Anthony’s Allstate Appliance Service

Anthony has been my go-​to appliance guy for the last 5 years. He is extremely knowledgeable about a wide range of appliances and has always been willing to go the extra mile to make sure something is fixed correctly. He is friendly and courteous and an absolute gem in this day and age of poorly trained sub-​contractors. He has been repairing appliances for 20 years, many of them for a well known local appliance store. I would trust him with any job, big or small, and I know it would be done right and for a fair price.

Hmmm … where to begin? Well, just in case you are the type that just skims the beginning, I’ll tell you now that warranty or no warranty, I’d NEVER utilise this service again.
Well, initially, I thought that Anthony seemed most affable and helpful. He gave a couple of tips over the phone and they made sense to me (I’m generally a reasonably handy type of guy around the house so wasn’t afraid to get into my dryer and have a look). I followed them — checked the breaker, etc. Things started working again only to stop a few days later.
So the problem persisted and I called him back to come and check it out — why him over the many other appliance services? Simply put — money! Being a young professional family with an infant and student debt that could afford me two-​bed condo AND an economy that is less than desirable, money is tight! He had pledged over the phone that it was a «free diagnostic» and that any costs for disgnosis of the problem would be rolled into the price of repair. Also, on his own website, it states very clearly «No service fees to come to the home!» and «2yr Warranty on all appliance service!» Sounds good, right? Well, we left a couple of messages and he didn’t call back and our laundry was taking a LONG time to dry in the humidity, so we booked with another appliance repair guy, accepting that we would have to take a $ 49 hit on a house call, albeit reluctantly.
BUT!!! He called back! So we cancelled with that «expensive» company and asked him to come over!
Around he came, that afternoon in fact, to solve the problem that we were having.
«You know,» he said. «It’s a good thing you’ve asked an honest repair guy to come over!»
He spent all of a few minutes in our basement and discovered what the problem was — the breaker in our rented apartment for the dryer is in the way out and a little finicky! If you get it jsut right, it’ll work! Nice! Well, I was at work leaving my partner at home with our son. She phoned me a little concerned by the fact that Anthony’s «free diagnostic» and lack of «service fees to come to the home» was actually going to cost us $ 75! For him to fiddle with our breaker a little! And with a ONE year warranty rather than the TWO years stated on his website!
I didn’t feel comfortable asking my girlfriend to deal with this man so told her to write him a check and get him out of our home. I called him back after he had left and spoke with him about it and he noticed that my partner and I were none too happy with his services. I told him he was correct. He also tried to justify his unreasonable price by telling me that some company in Weymouth (or the Weymouth area, I forget where exactly) would have charged me $ 160! (Given that I found someone for $ 49, I know exactly who I’d have called and, while I have not had the need to have them come out, they get excellent Unilocal reviews.) I am appalled that this «service» cost us ANYTHING!
So, if you’re having ANY problems with your appliance, check your breakers thoroughly, check out youtube for how to check a few simple but common problems, and if all else fails, call someone other than this swindler — because he’ll more than happily take money that he said he wouldn’t charge you!