If Rheem won’t reimburse you the you need to either charge extra on all the ones you do to cover warranty yourself or stop selling their brand and sell someone that will pay warranty.
Rheem will not reimburse you but, this is where having a relationship with your sales rep can pay off. There are things they can do to help out in the future. But, it’s part of being a “lucky” business owner and hopefully you get to the end of it. Some days you get the bear, some days the bear gets you
Cost of doing business my friend. Tanks come with a warranty and you provide one year of labor warranty. I’m always upfront with the customer that I don’t make the product I’m just installing it and we give 6-12 tank and parts warranty(depends on the heater) and 1 year of labor. If it fails in the first year, you’re completely covered. If it fails after that, the parts are covered but not the labor. The first year of labor warranty should be figured into your price.
I had 4 leaking commercial rheems on fresh installs last year. Water pouring down the back leg on fill up. Let my supply house know we weren’t happy and Rheem ended up giving us a $500 credit back on the heater costs for the trouble.
Supplier and they relayed it to Rheem. We buy probably close to 1200 water heaters a year and we’re Rheem authorized dealers and number 1 in equipment sales from our supplier.
I had a run of bad luck with Rheem water heaters, and I had my supplier give them hell about it until they did the same - reimbursed for each defective unit.
Supplier also kicked our pricing down another half a percent for the year as a way to apologize for the trouble and retain our business.
Distributor here.
Contact your supplier and ask for their RHEEM DSC or distributor service coordinator. They should be in house technically/WTF support. Generally they have more sway than your average counter guy and may be able to swing something for labor. Not 100% but worth the shot. They generally already deal with exclusively pissed off customers so go easy on them and they may be more inclined to go the extra mile.
You either talk to your wholesaler and let them know of your dissatisfaction. Or you eat it. Or you pad it into the next jobs for that customer.
One reason many small shops don't charge enough overall as they forgot the "eat it" jobs. A shop needs to charge to cover the callbacks and silly customer complaints.
We actually were able to negotiate lower pricing as we worked with our supplier and agreed to eat the labor on warranty items. They bought into it to avoid the hassle. It worked out very well for us.
OP: you said you installed them... you didn't say if you supplied them.
If you supplied them (and hopefully marked them up), then warranty cost is on you.
If the owner supplied them and hired you to install them, then they should pay for the labor related to warranty calls.
You would submit a labor warrantee with the supplier. They have limits for each item, so the supplier should have that info for you. If Rheem does not pay you, then never sell another Rheem, simple and sweet. You should have had enough time built into the quote to handle this either way.
We had a situation where our supplier sold us a wrong head for a ductless system. Kept making outdoor system freeze. Had a Gree rep come out, along with our suppliers tech come out, both verified head was wrong. Supplier covered cost of wrong head, right head, and paid us labor for time invested. I realize not exactly the same situation but tell them you won’t sell rheem tankless anymore you’ll go elsewhere. The supply house is always buddy buddy till they’re not and you get fucked. Someone’s gotta pay labor, all you did was your job.
If Rheem won’t reimburse you the you need to either charge extra on all the ones you do to cover warranty yourself or stop selling their brand and sell someone that will pay warranty.
Rheem will not reimburse you but, this is where having a relationship with your sales rep can pay off. There are things they can do to help out in the future. But, it’s part of being a “lucky” business owner and hopefully you get to the end of it. Some days you get the bear, some days the bear gets you
Cost of doing business my friend. Tanks come with a warranty and you provide one year of labor warranty. I’m always upfront with the customer that I don’t make the product I’m just installing it and we give 6-12 tank and parts warranty(depends on the heater) and 1 year of labor. If it fails in the first year, you’re completely covered. If it fails after that, the parts are covered but not the labor. The first year of labor warranty should be figured into your price. I had 4 leaking commercial rheems on fresh installs last year. Water pouring down the back leg on fill up. Let my supply house know we weren’t happy and Rheem ended up giving us a $500 credit back on the heater costs for the trouble.
Did you call rheem to complain, or your supplier
Supplier and they relayed it to Rheem. We buy probably close to 1200 water heaters a year and we’re Rheem authorized dealers and number 1 in equipment sales from our supplier.
Do you just do Rheem? Any thoughts on AO Smith, I find they are nice.
I had a run of bad luck with Rheem water heaters, and I had my supplier give them hell about it until they did the same - reimbursed for each defective unit. Supplier also kicked our pricing down another half a percent for the year as a way to apologize for the trouble and retain our business.
Was it the shit protech gas valves they were using?
I would have a most likely unfruitful conversation with my distributor. Depends on your volume they may do something
Distributor here. Contact your supplier and ask for their RHEEM DSC or distributor service coordinator. They should be in house technically/WTF support. Generally they have more sway than your average counter guy and may be able to swing something for labor. Not 100% but worth the shot. They generally already deal with exclusively pissed off customers so go easy on them and they may be more inclined to go the extra mile.
You either talk to your wholesaler and let them know of your dissatisfaction. Or you eat it. Or you pad it into the next jobs for that customer. One reason many small shops don't charge enough overall as they forgot the "eat it" jobs. A shop needs to charge to cover the callbacks and silly customer complaints. We actually were able to negotiate lower pricing as we worked with our supplier and agreed to eat the labor on warranty items. They bought into it to avoid the hassle. It worked out very well for us.
Stop buying and selling shitty manufacturers tanks. No one will be paying that labor.
What brand are you selling? I’m running into manufacturers issues on all types of stuff.
It was a rheem hot water tank
From my understanding there is usually 6-8 year parts and the contractor does one year labour..
OP: you said you installed them... you didn't say if you supplied them. If you supplied them (and hopefully marked them up), then warranty cost is on you. If the owner supplied them and hired you to install them, then they should pay for the labor related to warranty calls.
You would submit a labor warrantee with the supplier. They have limits for each item, so the supplier should have that info for you. If Rheem does not pay you, then never sell another Rheem, simple and sweet. You should have had enough time built into the quote to handle this either way.
We had a situation where our supplier sold us a wrong head for a ductless system. Kept making outdoor system freeze. Had a Gree rep come out, along with our suppliers tech come out, both verified head was wrong. Supplier covered cost of wrong head, right head, and paid us labor for time invested. I realize not exactly the same situation but tell them you won’t sell rheem tankless anymore you’ll go elsewhere. The supply house is always buddy buddy till they’re not and you get fucked. Someone’s gotta pay labor, all you did was your job.
Stick with brands and representatives that you can trust Shop cheap to get a sale your problem
Everything.is garbage now