104 lines
5.8 KiB
Markdown
104 lines
5.8 KiB
Markdown
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tags: HVAC
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---
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# Free quotes != good
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I found myself re-reading the
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[ACCA Quality Installation Standard](https://www.acca.org/communities/community-home/librarydocuments/viewdocument?DocumentKey=b1d2a39d-fda8-4af9-b8de-0ae579bfe24a)
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recently and it got me thinking about the industries tendency of offering free quotes. In this article, I'd like to just focus in on the
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items that are required as what I'm calling "prior to installation" items.
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## Prior to installation
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1. Ensure ventilation calculations are performed.
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1. Building heat gain / loss calculation (Manual-J / Manual-N)
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1. Room x room for new construction or duct modifications.
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1. Block load for existing (can use original if available).
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1. Proper equipment capacity selection (Manual-S / Manual-CS)
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1. Properly matched systems (AHRI or CEE-AHRI)
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Let's break the above items down to a rough estimated time to complete each of the items.
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| Item | Time (minutes) |
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| ----------------------------------- | -------------- |
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| Ventilation calculations | 15 |
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| Manual-J (data gathering) | 30 |
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| Manual-J (data entry / calculation) | 30 |
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| Manual-S | 15 |
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| AHRI | 15 |
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| **Total** | 105 |
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> _The above items are obviously just estimations and the person's experience in the different areas / tools they use. Some of the items are
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> probably on the low side while others are probably on the high side._
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This is 1.75 hours just to do the calculations required to meet the QI Standard. This does not include any of the time spent with the
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customer building value in you or your product recommendations.
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When you want to not guess at some of the calculations then a blower door test is generally required in order to understand the leakage of
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the home, which adds even more time to the estimation process. Depending on the understanding you are looking for, the blower door test can
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add 30-180 minutes. This takes the total time to 2.25-4.75 hours.
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## Pushing boxes
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The majority of residential HVAC companies make the bulk of their income off of equipment sales, so they have to "feed the beast" by
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skipping steps in both the installation of equipment and the sales process in order to close jobs and keep the ship afloat.
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This has helped contribute to these industry statistics:[^1]
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- **Incorrect refrigerant charge in greater than 50-80% of systems.**
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- **Improper airflow:**
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- **70% above the rated 0.5" w.c.**
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- **47% above 0.7" w.c.**
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- **85% undersized / inappropriate filter.**
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- **70-80% of systems have at least one fault.**
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- **90-100% if duct leakage is considered.**
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## Consumer responsibility
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Let me be clear, I don't think that all the blame is on the industry here. The culture today is that everyone wants things for free and
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fast. They have been conditioned by online services and box stores. Should we not cater to those that aren't willing to do their leg work?
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Is it really our fault, if they don't care?
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## Liability
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While it's generally easy to shrug our shoulders and think that it's ok to just continue on because all the competitors are doing the same
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thing. There is at least the possibility that skipping steps can come back to bite you. If things ever went to litigation and the steps
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outlined in the QI Standard are ignored, then there is high odds you would loose.
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No matter what you do to try and protect yourself (having customers sign-off, etc) does not adequately protect your company from litigation.
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There are stories out there where contractors were still held liable for not performing load calculations even though the consumer signed
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off on it, because it is not inline with "industry best practices."
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# Summary
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This has led me to the conclusion that free quotes are just bad for the industry in general. The path forward is a challenge (changing
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perception is hard). I don't know that I have answers on what the best path forward is, to be frank, but I do know that our current _status
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quo_ is subpar to say the least.
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Unfortunately, I don't think the change is going to come from the industry, but that it's going to require the consumer base to be more
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educated and demand more from the industry. There have been many organizations that have dedicated years to changing the skill levels of
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technicians in the industry, they are very well needed / don't mistake my words here, however unless a company has faced litigation or
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facing requests on a regular basis that demand better results, then why would a company change!?!
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I've been trying (unsuccessfully) to get rid of free quotes for 5+ years in my company. We try to educate customers during maintenance
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visits and when scheduling equipment estimates, however only about 10-20% choose to go down our paid Home Performance Assessment path. Our
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installation process does follow the QI Standard for the items that pertain to the setup / commissioning of the installed equipment, however
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there is just no sustainable way for us to completely follow the items outlined in this article without charging for our time, because at
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the end of the day we still have to be competitive in our market.
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There are days that I can justify our actions to myself and also days that I just want to throw in the towel / not sacrifice our integrity.
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Integrity is something that I take very seriously, after all our companies tag line is _"Since 1954, Integrity is in the Housh!"_
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As mentioned, I'm not sure what the best path forward is! I hate to not have answers, but some problems are just complex and somewhat beyond
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our control.
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Let me know what you think some good solutions are.
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- Does your company follow the QI Standard?
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- What are resources that you've found helpful in educating your customers?
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[^1]: DOE (2018)
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