Been using the same propane company for 20 years. They installed a replacement propane kitchen range oven fifteen years ago, and they regularly deliver propane to my outside tank. A couple of weeks ago, I started smelling a rotten egg odor in my kitchen, so I call them. They send a man the next day. He spends three hours fiddling around with this and that, says he fixed the leak, hands me a bill for $286.00 and leaves. Smell is still in the kitchen. That evening, smell is still in the kitchen. Next morning, smell is still in the kitchen. I call and tell them that the problem persists. They sent the man again, and he assures me there's no leak, and to prove it, he disconnects the propane line from the exterior of the house and seals it off. Within hours of this, the smell disappears. It stays gone for five days (all that time, I have no usable range oven). I call them back and tell them that this proves that he didn't fix the leak, since as soon as he disconnected the line, the smell disappeared and has remained gone for five days. They tell me they will send him back to attempt a fix again, but the charge will be the same as the last time he came to fix it.

So, in other words, they are not guaranteeing the work they already charged me $286.00 for, which was to fix the gas smell problem in the kitchen while the range was hooked up to propane. They want to charge me again as though that never happened. After a failed attempt to make them understand the wrongness of that (i.e., they are still going to charge me for the next visit as though they hadn't already failed to fix the problem and charged me for a failed effort), I tell them to forget it. I'll just buy an electric range. If that's their policy, who knows how much they will end up charging me, coming back over and over again without resolving the issue.

You'd think that if you call them about a gas smell, and after three hours work, it's still there, they'd guarantee their work and come back as many times as needed to make it right without recharging as though they hadn't already been there. Anyone else would do that, plumbers, electricians, etc..

You'd think the sumbeaches would want your business badly enough to not eff you over and actually fix the leak. That should be actionable legally.

change companys and go to their busness on the net and hit them hard with negitive comments

They also need to add some propane to your tank too for NOT fixing it and it continuing to leak.

My propane people will come out, change an igniter or thermocoupler and not even charge for the service call. They’ll even light pilots if you need it.

I had them move my tank due to an outdoor kitchen we built where it sat. I also installed a propane range top in our outdoor kitchen for power loss events. They moved that tank and piped in a new regulator and lines for the new appliance. ALL NO CHARGE.

They are a gas utility company and do propane on the side.

Hawk, I'm retired from the propane industry, and I gotta tell ya, I'd be pissed off enough to eat nails. You didn't mention your provider, but....

1 When you called and reported a rotten egg smell and they did not IMMEDIATELY send out a tech to investigate, they in essence told you they do not give a rats ass about you or your property. (Did they even have you turn off your tank?)

2 After their [bleep] response they did a [bleep] job! The odor should have dissipated rather quickly. (Did you open any windows)

3 After all that NO he should not have been willing to bill you again for something he should have fixed the 1st time.

Fiddled around? What did he use to find the leak? A CGI? Leak check solution? A pressure gauge? All three? What did he tell you was the source of the leak?

Go to their office and stand on someones eyelids, then, if there is another provider available, change companies. Your present one is not worth a crap.

No regulation for chit like this?
Seems that Co's azz would be on the hook should something happen.

This company has no respect for safety......Change companies.

Switch companies as they ain't worth a schit. I would also not pay the first bill as they never fixed anything.

Yes! Through the National Fire Protection Association (NFPA) and yes somebodies azz would be on the hook if something happened. The tech and the company. If you read the NFPA manuals it addresses that fact.

If it were me i would be calling another propane company.You have been a loyal customer for 20 years.That tells me they don't care about that,they only want your money,sorry ass company imo.

^^^^^^^^

Yuuuup!

I’d be chewing some serious ass before I left, Milton the repair doofuss would catch some harsh wrath, especially if he came back out for another visit. Video that mfer.

Lodge a complaint with BBB and public utility board.

