Clean House

[redfive]

Just wonted to see what others would say on this topic. Have you ever gone to a house that was so dirty and filthy that you just had to leave and tell the customer that they need to call someone else. I'v come really close the last couple of months. I do mostly commercial and have started to do side work to make up for these current times, and some of the houses I'v gone too. OOOOOO WEEE. What ship wrecks. Unit doesnt heat they say. Well 20 cats, 5 dogs,10 people in the house. No filter. Have to walk sideways down the hallway to get to the attic ladder. Kitchen dishes pilled up for months it looks like. Rats eating the dog and cat food. Vacuum doesnt enter into there vocabulary. I fix the problem, but I'd be more worried about my house burning down with all the crap around and piled up.
So is there a line that you draw, and if so what is it.

Redfive

[bwalley]

Just wonted to see what others would say on this topic. Have you ever gone to a house that was so dirty and filthy that you just had to leave and tell the customer that they need to call someone else. I'v come really close the last couple of months. I do mostly commercial and have started to do side work to make up for these current times, and some of the houses I'v gone too. OOOOOO WEEE. What ship wrecks. Unit doesnt heat they say. Well 20 cats, 5 dogs,10 people in the house. No filter. Have to walk sideways down the hallway to get to the attic ladder. Kitchen dishes pilled up for months it looks like. Rats eating the dog and cat food. Vacuum doesnt enter into there vocabulary. I fix the problem, but I'd be more worried about my house burning down with all the crap around and piled up.
So is there a line that you draw, and if so what is it.

Redfive

Are you licensed to do "side work" and have all the proper insurance?

[Roddy73]

Oh yeah, my stint with the gas company required that we re-lit any customers that we had locked off for non-payment earlier. And houses like that always got locked off! The piles of dirty diapers were my favorite.

My motto has always been if there's little kids or seniors I'll have a look, otherwise see ya!

[martin&sonsa/c]

its funny that you ask because just got finished at a customers house over in irving that was to say the least HORRIBLE!! let me guess this was up by mckinney tx. denton is also a bad area as well as irving. of course in the dfw area there are always going to be bad ones even in a nice area some people are just trash. but as long as they dont have a problem paying then i just plug my nose and get the work done and get out. its not as if you have to stay the night. there money spends just the same as a person living in a mantion

[bwalley]

over 20 years ago i worked for an apartment complex and there was an apt. that was so bad, i refused to work in it, the reason for my refusal that I put on the work order was "unsanitary conditions" the manager threw a fit, I took her to the apt. and showed her how bad it was, she almost threw up and I told her I would not work under those conditions and she could get someone else to do it if she wanted to.

There was cat crap stepped on and smeared into the floor, it was so bad you couldn't walk in there without stepping on the land mines.

She called the lady and told her if she didn't clean the place up, she would be evicted.

[big sky hvac]

I had a call last year on an apt. building. It was pretty cold out, middle of winter. When I showed up, I met the maintenance man there. He asked if I minded working in a "little" bit of water. I asked him if the pipes had froze. He said no, the sewer backed up! The furnace was in a small dirt basement, had about 4 or 5 steps going down there. There was about a foot of raw sewage on the floor. The furnace was partially under sewage. The maintence guy got right down in front the furnace, standing on a cinder block and a 2X6. He asked what I thought was going on. I told him there was no way in hell I was working on that furnace, very very unsanitary conditions. I told him you need to get this cleaned up before anybody can work on it. I told my service manager about it, just in case they called to complain about me not wanting to work on the furnace. He told me, "we have to draw the line somewhere". Later that night, our answering service calls me with a service call. It's this maintenance man calling back. He said he got it cleaned up. I asked him how he did it. He said he sucked it up with a shop vac and poured some bleach on the floor. I told him he must of been confused earlier in the day when I told him to call someone else. I said I really don't care how you cleaned it up, I'm still not going to work on it.

[Agent_C]

Just wonted to see what others would say on this topic. Have you ever gone to a house that was so dirty and filthy that you just had to leave and tell the customer that they need to call someone else. I'v come really close the last couple of months. I do mostly commercial and have started to do side work to make up for these current times, and some of the houses I'v gone too. OOOOOO WEEE. What ship wrecks. Unit doesnt heat they say. Well 20 cats, 5 dogs,10 people in the house. No filter. Have to walk sideways down the hallway to get to the attic ladder. Kitchen dishes pilled up for months it looks like. Rats eating the dog and cat food. Vacuum doesnt enter into there vocabulary. I fix the problem, but I'd be more worried about my house burning down with all the crap around and piled up.
So is there a line that you draw, and if so what is it.

Redfive

You can encounter people like this anywhere. Would you believe this is in a white glove building on Manhattan's East Side:

http://init-sce.tripod.com/garbage.html

Oh, and did I mention she's a Nurse? :eek2:

A_C

[heaterman]

I could write a book, no, make that a novel. Not just residential either, some of the stuff I run across in some of these restaurants is enough to make you stop going out for dinner!

[kenney t]

it;s sad that so many people live like that. i run into it at least two times a week it just makes me sick to my stomach to say the least.

GO TO THE DOLLAR STORE AND GET SOME CLEANER YOU SLOBS...........:deadhorse:

[big sky hvac]

Sometimes the furnace is the cleanest thing in the house when I leave. It's just hard to imagine how people can live like that, but they do.

[bwalley]

I think it is incrementalism, kind of like putting a frog in a pan of water and slowly boiling the water, it happens so slowly he doesn't realize it is getting too hot.

same thing with people who are pigs, it happens slowly and they get used to it.

