American Air Heating Cooling Electric & Plumbing

Very professional, knowledgeable, clean, and very thorough. No pressure to make costly repairs or maintenance, and offer multiple options as needed. Would recommend to anyone needing AC or heating services.

Tech called ahead and showed up when he said he would ready to go. Tech knew what he was doing. Made two repairs, one an adjustment the other required replacing a failing electronic component. Although the replacement part was "covered" under the service agreement and on the truck, the cost was still quite expensive, especially considering the furnace is only three years old. Thanks for watching out for us.

Technician was nice, friendly and efficient-also provided me with some information on a bathroom fan malfunction-will schedule that soon

I had a tankless water heater installed and a backup sump pump installed. Both were installed with all of the above descriptions. I am completely satisfied. I highly recommend Shawn who took care of us.

American Air did all of the mechanicals in our home when it was built 7 years ago. We continue to use them for the follow up maintenance needed to keep the systems running properly. They all do a great job but their plumbing expert Shawn stands out. He's friendly, knowledgeable and gets the job done right every time!

I would like to talk with someone at American Air to explain my experience.. mabee get some peace of mind.

I was taught that if you don’t have anything nice to say, don’t say anything at all. So, here are a couple of positives:
Setting an appointment was easy and I was scheduled for the next day (convenient)
The technician was on time, polite, respectful of my home and wore appropriate PPE

Now, the review:

After inspecting my air conditioning condenser unit (but having not inspected the evaporator coil, blower motor, thermostat or any portion of my furnace), the technician informed me that the cost to refill my refrigerant, with leak inhibitor, would be “over $1,000”, and that I “should put that money towards a new system instead”.

This is fair advice, albeit misleading, and could be interpreted as an effort to help drive replacements over repairs. To future customers who need HVAC service: Please be advised that refilling R-22 (“freon”) refrigerant is NOT illegal in Ohio, or in any state in the nation as of August 2022. R-22 production and import was made illegal in 2020, but the refrigerant is still widely available and completely legal to use to refill existing systems. It is *recommended* that a leak inhibitor be used in addition to the refrigerant to help prevent additional leakage.

The wholesale cost of R-22 in Ohio is between $20-50 per pound these days. That is not the customer’s price, because companies need to make a profit and the refrigerant doesn’t install itself. Customers should expect to pay between $90-$150 per pound of R-22, including labor. If you have an average sized HVAC system (call it 3.5 tons), you’ll probably pay around $600 (including retrieval fees) for an R-22 refill. That’s a fair price these days, “over $1,000” is not.

I asked the American Air salesperson with whom I had an appointment scheduled if it would really cost over $1,000 to refill my R-22, and he avoided answering the question masterfully. After making it clear that I wanted a straight answer, he eventually told me that, “with repair costs”, refilling the R-22 "could be" well over $1,000. See the difference there? Who asked about repair costs? Superb dancing, but not what I wanted to hear from someone that I needed to trust to give me a fair price on my HVAC system replacement.

It’s one thing to give customers advice. To be clear, refilling my 23-year-old air conditioning system with R-22 probably isn’t the best thing for me, my home, or the environment, but giving a customer misleading information on the costs and/or legality of a product or service does not instill confidence in the company providing the service. I wanted to buy an HVAC system, but I also want to be able to trust the company that I hired. American Air lost my trust and my business.

If you want to have your R-22 refilled, don’t bother calling American Air. If you want to buy an HVAC system at a fair price from a company that you can trust is being honest with you, I recommend that you don’t bother calling American Air, or at least be very careful and get multiple bids.

I’ll give the same advice to the owners of American Air that I gave to the salesperson who was assigned to my project: Previous success is not an indication of future success, and misleading customers is the best way to lose business.

Don’t worry, I won’t charge you the $99 I paid for the “advice” your technician gave me. Calling it a “diagnostic”, especially considering the fact that the technician never even stepped foot in my basement to inspect the other half of my HVAC system, is a bit of a stretch.

Always courteous and professional. They take care of my heating and air conditioning and now I have a new hot water heater. I highly recommend them to friends and family!

Guy did a good job as always. Found potential issues and provided helpful advice.

James and his trainee, Destiny, were excellent, cordial, fun to talk with, knowledgeable. Just a delight to have service our furnace. I asked specifically for James to come again today because of his performance previously.