Oh dear - you paid out $7,000. for a new circuit set-up to some guy your appliance man brought in, without getting a second and third opinion? Wish I could afford to just do that! You may want to talk (fast) to a lawyer about this - we can't tell if you were scammed for sure, but it does sound pretty fishy to me!

If all he replaced was a circuit breaker---you got scammed. I have known a lot of electricians in my life and never heard of the 15 year service schedule. Circuit breakers can wear out due to constant overloading or improper construction---but that usually occurs in less than 15 years.

"Was I Scammed??" Definitely.

By the dishwasher repairman for not finding the electrical short in the first place. Did he charge you for a service call? And for telling you the circuit breaker was bad when it was doing exactly what its supposed to do - break the electrical circuit when there's a short.

The electrician who replaced the circuit breaker charged way too much even if the circuit breaker had been bad. The most expensive 20 amp circuit breaker I just looked at on Lowes website was $35.00. Even adding 3 hours labor at $100.00 an hour comes to a whole lot less than $1500.00.

Options at this point:

Stop payment on the check.
Contact your credit card company.
Contact you state attorney generals office of consumer affairs.

Yes, and you need to act now. Call everyone you can, immediately.

Agreed -

First off, the repairmans missed the short-circuit, which is forgiveable given the lack of training they get nowadays. The best thing you got was a reference to an electrician, which was the proper next step.

Electricians can be expensive, but it seems you found the one looking for that pot of gold. Just replacing a circuit breaker, without looking for a cause of the trip, sounds sloppy and dangerous. Charging more than $200 is simple theft, and I'd suggest contacting your states department of consumer affairs.

However, give the company a call first and explain your concern about being overcharged. Perhaps someone there cares enough about this to get it straight. If not, the local Better Business Bureau can be helpful.

KT

You got HOSED BIG TIME.

I had a guy come over and tell me .. about the same thing, then I found out one legof my 220 was out to the house.

I sent him packing ... with no money.

Common sence... I live on a street with all the same builder and all the same ( 4 different models) houses.

The electrican told me how dangerous the 30 year old breaker box was ... "oh my god " they could cause a FIRE.... He told me " look you don't know anything about electricty.. I do trust me"
Well lets see..... 30 years I'v lived here and not a fire truck came down my street yet..... If the breakers were bad the city fire department would be in on it.

The power company guy came out to fix the input power from the pole . I told him to look at my brakers and tell me if they look unsafe, I told him that an electrican just left and wanted to replace the box and all the breakers.

He laughed.... I saved 1800 bucks.
Scott

Maybe California circuit breakers are only good for 15 years?
Andrea, RUN and SCREAM to your BBB!

P.S. Come back & let us know how it turns out.

Lotsa luck.

Don

I have one question. Did the appliance guy recommend that particular electrician? If so they might even be in on the scam and/or getting kickbacks from the electrician's company. Either that or they really need to be made aware that they are recommending a company that appear to be sleazy scumbags.

Also scott2006, it is slightly possible that the electrician was right. If the brand name of your electrical panel is Federal Pacific, it will definately behoove you look into the matter. Their Stab-lok breakers are indeed a fire waiting to happen.

FPE Stab-Lok or Federal Pacific Electric Stab-lok circuit breakers can fail to trip at an alarming rate. In the original testing, at a modest overload (135% of rating) switches that had never been touched (never mechanically switched) were energized on both poles. These failed 25% of the time, followed by a lockup that meant the switch would never trip in the future at any overload. Once these switches had been flipped on and off (mechanically energized), failures increased to 36%!

Its as if your car's airbag were known to only deploy 64% to 75% of the time in a serious head-on accident. As long as you don't run into anything, you'll be fine, but I'd still probably want to replace the airbag with one I could be assured would work.

Bob,

The panel is GE. Thanks for the good info. It was clear from the electricans actions .... his "well you don't know anything about electricity ... I do ... let me take care of this"
Well... I work for a welding company in the electro - machanical testing lab. We develope the transformers and the wire drive systems for the new products. Been there 40 years.`

This guy thought I was some old retired dude ( I just happened to be home that day) that he could RIPP OFF.

He advertises senior discount in the phone book.

I think he likes RIPPING people OFF.

Like I said ... all these houses were built by the same builder and there has been no fires for 35 years. If there was a breaker problem the fire department would be all over it.

Scott

Bob,
I will see that the Mentor Ohio fire department gets the info on the breakers. That's a good web site ... thanks.

Do you do home inspections?

Scott

I'd have bought a new dishwasher, for $1300 I could have bought 3 of them.

As for your electrical panel ... I'm here in San Diego County. We got a quote from La Mesa Electrical to upgrade our electrical panel for $1500. We haven't done it yet. It's not in the high priorities right now. But that's a darn sight cheaper than $7K.

Suggest you pay attention to some of the articles both online and in the U-T. Scammers are out big time, these days, especially picking on the fire victims (as if they don't have enough problems) and older folks.

DonnaR/CA

Last summer I got a new box and breakers for the house next door.
$1100.00 TOTAL for box instalation breakers ground rod, and running 2 new 220 line because my mom wanted an electric dryer and stove. Oh ya I almost for got the electric lamp post ( I paid for the fixture) and 4 fixtures ( instalation only) AND 3 outside electric outlets with covers. Oh ya and a on/off switch inside for the lamp post.

Soooo.... do the math.....did you get scamed??? you betch ya.
Scott

yes scammed, but I guess you've figured that out by now.

Afraid you probably were.

We just bought a new house and had the circuit box & breakers replaced (200am service) ran 2 new circuits and some Cat 5 and it cost us $1800.

Anything over $1000-$1500 you should get a couple of estimates.

...would post back and let us know what happened.

Ummm Andrea, did you go ahead with the $7000 service? I seriously hope not.

I'm an electrician. It would only cost $7000 if you dida 400amp underground service from the telephone pole to your outside meter, also change your panel, aslo add a sub panel and all that includes the 200 feet of wire from pole to meter.. That is a $7000 job.

Not sure how big your panel is but $7000 is a lot.

$1500 to change a breaker is also alot. I charge someone ....... are you sitting?....... $50-100 per breaker. A breaker can cost $5 - 40 depending on size. Dishwasher breaker about $8.

So if he replaced 3 breakers and was there 15 minutes, I would have charged you $200.

YOU GOT RIPPED OFF, SCAMMED! Please report him to the Better Business Beauru and sue him to small claims court. Get other estimates and take those to court with you. Good luck and please post back!