I would not be Mr B Type, no way you should just ‘take your lumps’ fouck that. Give em hell

Newschannel 5 them LOL

Any of your local TV stations do any stories where a consumer is not getting satisfaction?
This seems like a story they would love.
Customer calls local propane company about a dangerous gas leak.
Company comes out does work that doesn't fix problem, customer still has dangerous gas leak.
Company denies there is a gas leak even tho you can still smell gas.
Wants to charge customer again to fix dangerous gas leak they didn't fix the first time, you know the leak that doesn't exist.
If you have a TV station that does those kind of stories I would call them.
Lots of people will learn what a chitty co. they are.
Business hate bad press, especially when it's deserved.

your state public service commission will be fascinated to hear that story with all the gory details. a gas explosion will certainly find time on the evening news..

I think I will do that.

This company was like that 20 years ago, but about ten years ago, they were bought out by a large conglomerate and polices changed dramatically where they sap customers for whatever they can.

This is how I feel. The bill is still sitting on my kitchen counter, as yet unpaid.

Some fire departments do safety inspections for training etc ..."come on over and bring the new guy along to show them "......u can't be the only with a little leak...I'm sure they would love that!

Do you own your tank?

No, rent from them.

I'd be straight up somebody's ass.

Absolutely amazing.

Put in electric and forget about those asshats !

Speaking of propane ...Does anyone have a 120 gallon tank they want to sell?
I’m willing to pick up and pay cash. Thanks

You can't find the leak yourself?

I just got off the phone with them, and they stonewalled me over and over again on that bill for supposedly repairing the leak, which didn't get repaired. They insisted I owe them that $286.00. Eventually, I said I'd pay for parts used in the failed repair effort, but no more. They wouldn't go for that, but finally offered to lower the bill by $100.00, down to $186.00, which I agreed to. Not sure I should have, since I'm paying for a failed repair effort. Anyway, just to get this resolved, I paid that reduced amount. Money out the window. Thoroughly disgusted.

And your stove still doesn’t work? Go to the hardware store and get yourself a bottle of leak checker. Find the leak yourself and tighten it up. Then call them and tell them to come get your tank as you’ll be getting a new provider. Unless you just want to sink a bunch more money into going electric.

Should have use a charge card and put a stop payment on the work....they would have been out to fix it properly when they were not going to get payed......

I know and have done it before.

The critical question is: did they do a pressure test on your line before and after the attempted repair?

If they did neither, they should be dumped like last week’s fish. I have no idea of regulatory requirements, but anyone that doesn’t do a pressure test after a repair should be run out of the business.

Amerigas?

An elderly couple not far from me lit their propane furnace and there was a leak. It exploded almost killing them. This was inside the house and away from the tank. By the time the court got done with the propane company and the furnace manufacturer this couple put a shade under 1 MILLION dollars in their pockets. I'd make it real clear about taking legal action against them.

More money than brains or just a Pussy. People like you let others fight their battles.

This.

We have a small propane fireplace. The gas co guy came out and ran the lines under the house and made the connection in the fireplace. He then capped the line coming out of the house and pressurized it with air/inert gas, whatever. He came back a week later to ensure the line had not leaked down.

Then he hooked us up to the gas supply.

Man you should have told them NO.Why get suckered into paying for something that was not fixed.If everything you say is true no way could they win this fight.

"about ten years ago, they were bought out by a large conglomerate and polices changed dramatically"

Now they have to worry about keeping their expenses down so they'll make a bigger profit and keep their stock price going up.

Mix up some dishwashing liquid and water in a spray bottle. And spray all of the connections and pipe you can get to. The leak will be apparent. The soap will bubble up at any leaks even very small ones. It works as good as Snoop that they use.
Also they could have put too much odorant in that tank of propane so that it stinks even when it burns.
If you still think you have a leak. Disconnect your feed line from the tank regulator.
Cap all your appliance connections but one. Or close the valves. Connect a regulated air supply 20 or 30 psi and purge the line out. Tee in a gauge and valve. Cap line at the.tank and air the whole system up to 30 pounds and lock the pressure in. The gauge will tell you if you have a leak.
This is what I would do if it was me. But I was an instrument technician on oil and gas facilities.

