SALT LAKE CITY — When the air conditioner died in the middle of summer at Ryan Gebhardt’s house in Lehi, he turned to Action Plumbing, Heating, Air and Electrical.
“And I asked them to install a heat pump just because they're more efficient,” Gebhardt explained. “They just said, ‘OK, this is what you're going to get. This is what your home needs. You need to you a 3-1/2-ton heat pump.’”
Despite the name, heat pumps are supposed to cool a house. Gebhardt says his couldn’t keep up with the triple-digit temperatures.
“I found out,” Gebhardt said, “that even though they said they were going to install a 3-1/2-ton, looking at the model number on the unit, it's only a 3-ton.”
Gebhardt is among the customers who complained to the Utah Division of Consumer Protection. Thursday, it filed suit in state court asking a judge to award damages to Action customers.
“Over at least the past five years,” the lawsuit says in its introduction, “Defendants have engaged in a pattern of illegal, deceptive, and unconscionable sales practices targeted at unsuspecting consumers and elderly adults.”
Consumer Protection uses the term “elder abuse” in its lawsuit and spends many of the 57 pages in the filing describing seniors’ interactions with Action.
“They would go in and they would use high-pressure sales tactics to get some of these vulnerable adults to pay for services that were not needed,” said Margaret Woolley Busse, the director of the Utah Department of Commerce, in an interview with FOX 13. That department oversees Consumer Protection.
“I actually just talked to one of the main investigators on this case,” Busse added. “He said it was the most egregious case that he has ever investigated.”
An attorney for Action did not return after-hour messages seeking comment.
The state’s lawsuit included photos of two checks. An Action employee admitted to filling them out for a customer diagnosed with dementia, the lawsuit says.
The checks added to $56,000 for what another contractor told investigators amounted to about $1,580 of electrical work.
Consumer Protection also alleges work was shoddy, with some HVAC work putting customers at risk for carbon monoxide poisoning.
Of Action’s 120 employees, only five have master licenses, the complaint says; other technicians are apprentices and some supervised work without the proper credentials.
The Utah Division of Professional Licensing, in a separate, administrative action, is seeking to revoke the professional licenses of about a dozen Action owners and employees who it alleges violated consumer or licensing laws.
Gebhardt, who is in his mid-30s, said Action is seeking nearly $20,000 from him. He’s disputing that. So far, he’s paid about $5,000 to the company with which he financed the work.
Gebhardt is hoping for money to pay another company to install a proper HVAC system in his home.
The state of Utah needs “to protect other consumers from having this sort of experience,” Gebhardt said.
HOW TO PROTECT YOURSELF AND YOUR HOME REPAIR:
- Get multiple bids.
- Verify contractor has a license at DOPL.UTAH.GOV.
- Read online reviews.
- Get written estimates and contracts.
- Don’t pay large amounts upfront.
Source: Utah Department of Commerce