I’m relaxing on the couch watching “This Old House”, which I can do because the boy is staying at his Grandma’s house (thanks!) instead of harassing me to watch cartoons. The best part though, is how pleasant it is in the house right now. It’s cold outside, but not inside for a change. A month ago I’d be sitting on the couch wearing a sweater, because the house was so drafty and the furnace had the ability to heat the vent grills and that’s about it. Why the change? Well, we just installed a new furnace, central air and windows through the rest of the house that we didn’t do before. Our bedroom was ridiculous, with no heat at all. We know this because the installer had the vents disconnected to our room and we didn’t even notice.

The interesting thing to me was the difference in the professionalism of the different crews. We had the windows installed by Window World which we’re happy with, but they’re relatively cheap and cost just a little more to buy and install than it would to buy the windows at Lowe’s and do it myself. Of course I have zero desire, skill or time to do it myself. So Window World had a couple guys come out to install. They came about an hour after they were scheduled, took a pretty darn long lunch break and finished pretty late in the evening. The installers tried to leave earlier, but I had them go back over the deck and roof and clean up the sizable mess they had left, which I still had to clean up after. The windows are fine though, they look fine and work well and I have no complaints at all about the quality. They are perfectly good windows and match the quality of our house. If we were richer and had a nicer house we’d get nicer windows. Also, one of the windows was the wrong size so we have to wait a few weeks for them to make and install a new one.

Our furnace and A/C was installed by Scott Bartmess Heating and Cooling. I think this is a one man show, and Scott is amazingly professional and courteous. He was thorough and articulate about the job and explained every piece of the installation. He was also incredibly efficient, he’d show up on time every morning, it was a four day install, though we had heat the first night, he’d head right downstairs and get to work. One particularly nice thing is how he would plan certain installation activities with Zoey’s naps, so that he’d do non-noisy things while she slept. I’m absolutely delighted with the difference the new equipment makes, we had new venting installed in our bedroom so that it would actually be temperature appropriate and that apparently works since last night was not hot or cold, but just right. We’ve had to run a space heater back there all winter in order to stay above 50 degrees. With the new windows too we can barely hear the neighbors dog yapping all night long. One of my favorite things about the installation too is that the finished bill came in just under the estimate, the same was true for the in-laws who recommended Scott as well as he installed new furnace and A/C units for them as well.

It’s interesting to me also that the WIndow World guys put a sign in our front yard without asking. I took it down as soon as they left, but I would have let Scott put one up. He would have asked first though. Overall, I’m happy with both products, but the impression left by Scott Bartmess in terms of actual customer service is light years beyond any other company I’ve dealt with.