I think in your place, I would be all over those connections with soapy water and someone with a good sniffer. When we had our new gas stove installed, the guy had a sniffing machine that would detect any small leak. I'd be pretty surprised if your gas company wouldn't have one like that. It could very well be a connection in the stove itself and maybe a service call to the stove repair place would be in order instead of the propane company. Actually a lot of the problem in our experience is your "North Florida" location. The work ethic down there is nearly nonexistent. We had the refrigerator fix it guy out five different times before he finally got our new one to quit freezing or not cooling food properly. Best guy we found for the washer was a retired appliance guy from New York who did side jobs.

The wife had a gas fireplace installed in her condo albeit poorly and called the fireplace company Friday afternoon to say that she smelled gas. She was told that they didn't work on the weekend, but wanted the address for the service call. She said that wouldn't be necessary because they could just follow the fire truck to the fire. The owner of the company redid the installation later that afternoon.

They suck

They have bought up several small gas companies in our area. Whittling down competition.

I called them and they have call center females *try* to answer your questions. They stay on script and cannot reason anything out.

Best answer.

Most propane comapnies will but allow you to turn the propane on to your home after a leak like that until it has passed a pressure test.

LOL.

Again, call your local TV station. Get it on the 6 o'clock news. An ambulance chaser will be on the phone soon. Be Well, RZ.

Personally, I would consider taking them to small claims court not only over the $286 faulty repair bill but also over the technician that you do have come out and actually fix your problem. I would charge them for both invoices in court as well as $100 in Lost propane and provide them with receipts for the meals you had to eat at restaurants because of their lack of service. I would also probably tag on mileage to and from restaurants and a percentage of the electric bill because now you've had to heat the house with electricity versus propane which is obviously more expensive.

Give me another couple of minutes and I'll figure a few more things to add on.

Of course the judge won't allow everything but maybe they will get the memo.

You can also rip their ass up with a Yelp review. I don't pay a whole lot of attention to Yelp reviews but Millennials do.

I know you have a beef with Amerigas, and I don't blame you, if they were not responsive to your needs, but I can tell you for a fact that any tech that handled a call like that working for them would get a one way ticket to the unemployment line. They might tolerate some things, but failure to properly handle a leak is not one of them.

Time to switch to another company.....
Or go electric oven.
And tell them come get your schit .
Dont be surprised if they charge you for that either.
Is the oven the only thing the propane is used for?

Growth through aquisitions. Yeah from what I see since I retired a couple years ago, they have restructured to a model they were angling towards for a long time. No local manager or CRR or....Only delivery drivers and techs. Their daily work is dispatched on line and completed on line. One manager in the whole state here. I took early retirement partly because of the direction they were going.

Already called the electrician and scheduled the installation of the proper outlet for an electric range oven.

Before I got to the above post, I was thinking about asking whether the company had been sold. Not a surprise given the way you were mistreated, and the company wouldn't have stayed in business for over 20 years if they had always treated their customers the way you were treated.

I would give them the offer a: fix it and no chRges or:B: I go public, Facebook tv etc your choice boys

Don't pay them anything, hell you want I'll send my old lady over there to straighten them out. lol, she loves making them grovel.

Amerigas was my first thought also. That company really does suck balls and people that work for them are lower than pond scum.

Tell the gas company to come and get their tank off your property!

get me buck strickland on the phone pronto

lol.

I try to get there first, to give them a chance, hate my food to get spit in or be put on a watch list.
Usually when I get done, I have mrs slumlord finish them off with a shovel to the back of the skull

gawd, and I feel like such an ass hole sometimes. I’m embarrassed to have to hear her deal with them, anything like that. Cable, phone, FAFSA people, the bank, the renters.


