Andy's Bright Ideas

Zachary R.

I first hired Andy back in summer of 2019. He was and still is good for small jobs and minor emergencies, but ask him to replace an electrical panel, or any other job that requires permits/paperwork, and be prepared to micromanage him throughout the entire process. Andy is lousy at communication and filling out paperwork in a timely manner. I originally contacted him late Nov 2020 about replacing the panel at my house, that is now a rental, and he was going to send an invoice for a $1250 deposit on 11/16/2020. I gave Andy the phone number and email of my property manager, so he could send the invoice and notify the renters and assumed that was happening. However, I received multiple complaints from the renters and property manager stating the house had new outages, Andy failed to return to do repairs after stating he'd return and that no invoices had been received or work done on the panel. Andy finally sent over the invoice to the property manager on 1/4/2021, but was asked to fill out a W9, to which Andy was unable to electronically fill it out on his phone and sat on it for four days, because he claims he is never in front of his PC or printer to print the form out. He finally got it to them on 1/8 and a check was mailed out that day, which he received and promptly cashed on 1/12. Once he was paid, I had to constantly ask how things were going and always got an excuse about why the job hadn't started yet. After two months of dealing with this flakiness, I finally demanded he return the deposit so I can find a more reliable electrician and Andy is now refusing to return my deposit and being extremely unprofessional about it. I filed a BBB complaint and may end up having to take him to small claims court, since he told me to come get my money and say all of this to his face.

Update: After multiple threats of legal action, Andy did in fact return the illegal deposit he charged me which was received by my property manager on 1/22/2021. Andy charged a $1250 deposit up front and the total bid was for $2750. Andy may have finally returned my deposit, but that doesn't make up for the horrible experience he put me and my tenants through. Also, legitimate contractors should NEVER charge more than 10% up front, which I did not know until AFTER I had paid Andy.

Had Andy informed me about his personal issues sometime during the two months that I tried to be patient with him, I would have been a lot more understanding. I even asked him at one point if he was too busy to do this job, so I could quickly find someone else, and he said that he could handle it.

Andy also makes a claim that I harassed his family, which is extremely untrue. I received a message on Facebook from Andy's wife, shortly after writing this review and ended up having to block her.

In retaliation for writing these reviews, Andy did in fact report my home to Sacramento County Code Enforcement and an officer did show up to the house and talk to my tenants. The officer told them he received a report that my tenants had been living in the home with no heat, for two months, and that I wasn't doing anything about it. The heat had been down since 12/14/2020 and was caused by the failing electrical panel, which Andy was hired to replace. Andy was also called out to take care of the heater issue on 12/14/2020, and turns out he told the tenants he had to leave but would return to finish fixing things and never actually returned. The tenants informed the officer about the issues with Andy the past two months, let him know this complaint was false, and that a new electrical company had already been hired to finish what Andy never started. The new company is definitely on top of things and already had SMUD out to do their initial inspection.

My complaint to CSLB highlights the fact that Andy charged me a 45% deposit up front, as well as his vindictive and false complaint to code enforcement, for something that I hired him to fix. Andy also charged $150 for his 12/14/2020 visit, where he never even finished the emergency repairs he was hired to fix, so he only sent back $1100 of the $1250 deposit. $150 is not worth losing sleep over though, so I let it go.

I was also able to locate the ""200 A reviews"" Andy speaks of on Angie's List (There's actually 111 A reviews). It turns out the last review he's had was from 6/26/2016 because he's been in the Angie's List Penalty box, due to complaints from other customers. This makes it so he doesn't show up in the search results unless researching his company specifically. It also goes to show that Andy is an extremely deceitful, manipulative, vindictive and narcissistic individual that should not have a contractor license.

Mariella B.

Andy came by in late August and was very professional, friendly and honest. We will definitely be calling him for future electrical needs.

melissa m.

Christmas Eve we had an electrical fire in an outlet in the house. I contacted Andy and setup an appointment for the day after Christmas. Andy was prompt, professional and identified the issue quickly. His price to correct our issues were also reasonable. We would recommend Andy's Bright Ideas in a heartbeat.