Free Service Call Explanation

We at Texas Air Conditioning Specialist wanted to take time out to explain our idea behind our “Free Service Call”. The way the air conditioning industry has operated in the Austin and other areas is if your air conditioning system is having issues a air conditioning company will come out for a service fee to diagnose what is wrong with your air conditioning system.  Once the air conditioning company has figured out what is wrong with your air conditioning and heating system they will give you an estimate. If you choose to do this repair the air conditioning service company will in most cases waive the service fee. But if you feel like you want a second opinion or just do not want to do the repair at that time then you are charged the service fee.

Mark Cardwell(owner of Texas Air Conditioning Specialist) felt this was a way that companies forced a customer into a repair. Mark felt this was a bit unfair and wanted to change the way this process was done. So Texas Air Conditioning Specialist became the first air conditioning and heating service company in the Austin area to offer “Free Service Calls”. If the customer wanted a second opinion or just did not want to do the repair at that time there was still not a service fee charged. Mark wanted customers to use his air conditioning company to fix their air conditioning or heating system because they wanted to not because they were forced to.

Over the years some customers thought this meant if they wanted a spring checkup that their was not charge. “Free Service Call” only applies if your air conditioning and heating system is  not working or not working the way it should.  So what the “Free Service Call” really stands for is a no charge trip charge. It does not stand for Free labor. If a customer wants us to do a tune up on their system their is a charge for this.

There have been some other items customers are confused on and we wanted to clarify some of these issues. When a customer calls our office all of our staff are trained to ask certain questions as it pertains to the reason for calling our office. If a customer is calling because their air conditioning system is not working one of the main questions we ask is if the customer has changed their filter. Filter not being changed is one of the most common reasons air conditioning systems fail during the summer. The reason we ask this over the phone is because this is home owner maintenance and the home owners responsibility. Since we have asked over the phone and we come to your home and the reason it is not cooling is because the customer did not change the filter we have given our techs the option to charge a minimal fee. There has been some negative feed back from this and this is why it is a optional fee. If the customer feels it is unfair that we charge a minimal fee because the homeowner failed to change their filter then we will waive it. 90 Percent of our customers do feel this is fair.

So there are some limitations on the “Free Service Call” and when it applies and doesn’t apply. Below is a list of when it does not apply:

• Free service call does not apply to after hour service (late night  and Sunday service)
• Free service call does not apply to all areas (See our service area map for details)
• Free service call does not apply to commercial and rooftop units.
• Free service call does not apply to tune ups
• (optional) Free service call does not apply to warranty service, this is optional. We will not charge a service fee if it is a system installed by us. We have had customers in the past have a system installed by another service company and after 6 months it fails. Customer calls us and since it is still under that companies labor warranty we will charge a service fee.

We hope this explains into detail the reason the “Free Service Call” was created and what it applies to. It has been a success and our customers love it. We also know that other air conditioning service companies in the Austin area are agreeing. Since we first started offering the “Free Service Call” the are more than a dozen air conditioning service companies doing the same. Thanks again for supporting us and giving us the opportunity to earn the chance to be your air conditioning and heating service company.