I make her take shît back to Lowes and walmart.

I got banned from Farm Bureau insurance for 10 years for goin off on the branch broker. Old phaggot

👍👍👍👍👍👍🤓
Pot Pies on da fly!!!!

I was damn glad I had a Propane Stove / Oven during the recent Ice Storm and Rolling Blackouts we had here in TX. It was the only heat and way to cook I had.

That seems rather harsh. Most of those I worked with were good people. Some jerks sure, but most just trying to do the best job they could. Part of the reason I left though was because I could see trouble coming, and I think it has been happening with a lot of the larger corporations. The loss of the personal touch? Too many levels where you don't get to interact with someone in person. That and I felt like Amerigas got too big and too arrogant. They didn't seem to care to be competitive.

Unfortunately it's mostly full.

Yeah, that's a good point. I've done that, too, during prolonged blackouts. Just turn on the gas and use a BBQ stater to light it. I'll miss that next prolonged blackout.

Ever consider hooking your own schitt up and doing your own maintenance? Lowes and Homer Despot sell everything you need. Leaks are easily enough found with a Zippo and only at connections. There should only be three connections at most. One at the tank, and two at the stove inside IF you add flex tubing between the main line and stove. The only money you're really out of is cost of materials. Just helped install a spankin' new Samsung range for a friend and neighbor this past fall. Not rocket surgery. The most difficult task was contorting to reach and swap out the orifices from NG to LPG. Planning on installing the same make and model of my own and building an insulated and electrified hut for a pair of 100# tanks next year at my "Up North" place. When it drops down below 0* F, I'll put a drop light in to keep them warm and if the power goes out a modified Dietz Jr No.20 kerosene lantern.

Of course we bushkins do tend to be a bit more independent and self-sufficient than most.

+1

Hawk,

That IS a royal ripoff.

This is another example of lousy service men. It's so hard to find good honest help these days.
I don't know if this will work, but its worth a try.
This company and their man are licensed by the state.
I'd contact your attorney general's office with the details before getting the new stove. Maybe you'll be able to get through and you'll get a staff member who will help.

^^^^ This. I just plumbed in and installed a NG range in my house, took about 3hrs. You’ll regret going electric, aside from the power outage aspect an electric stove sucks ass to cook on.

PS:
I'm not a gas plumber, but my Dad and one boss showed me how to find leaks. They would get a little dish soap and water. Paint that on all of the joints.

Propane is heavier than air and collects like gasoline vapors. Very flammable. Explosive in concentrations.
A heater or hot water tank could ignite it if it's more than a mild smell.

You will regret the electric stove if you actually cook much.

When we got married we gave away a gas stove and I installed electric.
Gas scared me, didn't want it in my home.

26 years later we have have had a beautiful smooth top electric
stove for 5 or 6 years.
Convection oven, it's great for cookies.
Can do 3 pans at a time, all get done nicely.
Once its hot.

Boy, it is pretty.

One burner has been bad for awhile and I'm not sure how to fix it.
And it totally sucks.
Takes forever to heat a burner.

All by design to get good efficiency ratings.

Have been thinking about getting gas installed and a new stove.

Hawkeye, this type of B.S. has become pervasive.
Recently I was "gas-lighted" by my electric power company.
Transformer down the road blew up- loudly. One phase in my house was out so the supervisor tried to bullshidt me that I had a bad main breaker. Lol.
My breaker "healed itself" (when they fixed the transformer) the next day.

Aint a hair on that azz if you have that tank in your yard next week. And a check for the propane in your pocket. No need to pay an electrician and buy a new stove. Swap gas companies and roll on. Amazing the contortions folks will put themselves through to avoid confrontation.

I wouldn't pay them one red cent.

You would send them a link

My guess is the leak is in the appliance itself, gas company supplies gas to the appliance. I’d look around the knobs for either the front right or left burner, the one that gets used 90% of the time

Yes the repair guy could have looked into it further but I’m betting the company has a policy about working on the gas consuming appliances.

