I would just like to share my experience with Fallon Solutions and Fallon’s inflated prices.
Firstly we could not get a quote by phone we had to get it on site so there we have a travel fee even if we don’t like the price and refuse to have the work done. Not being knowledgeable about costs my wife (I was at work) accepted the on site quote so all was done above board, no complaints there.
The job was a straight swap of an existing toilet suite, we had bought a new one and wanted the old one removed, taken away and the new one fitted by a plumber. BTW Fallon did not supply the toilet suite it was bought prior to the change over. There was already a water supply in place and an existing soil pipe so it was a case of swapping one for the other, no major work as in plumbing in pipes etc was required.
The plumber spent a total of 3 hours on site and did a nice job so again no complaints. The total cost of the job came in at $1487, by joining their home protection plan at a cost of $60 we got a 15% discount and saved $214, so the final bill including the travel fee, plan membership, GST and the fitting fee came in at $1273 for 3 hours work.
I did call and give Fallon’s customer consultant my feedback regarding the (in my opinion) inflated cost of the work done is such a short space of time and pointed out that $400 an hour was not acceptable. He advised that it was a set fee that they charged and not an hourly rate and that my wife had accepted the price. They did refund the travel fee and plan fee so I got a refund of $102, but I would not recommend this company to anybody that is looking for a fair price.
To top it all off the plumber left site at 10am, I returned home from work at 3pm to find the old toilet suite laid on the nature strip at the front of the house. They were supposed to take it away but the wife advised that it was to be collected at some point by a third party but I was not prepared to have the old loo laid there for any length of time for obvious reasons and it looked bad so I disposed of it myself.
Welcome @Andyt
What a revelation. One to avoid as you noted.
Quality toilet surgeons, or a blatant rip off. Depending on how the pedestal is secured 3 hrs to replace seems a little long. Under Qld law it’s restricted trade work which limits the options. For plumbing work we’ve paid for in recent years around Brisbane and surrounds $120/hr would be the maximum we have bern charged, excluding materials. Our local plumber just north of BrisVegas is less, no travel cost and call out only after hours. Fallon like other large trade service businesses directs vehicles all over the Metro area, has a large head quarters, office overheads and other labour driven on costs, a smaller local plumber does not.
Unless it’s desperate, there are other options.
Welcome to the forum.
To have taken three hours, I can only assume that the new toilet suite didn’t slot straight onto the old suite’s mounting holes, so it required extra work to fit making it a more difficult replacement.
A quick search of current pricing shows it should cost under $400 for a complex toilet suite replacement to be installed. A straight forward job should be between $150-$250.
The original price your wife apparently accepted, $1487, actually equates to over $495 per hour for the three hours work. If they supplied a new reinforced connector hose, it would still equate to about $490 per hour and $1,000 over the generally accepted cost for a more complicated job.
So yes sorry but you got ripped off big time.
The lesson here for other people is to always get a number of quotes, and ask questions before accepting any quote.
Hi, I have previously posted on here about Fallon Solutions and their charges when repairing my air conditioning. I will never use them again.
Here is the link to my post from 2018.
Thanks for the feedback and warm welcome.
I did post my experience on a website that had a feed to Fallon Solutions and this is their reply to me a few days ago.
Thank you for your review and Feedback.
Fallon Solutions operate on an ‘upfront price’ model. We understand there’s an inherent anxiety when a tradesman visits someone’s home, as you are usually paying for time on site (similar to a taxi with the metre running). We strive to remove this negative experience from the equation altogether by coming out to your home at the cost of our very competitive travel fee (advised on the phone), and then provide you a fixed up-front price based on the job/s at hand. This way the customer knows exactly what the costs involved with the job are going to be. As a result, customers are in full control of the process, and they’re not exposed to the risks of time-based charging. If the work is accepted and our technician encounters a problem and it takes longer than anticipated, then Fallon Solutions wear that risk, NOT the customer. Because the price is fixed, there is also no incentive for the technicians to work inefficiently in order to drive up the costs to the customer. As a result, our technicians are able to do the full works no matter how long it takes. This tends to mean less revisits for us as the technicians aren’t pressured by the customer to get the job done quickly and potentially cut corners/look for shortcuts.
If our price is declined, we simply collect the travel fee advised on the phone when booking the job, regardless of how long we’ve been on site. We’re not charging by time onsite like other trade service companies.
I am glad that you spoke to our Office and received the refund. If you wish to discuss this further then please don’t hesitate to call on 3846 3666.
I reported Fallon to the Office of Fair Trading for overcharging me on work they did on a leaking aircon. They were asked to reimburse me $300, which they did, but I will never use them again.
Hi @Del, welcome to the community. Good to see you pursued Fallon when you were overcharged.