[612Rob]

What about places where people keep their over flowing litter box in the furnace room, smell is so thick it could gag a donkey.

[redfive]

Well good. I didnt wont to sound like a clean freak or anything. And to bwalley: yes I do have a HVAC Contractors license and a electrical contractors license, insured and bonded. I work for a City so its not a conflict of intrest to do side work. If it keeps up I may just retire from the city and start doing this full time.
Thats why I hang around the residential site allot. To get some insight into the res. side of doing things.

Redfive

O and by the way. To fill out the pro member app. How do you do it. I cant seem to import it or save it or anything. Yes I suck with computers

[big sky hvac]

What about places where people keep their over flowing litter box in the furnace room, smell is so thick it could gag a donkey.

159431
That is the return air grill the litter box is sitting in front of. Nothing like the smell of fresh cat poop to clear those sinuses!

[Moose]

Well..sometimes ya gotta slip on yur body condom & git-er-dun. :)

[SoFlaDave]

We had a customer with so many cats that all the ammonia from the piss destroys his evap coils in about 11 months. he's been through 3 and i've changed 2 of them. The other tech refuses to go back lol

[big sky hvac]

We had a customer with so many cats that all the ammonia from the piss destroys his evap coils in about 11 months. he's been through 3 and i've changed 2 of them. The other tech refuses to go back lol

He must really love cats and have deep pockets to keep replacing a evap coil every year.

[SoFlaDave]

Dudes full on creepy. Also, he shares a name with a famous knife handed horror movie character. Seriously.

[Energyservices]

The same thin here in dallas with the Indian people. When you go inside you need a deep breath & close your nose with a vise grip. A lot of bad coil too.
To much condiment

[stvc]

I ran into the exact same thing, 24 cats if I remember right. There for an energy audit for a utility co. Auditor calls me [from the truck] and explains not being able to walk in the place without stepping in Sh...
Told him to get exterior measurements and no blower door test, think really stirring it up!
I called the utility co. admin. and explained and they said to leave. Called my guy and had him pack it up and tell the HO someone would be in touch.
Not sure how that story ended, we never heard back, but it's OK to leave if you are in an unhealthy situation.

[edward301]

Years ago went to a residence for a no cool call. Let me in front door and
the odor knocked me down. Get to the living room, carpet was awful.
Bedroom was worse, guy had a big dog that had recently had pups,
carpet where dog gave birth can not describe, momma dog and pups
running all over house, they all would go to the bathroom anywhere, and
guy just left it.

I told guy I could not help him and left, he asked why, and I said I am
about to get sick.

[Texas-Tech]

Got sent to a empty rent house back in the 90s to do a evaluation on the mechanical, opened the door to the smell of old dog. Big piles of dog crap still on the carpet in most of the rooms. Found it was a fir down coil in bathroom, at least that was as far as I got cus my legs started itchin. Looked down and I was covered from the knees down with fleas, hundreds and hundreds of them. Ran outside to get um off and called the office. They wanted me to go back in and get the size of indoor unit so like a dummy I agreed. Didn't make it that far as I was swarmed again.

People can be pigs

[bmathews]

I did one yesterday. Air handler in closet. I opened the door, started checking the air handler out and I see something out of the corner of my eye. I must have disturbed a family of cockroaches. They were everywhere. I changed a t-stat out here last year, pulled the old one off the wall and there must have been 100 baby cockroaches ran out. They ate all the wiring up inside the tstat.

[SJProwler]

After 15 years as a telephone repairman I've seen all the above and sometimes not just in the bad part of town. One family was a repeat offender. Guy was a bigwig with the worlds largest appliance manufacturer, they'd spend half a million or so on a house, all new furniture, appliances etc. When it got dirty they'd move to a new one. Never cleaned anything, absolute slobs.
Back before telephones sets were de-regulated and we had to go remove them. I followed them through 3 consecutive houses. Most disgusting. gut wrenching thing I ever did. These are people with Masters Degrees...
Cats, Dogs, Birds all with the run of the house and none housebroken. 2 car garage stacked with garbage bags, the Mercedes and Seville sat in the driveway. Odd thing, their lawn and shrubs were perfectly manicured...

[tlb]

went to a house awhile back walk in back door banana peel from about month ago mashed into carpet go through kitchen eaten chicken wing in floor filth everywhere then bad part had to take a leak real bad nowhere outside to go so i mustered up the courage to ask where bathroom was wish i had went in my pants

[blownfuse99]

Well good. I didnt wont to sound like a clean freak or anything. And to bwalley: yes I do have a HVAC Contractors license and a electrical contractors license, insured and bonded. I work for a City so its not a conflict of intrest to do side work. If it keeps up I may just retire from the city and start doing this full time.
Thats why I hang around the residential site allot. To get some insight into the res. side of doing things.

Redfive

O and by the way. To fill out the pro member app. How do you do it. I cant seem to import it or save it or anything. Yes I suck with computers

http://hvac-talk.com/vbb/showthread.php?threadid=116113

[REP]

Ahhh the good ole days,LOL.
I once went to a night call for no heat.The basement was filled with chickens,pigeons,and to top it off a goat.Had to be rats but I did not see them.
Another night call in the same neighborhood .No heat in Dec..
I open the door to the basement and see water almost to the first step.Had to be 6-7 feet of water.I told them to call a plumber.The guy says ok he will but could I just give him heat for the night.LOL LOL Needless to say I didn't have any scuba gear.