Do any of you old fuggs deal with life issues without starting a thread. You are supposed to be adult males.

Cripes what do you all do when you stub your toe, or get confused at a 4 way stop?

Are they owned by ATT now?

Hope it all works out for the good in the end.

I'd go propane here if I could. Wife doesn't want to spend the $$$ for the whole setup. But I hate our electric stove.

I miss my electric cooktop. I've got this gigantic stainless steel dual fuel thing now. It's got gas burners and an electric oven. The gas burners are always a mess and much more time consuming to clean than the electric cook top was.

My main issue is this glass top electric range we have. Easy enough to clean, sorta. Don't let stuff boil over!

Main problem is I can't see the heat source. And ours has two big burners in the front, small in back. (Dumb idea in my mind, I like a small one up front too) And the dial settings don't mean scheidt. When I cook pancakes I have to set one side differently than the other to get the same cook, using the exact same griddles on each burner. And the damn thing cycles power to the elements to maintain a temperature, instead of having a steady glow.

With gas I can see the flame height and diameter and know what kind of heat I've got going on. I told the wife if we go with a new electric when this one dies, I want one with the old coil type burners I can see the red on. I'd rather a bit more difficulty cleaning to be able to see my heat source.

But, I'm a grumpy old fart anyway, so what does it matter in the bigger scheme of things anyway?

It sounds like you need a better electric range. The one in my old house was from the 70's, spiral plug in burners. It's a beast.

Check the regulator. I had a persistent ng gas smell from the range - they claimed I had no leak. I only called em out once- and it wasn't that bad -1 hour service call

so I went after it myself - found an almost invisible hairline crack in factory regulator - manufacturing defect looked like, new reg., self installed, fixed it.

To be fair, the woman who has been delivering propane to my shop is very pleasant, and a hard worker. She’s expressed her frustration with how things are going over there. But her hands are tied unfortunately. I made the decision to swap over to natural gas heat to avoid having to deal with their bullchit. As they are the only game in town.

when i built my log house [reconstructed on my place off the grid ] only propane for fridge stove ,instant hot water and about 10 lights. Did it all myself , buddy gas ticket ,elec ticket says test it at 100 psi ,, once done i never had a leak.

norm

You must live in Alaska.

Wouldn't have an electric kitchen range on a bet.

Did the 'technician' have size 13 shoes and mention anything about suckerpunches and Thanksgiving Sunday house fires? Just asking...

The zippo method is not good for two reasons. The first is obvious, the second is this: a tiny leak may not ignite, but the odor from the leak will still be noticeable. Sometimes leak detector bubbles will not show a leak especially in hard to see places where the solution might not flow all around the fitting. Sometimes the leak is from the regulator or the gas valve, and could be the stove just doesn't shut off completely. Sometimes it is a pinhole in a casting. An electronic gas sniffer will find leaks better than any other method.
If you inhale the odorant that is added to gas for a period of time, your ability to smell the odorant is diminished. So you could be purging the air from a long gas line and wondering when the gas odor is going to show up long after it already got there (also a bad technique).

That was a good catch. If it's not a connection on the main line coming in, one of the most common leaks I have found would be on the gas tube to the oven main burner at the nut on top of the oven control. A gas range being what it is though, There are a number of places it could be.

That was a good catch. If it's not a connection on the main line coming in, one of the most common leaks I have found would be on the gas tube to the oven main burner at the nut on top of the oven control. A gas range being what it is though, There are a number of places it could be.


Yeah, I had a feeling. The people you deal with in the office are not like those in the old days that could have been raised in the field. The "secretary" was the most likely to be off the street. Local manager on up would have been likely to have been raised out in the field. Now days they hire them straight out of school as far as I'm concerned raised on a mixture of bullschidt and business theory. No practical field experience at all. I'm know it makes for some interesting conversations for the consume.

