Our compressor stopped working on a Saturday in the middle of summer in Houston, Texas. American Home Shield took 48 hours to get a technician out — a contractor from a company called "Cool Breeze of Sugarland." During the interim, the house was uninhabitable, so we stayed in a motel.
The repairman took a look at the unit and declared it was the contactor that was at fault. He found two dead ants in the contactor and blamed us for failing to properly maintain the unit. Hence, AHS denied coverage. We ended up having to pay $120 for the cost of replacement of the contactor, as well as the visit fee. The unit STILL didn't work. He THEN told us there was inadequate voltage getting to the unit.
A neighbor from up the street came by and looked at the circuit breaker. It turned out the breaker had gone bad — THE PROBLEM HAD NOTHING TO DO WITH THE AC UNIT. We replaced the breaker ourselves and the AC came back on line.
AHS told us they wouldn't resume coverage until the unit was inspected and found to be in good working order. I told them I didn't want that guy from Cool Breeze coming out again. So AHS sent out another contractor to look at it. He told us the fins were dirty, and he couldn't sign off that the unit was working until we had the fins cleaned by him — for $185. We paid.
All told, between the motel and the two contractors, we shelled out about $600. Add the $400 we paid to AHS for their worthless warranty and we ended up paying $1000 to learn a valuable lesson:
American home shield is a ripoff!!!
We are lapsing the AHS policies on our house and our investment property, and we're telling EVERYONE we know to do the same. Spread the word.
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