Dunman Electric

Cassidy I.

Unfortunately I am one of the apparently many that have had horrible experiences with Dunman Electric. My first mistake was not looking at yelp before hiring them. However, both my mother and brother used them around 6 years ago and had no issues so it didn't even cross my mind.

I called Dunman on Tuesday 9/11/18 to get a quote for installing two ceiling fans I had purchased. The receptionist, Becky, was incredibly nice and told me that they charge $95 per fan if there is already existing blocking, or $120 per fan if there is no blocking. This seemed like a reasonable price, so I scheduled the installation for 9/14/18 and was very pleased they were able to fit me in so quickly. My second mistake was not getting these prices in writing.

I scheduled the time frame for 10am-12pm because I have two roommates that work late and sleep in, but I got a call at 9 am that the technicians would be there in 15 minutes. They were at the house 5 minutes later. Thankfully, my roommate woke up to my call to let them in and my parents were able to get to the house quickly to meet them. It was a bit stressful and I had spend 15 minutes of work time dealing with it, but I let it go because I know these things happen.

Then, when the technicians started they did not place any sort of plastic down under the first fan so my roommate's bed, dressers, and floor was COVERED in insulation (which had fiberglass in it) and drywall dust. They shook out her comforter and vacuumed the floor when they were done, but they still left a huge mess and we had to to a much more extensive cleaning later before she could sleep that night.

Next, there was an issue with the fan blades. The fan blades had two sides with different colors. They installed them black side down without asking which color we preferred. This was partially our mistake for not making clear which side to do before they started, but when asked to flip them they said, ""Well I picked the black side because it matched the furniture."" It is not a technician's job to decide which color blade looks better in someone else's house. He then said it would be another $80 to flip the blades. This was quite annoying but, again, I just let it go and figured I would just figure out how to flip them later.

But then came time to pay. They finished and said the total was $569.
That is well over double the price I was told. They said they charged $170/hour, it took 3 hours, and there was an extra fee because I had not had any blocking for the fans. Unfortunately, my mom did not realize what they had quoted me and filled out a blank check I had left.

They also left their ladder in the garage, as well as the old lights and trash from the ceiling fan packaging in piles in the rooms.

I was still at work but I immediately called back the office and relayed everything that had happened to the receptionist to figure out what was going on. She told me she would pass my complaints on to a manager, who would get in contact with me after she talked to the technicians. I called back after an hour of not hearing from them. The receptionist informed me my case had been escalated to the owner and he would get in contact with me, however he was at an electrical emergency and it may not be until later that afternoon before I heard from him. I never heard from him. At this point I put a stop payment on the check so it would not be cashed before I had a chance to talk to Craig.

I had to call them back myself Monday. When I finally got in touch with him he informed me that while, yes, his receptionist had told me $120 per fan, the lowest he would go for the service was $450. $125 per fan installation plus $100 per fan for the blocking.

At this point I had already had to take a half day off of work and spent the entire weekend stressing about the situation. I am a first time, single homeowner in my 20's and I do not have $300+ laying around for a job I thought would be much cheaper. I would never have agreed to let this company do the work if I had gotten a quote for this amount upfront. It is not a good feeling to feel like you have been scammed. From the looks of the other reviews it seems like I'm not the first person that has felt this way after hiring them. On the plus side, they have taught me to always get any quotes for work in writing.

I would strongly advise anyone looking for an electrician to look elsewhere. There are plenty of honest companies in Austin. If you insist on using Dunman, make sure you get everything in writing. In the end, I agreed to this price to get all of this behind me and to keep from missing any more work, not because I thought it was fair or just. I truly hope Craig and everyone else at Dunman learns from this experience and can provide better service for their customers.

Austin X.

Dunman electric installed 16 canned lights for us and replaced a couple of ceiling fans. They were prompt, polite, clean, and everything worked well when they left. The second day they didn't show because another job ran long but the office called us. (That was nice).

We had added in an ""extra"" to our original scope of work and that was a bit pricey because it took them 1.5 hrs to get the capacitor from Home Depot because they didn't have it on their truck. In the future I might ask for this cost up front.

Overall we were happy with the service. I would call them again.

Mel W.

I would not recommend Dunman Electric. They provided service that caused minor cracking in the ceiling of the bathroom; left an unsightly access to the attic; failed to complete an issue involving track lighting in the living area; invoice was high; and customer service to address concerns abysmal.
Mel

Leigh'An G.

I recently hired Dunman Electric to do the electrical work in a recent kitchen remodel in my home. The scheduling was easy and flexible. The crew was friendly. The job was well done. They are not the most reasonable for their services but the scheduling was easy, workers were friendly and did the job right. Thanks Dunman Electric!

Mark D.

Horrible! OVERPRICED! Called in 2 companies for a repair. The first company charged $35.00 for service charge and gave an estimate of $950.00
Dunman Electric charged over $200 for the service charge and could not give an estimate.
Tottaly unacceptable. STAY away from these folks. Do not know how they stay in business.

Anthony M.

DO NOT EVER USE THESE GUYS!! if you get any estimate over the phone, make sure you get it in writing. The credit card company will not honor a charge back if it is not in writing!! My original response was cut off because yelp said it was too long. No more than 5000 characters. Mine was 1300. Still would not post. It is a complete rip off when we hire someone to do a job and specifics and verbally agree on the price and these pricks did something different(said there was no space in the breaker box to put a dedicated circuit in) they decided to jump off an existing garage circuit. NOT what I wanted done. They also charged me 521 to do so. We agreed to 300(still high for work that was supposed to be done). They did not call us, email us or text us to say ""hey, we are not going to do what you asked but something different and charge you a lot more"". They informed the Home owner that there was no space in the breaker box which is a total lie. I have pics. I knew from the previous reviews to know the price before they did the work because they have done it in the past. I was not ""picking my own price"" as one of the owners will claim. 300 for the job is 30 percent higher than ANYONE in the Austin area but was willing to pay the 300 just to get it done. There is NOTHING this company can say that can make it right . SHAME ON YOU DUNMAN ELECTRIC!! SHAME. I expect them to try to tear me up on my review but they did everything wrong.. please see picture of the breaker box with no space available... it's in their pics

Jeremy B.

I had Dunman electric come out to check on the connection of a spa light. I thought is might be an electrical issue, so I wanted an electrician out to make sure. The charged 1.6 hours of labor, and a residential charge to tell me that we had a burnt out light bulb. Thy didn't have the light, so the bulb wasn't even replaced. $270 to tell me I had a light bulb out. Stay away!

Stevie F.

So, unfortunately, I have to add my voice to the other negative reviews here, since I have had a horrible experience with this company. The day after the electrician came out I discovered that he did not actually fix the issue with my ceiling fan even though he said he did. I called to let Dunman now and was told I would receive a call back. I did not. I ended up having to follow-up several times to make an appointment with Craig the owner to come out. Unfortunately, he never showed for his appointment.

After following-up several other times, I did finally get a call back from Craig, but at this point had completely lost faith in the company. When I did speak with Craig he was incredibly hostile to the point of being personally insulting. I'm going to take further steps to try to dispute my charge, but please save yourself the hassle and just avoid this company.

Jeffrey S.

Would recommend to others, would use again.

Dunman stepped in when another contractor flaked on me and installed some ceiling fans for me with very short notice.

Terry A.

I had them install an LED fixture in pantry to replace a failed fluorescent fixture: worked quickly, and did a great job. Very pleased!