My propane supplier filled my tank, and for a day or so afterwards, I was smelling something around the tank. My first thought was that the dog had drug up something dead. Finally came to the conclusion it was leaking at the tank. Called company, and they can right out and fixed it. Turns out that when they refilled it, they didn't turn a valve completely off. They gave me a credit for the gas that leaked out. Also, this past fall, when I started using my gas logs, they were smelling. Called the company to come out and look, and they called me back asking if we'd done any painting recently. I told them we had, and the guy said that the paint fumes would stick to the logs like glue, and to open the doors, and turn the logs on high and let the odor burn off. He said that should fix it, and if not, he would come out. Problem was fixed. I am very happy with my service.

^^^^^

Always makes me smh when people start talking about checking for a leak with a match or zippo. Most don't know to avoid soap solutions containing ammonia either.

My Bonnie looked into a gas tank

The heart of its contents to see

She lit a small match to assist her

Oh bring back my Bonnie to me!

We heat our deer camp with propane. Last year we were smelling it outside the house and our usage seemed high. I disconnected the line on both ends. Purged it with air then capped it and aired it up. None of the connections bubbled. But it wouldn't hold a pressure test. I aired it up to 80 pounds and one of the young guys at camp could hear the leak. I couldn't hear it. We soaped it and it bubbled like crazy had a tiny pinhole between the tank and house. I ordered a new flexible LP line. I think it cost 60 bucks for a 65 foot line. Problem solved.

I would go a little slowly on totally replacing the gas stove with electric. You will never see an electric in a restaurant kitchen and the good cooks all prefer gas for better control on the range top. We got rid of a perfectly good electric when Sweetness said we should get a gas stove top or she might stop cooking. It turns out that GE makes a really nice one with a gas top but with two electric ovens. Kind of the best of both worlds.

A tenant called me two months back and said that her glass top “just broke” and a new stove was needed because that model was obsolete. Another one said that one of the glass top elements wasn’t heating up the outer coil. Okay, so I order a new coil and how much could that be? Gulp, $450.00 for that model. Electric glass top stoves are not trouble free.

I will only heat my Chef Boyardee mini ravioli with the blue flame of excellence.

rene's Cici's farts blue flame????

The spiral ones I can kinda deal with. When there's enough electrons going thru them I can kinda see how hot they are.

But, when this glass top goes, it's the last one I want in our house. Of course, it's 15 or so years old now, assuming it came with the house when built. Maybe that's part of the problem? With the $450 element fix noted in that post above though, I'm not likely to start exploring why a medium setting one on burner is just that, but the other is more like a medium low and won't heat up my pancake griddle.

First world problem though. I'm not cooking over some rocks with scavenged cow dung for a fuel source.

Can anyone explain these things in terms of our family gas (natural) stove that lasted 30+ years and for all I know may still be in the house that was sold around 2005? All the years we had it I can never remember a leak. And with five kids, two adults, a single earner family at that, it cooked a whole bunch of meals and pre Mr Coffee boiled a whole lot of percolator pots of coffee. All day every day.

Explanation: they don’t make them like they used to.

$450 for an element would be a huge no go for me. I just bought a brand new GE gas range, granted it’s pretty plain, for $545. I put another $40 in materials for the line I ran off the main and presto we’re literally cooking with gas.

Is your stove a Cafe?

Was poking around Lowe's, and the appliance guy just had to talk to me.
Liked a stove and asked if it was dual fuel?
"No, but it's GE Cafe, and we can get them in dual fuel.
And that's exactly what we have at home. I love it."

So I come home and Google fu.

Hmmm, Lowe's must be paying pretty well these days!

Figured I'd splurge on this, $1500! Damn I'm a big spender.


Except, these things go $2500!

If it were commercial, and I knew it would be the last stove I would
ever buy. And probably never need to repair? Ok.

But it's not.
It just a really fu99ing expensive residential appliance.
The type several salespeople have told me have a 5-7 year lifespan.