie before I got him live on July 3rd. He mentions he called me and I could not talk, well yes, I was holding my newborn baby at that time just about to put the baby in the crib so I could not talk. When he called back, I was driving, and I do not pick up cell phones when driving (it is illegal here in Ontario). We then had a couple more times of 'he called/I called phone tag'. Drainworks mentions the awards they have won...well...some companies may choose to rest on their laurels over time. Again, my earlier comments....see how a company responds to customers when jobs do not go 100% right. That is the most telling. Read their TONE to these customers. The job Drainworks was hired to do: Easy unhook of dishwasher, move it slightly out, move it back, re-hook. Immediately after it was rehooked and the technician ran the test cycle there was water leaking. We had to get appliance specialists to look at the issue, they could tell that the Drainworks plumber did not balance the dishwasher correctly when rehooking it and damaged the door seal when pulling it out. That was the issue we had with Drainworks, which we wanted to discuss with someone in charge. My wife and I both knew the cost was $304, that was not the issue we had with Drainworks...I already waited 4 hours for the technician to come out (my time slot was 11-2pm, the technician came to my house late at 3pm). I took a half a day off work to wait for him...I did not have time to get another technician to come. However, I was not expecting to pay $304 and be left with a leaky dishwasher from the job! Thanks for reading.

I had a bad leak under my sink, due to some bad plumbing and a drain backup / blockage, and all this happened on Canada Day when I was sure that everything was closed. I called Drainworks on the morning of July 2 and a plunber was at my house within 4 hours.
Phil Burns did a fantastic job explaining the situation to me and provided excellent and fast work to replace the poor plumbing I had under the sink, which fixed the leaks also. Since the drain was also blocked and there was no cleanout to be found anywhere in my basement, Phil installed a cleanout right on the drain pipe. He then, free of charge, took some of his time to help me snake the drain and he was able to clear whatever was causing the blockage. I appreciate the excellent and friendly service that he provided. I had mean't to show him another plumbing problem that I had in my basement, for a step-up tub that I am currently not using, but I forgot to tell him about it. I will not hesitate to call Drainworks again, knowing that I will receive excellent service.

Phil Burns did a great job and left the place neat. There was a problem with low hot water pressure, and Phil figured out that the problem was in the new Kohler faucet, and sure enough found an obstruction in the hot water feed of the faucet and cleared it. He saved me having to go to Home Depot for a new faucet and having to pay for a second plumber's visit. Way to go, Phil!

Had a sewer backup in my basement, called a whole bunch of emergency drain companies and Drainworks was the first to respond. So grateful they did. They were professional, polite, and unusually friendly. They did great work, explained everything, and completed the job in an efficient and timely manner. I've dealt with a lot of trades and service companies - i truly believe this was the best experience I've had.

Armando, Frank, and the rest of the team: thank you again.

They were fast left no mess and explained everything to me... Hoping I have no more plumbing issues but if I did I would call drain works.I called one day to have my drain snaked the next day my trap was replaced.

We replaced our counter top and with it, we replaced our over-mount sink with an undermount sink. We forgot to account for the added depth that the undermount sink has and, as a result, our existing plumbing no longer fit. We discovered this on a Saturday and had already been almost a week without a functional kitchen so we were in a bit of a panic.

We used HomeStars to find plumbers. We called another company first and I got a rep on the phone who wouldn't discuss the problem with me, she would only take my information so someone could call me back. So I moved on through the reviews and called DrainWorks.

The person I spoke with discussed my situation with me and let me know that the DrainWorks contractors are equipped to handle just about any job which meant that I could feel very confident that once they came to our house for the initial estimate, the plumbing would be fixed during the same visit.

Chris was assigned to our project and he was really great. He replaced our existing plubming which we hadn't anticipated but we also weren't suprised because the whole system was falling apart. Once he tested the work he had done, we found a leak somewhere else. The leak was behind a cupboard wall and the only solution was to cut through. Again, we suspected that might be a problem but didn't know until everything else was done.

Chris was equipped to handle this and cut out a portion in a far corner that was out of the way. He also cut a little finger hole so that, in the future, we could now use this as a plumbing access panel. I thought it was ingenious. In addition, he assembled the new plumbing in a way that we can more easily access it and take it apart ourselves if we need to.

Chris was polite, friendly, and enjoyable to work with. The quality of his work is far superior to what was already installed. He left the site spotless and I would absolutely recommend him again.

We were extremely impressed with some waterproofing work we did with Drainworks recently. Our contact Frank walked us through a thorough analysis of the work that needed to be done, and his knowledge behind the work really made us comfortable in our choice. He gave us a few days to shop around, but we knew right off the bat that we would go with Drainworks. The work was started quickly which was very important to us with the degree of damage done to the house. The team that came to work on our home were extremely timely and efficient. They also did a thorough review of the work after it was done. I would highly recommend Drainworks for anyone in need of waterproofing or plumbing services.