If you have time it would be interesting for the community if you could provide some further details on the overcharging and how you achieved a successful outcome with the Office of Fair Trading. Such information might to useful to others if they find themselves in a similar situation in the future.
Good work! Lets hope they take note and think about their business model.
A few months ago I filled out the website form requesting a call for a job with Fallon . All I got was an automated response that they would contact me. Never got any response. Last week I needed a water efficiency certificate for a rental property. I did a search and in the results one of their ads came up with ‘prices from $80’. So I filled out the form again. No response. Filled it out again yesterday. Still no response so far. Went onto their website and got a ‘chat agent’. told her I wanted a certificate, how much would it be if there were no upgrades or work required. Got an obscure response about charging $49.50 for a callout and then quote onsite. I said I only want a flat rate for a certificate and your ad says from $80. She asked for a link to the ad, I sent it and she said that’s not our ad, we are Fallon Solutions. I said at the top you can see IT HAS YOUR NAME ON IT. She admitted it was theirs. So how much is a flat rate for a certificate? Still no answer, we don’t do that we charge $49.50 blah blah blah. I asked for her to reply to me by email as I had to go out. Instead some person named Dave rang me and was extremely pushy and manipulative, again quoting the $49.50 and trying to push me into getting them to come out and look at the job. He ended up threatening to hang up as I said I just want a flat rate for a certificate as your ad says from $80 and he couldn’t answer the question. When I asked to speak to a manager, he hung up. I feel sorry for vulnerable or elderly people who would be fooled by this practice. The advertising is misleading and deceptive and I am 100% sure they would have arrived and found a lot of upgrades required.
Welcome to the Community @barbs333
The obvious question is considering their lack of reply over multiple times, was that not a message in itself? It could have been an IT failure but when
Would you have gone with them after that experience even if they quoted a flat $80? Would you have trusted them regardless? Or should it have been a signal to hang up?
How long is a piece of string? From $80 means nothing other than they will charge $80 or more. Could be $80 or $800, who knows until they have knocked on your door to do the inspection for the certificate.
For such certificates, these should be ‘run of the mill’ for many plumbers and a fixed quote should be possible based on your location and by answering a few questions during first contact (how many bathrooms, toilets etc).
You did well to go elsewhere since they couldn’t/didn’t want to provide a firm quote over the phone.
My thoughts exactly … I rang another plumber and he straight away said $100 for the certificate. If anything needs upgrading that will be extra. These other people are just rorters. Product Review says that Fallon ‘monitors the listings’ so I knew it was pointless putting a review on there. They manipulate them and place a standard please contact us response on any review that is less than 4 stars.
I would definitely give them a well deserved serve on Product Review.
I also expect that they have been arranging their own 5 star reviews, especially as most posters have no other, or very few reviews on Product Review.
Pretty easy to provide a fake tax invoice to mates and relatives for a carton or two.
On the other hand,a lot of the 1 star reviewers have provided multiple reviews.
I doubt that most consumers would believe their copout excuses regarding the 1 star reviews.
Here is an update.
After reading Del’s reply I put a complaint in with Fair Trading online who then called me and passed on my complaint to Fallon Solutions.
Within a couple of days Fallons called me and to cut a long story short agreed to reimburse $571 of the total balance that I had paid which was $1173 after the initial $102 refund so the total cost ended up at $600.
I must say that this has been a learning curve for me and in future I will get a solid estimate from any company that I am intending to do business with.
I suppose that many people would just put things like this down to experience and leave it there which is what companies like Fallons rely on.
I’d just like to add also that Fair Trading said that there were no laws on pricing and there was very little that they could do other than forward my complaint and hope that Fallons came to the party, which they did and gave me a refund.
Yes, I’m in an argy-bargy with them at the moment trying to get my refund back. I can’t find anything on their website about a call out fee and don’t remember it being anywhere in the conversation when I called to book. And their prices are outrageous and the pressured upselling intense. Would not recommend them and certainly won’t be using them again!
Yeah, know exactly where you are coming from! I’m using hipages from now on!
I’m on the verge myself! Still waiting for a call back from them which may or may not come because I mentioned Fair Trading and the person on the other end said she’d ask someone and call back, then she hung up. Hasn’t called back yet . . .
Welcome to the community @Arena
I’ve highlighted two lines.
Was this the webpage you responded to?
I’d wonder why there are no links on the web page to their T&C’s, and no mention of a call out fee or deposit, or minimum charge. Consider the spiel in the second paragraph says Fallon will in most instances ‘give you a price on the spot and start work after ….’. I’m left confused about what conditions and costs apply to ‘Upfront Pricing’?
I can’t remember exactly what the website looked like. But I do remember that what I did look at came across as very caring and supportive and reasonable. My latest conversation with their manager about the rip off I experienced and their refusal to give a full refund of my deposit as promised ended in him laughing at me and refusing to budge. I’m just going to make it my mission to warn people about them.
