M & M Plumbing & Heating

Mike has done two jobs for us in the past year. One was because our laundry hookup was leaking and caused a whole bunch of mold damage. He made the fix promptly.

On Friday while I was away for work during Winter, our heating went out and my wife came home to a cold house right before we were to leave for our honeymoon. Mike came at 10:30pm to assess and got the heating up and going by noon the next morning.

Nice, personable, reasonable.

I have no idea whether this guy is a good plumber or not, but when I called for rescue from my completely stopped whole house drain, he said he’s recovering from back issues, could maybe come later if it didn’t involve heavy lifting, but then diagnosed my problem over the phone and told me how to fix it. Worked.

I’m adding M&M to my contacts, maybe next time he’ll charge me something for his services…

Mike came to help us in a difficult situation; we had a new dishwasher to install and an old one to get out, but the new tile flooring that had been installed in front of the old one made it very hard to get out and very hard to put the new one in. Mike figured out a good way to get it to work; I was very impressed at his inventiveness and determination to succeed. It was not easy! He was very friendly and worked hard until it was finished.

Had a leak in the boiler with water on the floor. Mike fit me into his schedule the same day. Diagnosed the problem, got the part, returned and quickly installed it. Took the time to check to make sure the system was running. Glad to have a competent plumber to fix the problem.

I hired Mike and his son Mike to put in a bathroom and kitchen in a barn conversion project at my farm. Mike is prompt, courteous, returns calls, shows up on time, and got the job done when I needed it to be done. Definitely recommend. Thank you Mike!

I had a natural gas emergency and Mike come out right away and got it all sorted out that day. He was a live saver.

I won't go into detail since it's been several years, but I recall this: 1st visit he didn't show when I was to meet him across town at a rental for 8am, I had to call him and he had me waiting 2 hours to just get there. The work he did ended up leaking, requiring another visit in which he kept me waiting again without calling or warning me. He charged way more hours than he was there for and we had to argue to get the bill down, but it still wasn't lowered properly. Something's just not right with this guy.

I called M & M Plumbing because my sink that is connected to my washer machine was over-flowing. Mike came to my house at 8am and was there for about 20 minutes. He diagnosed the problem to be an old cast iron pipe that needed to be replaced with a wider 2” PVC pipe. He said he didn’t have the material with him and would be back later that afternoon. He returned at 12pm and by 2pm he was done with job. He stayed another 20 minutes to take a look at a toilet I asked him to check out.
Mike said he didn’t have his invoice book with him and quickly added up the cost of the job in his head. He charged me $569.00, for which I paid immediately with a check. I asked that he put the bill in the mail or drop it off. I also asked that he please come back to take the old cast iron pipe (said he didn’t have room in his van). He said he would at some point.
After to speaking to friends and family regarding Mike’s charges, I called him the next to ask that he send the itemized invoice right away as the bill seemed awfully high, especially since he admitted to me that the cost for materials was only $40.00. He said he would itemize the costs and call me back. He left me a message about an hour later, stating he mistakenly over-charged me $100.00 and would put the invoice and the check in the mail.

I received the invoice and $100.00 a couple of days later. Mike charged me $112.00 for a service call, which is fine but what is not fine is that he charged me for 4.78 hours when he was only at my house for 2.25 hours. Clearly, he backed into the number of hours to make up for the amount he charged me on the fly a week earlier. Invoice is attached. I let it go though, until the laundry over-flowed again.

Five days later I did laundry again for the first time since Mike installed the new PVC pipe. My laundry over-flowed. I called Mike to explain that the same issue was happening and that the removing and replacing the pipe did not fix it, he told me to call Drain Brain. He told me that he couldn’t help me and that the work he did wasn’t a guaranteed that the sink wouldn’t over-flow again. I asked him why he didn’t tell me this before he did the work and he proceeded to berate me saying “I didn’t understand plumbing and he didn’t need customers like me.” He then hung up on me.

Needless to say, I contacted Drain Brain and they snaked my drain pipe. The guys with Drain Brain told me what I already knew by that point; I did not need a new pipe, it was just clogged, and Mike from M&M did work that didn’t need to be done. They looked at the bill and agreed that he gouged me for the work he needlessly did.

I should’ve known when he kept telling me I didn’t need to be there later that day for him to do the work (told me I could leave a key under the mat) and when he asked if I had a husband. This guy is bad news. He may be fine if he’s dealing with a man that he can’t bully but if you’re a woman, take my word for it, do not call this guy. I have contacted the Better Business Bureau and have let my friends and family know to let everyone they know to stay away from M&M.

Issue #1:
March 11/2019: Mike checked my McClain boiler, flipped switches, touched pipes, and couldn’t resolve the problem. He decided to contact another plumber, his friend Dave who diagnosed the problem. The next day Mike came over my house along with Dave. Mike basically watched Dave do the job.

Mike did not recuse himself since he could not do the job and I ended up paying for two plumbers.

Issue #2:
Mike told me his total service fee was $1050 (he made some calculations in his head) at the end of the job, day 2. I gave him a check and he did not give me a receipt. Dave told me his service fee was $450. I also gave him a check for his fee and he did not give me a receipt. Realizing a week went by and I did not get receipts in the mail from either of them. I left a message for Mike about my receipt. He returned my call and wanted information about the check that he had already deposited so he can write a receipt.

These two plumbers do not go by the book. They deliberately did not give me a written document/contract/receipt for my maintenance records.

Issue #3:
I received Mike’s receipt after 18 days and numerous phone calls.
He lumped 3 undetailed items that he ordered for Dave to complete the job - $621.40 (a jacked up price that I paid as these items were significantly lower online).

Mike’s total labor $895.00 - for a job that could have been done in 1 to 2 hours. Mike’s total bill included labor and parts $1,546.40. His numbers did not add up since I paid with two checks one in the amount of $1050 to Mike and the other in the amount of $450 to Dave.

Issue #4:
After receiving the receipt, I called his business number from the business card that he had given me. His wife returned my phone call to say that I should not call her home and did not like the nature of the message and hung up on me.

Overall impression:
NO TRANSPARENCY. NO INTEGRITY. BOTH PLUMBERS DO NOT GO BY THE BOOK. THEY DELIBERATELY DID NOT GIVE ME A RECEIPT AFTER SERVICES RENDERED.
Mike M. Mahool, Owner/Operator of M & M Plumbing and Heating Located in Brooktondale, NY is a thief in disguise as a plumber!