what is the size/efficiency of the furnace he is proposing to install?

V

My thoughts are you are dealing with someone you shouldn't be dealing with. Hopefully you got a written contract before any of this started and you haven't paid him all of money. If not, you have made a mistake. Reputable contractors and companies do not operate this way. In most cases, if not all, you should not pay a dime until the job is complete and you are satisfied. That's a sign that you are dealing with a contractor who has a good reputation, has access to credit and an equipment supplier, and intends to do a good job.

You are suppose to have a written and signed contract with the exact model ,size BTU, Manual J load calc,efficiency and total cost installed, warrentys, BEFORE any work is started.If none of this was done before hand shame on you!!!! If he purchased a furnace and has not been installed
or damaged in any way, He can return it to a supplyer,they prefer it be back in its original box tho so they can sell it to the next guy. who made the mistake? This so called contractor sound like a scammerand unexperianced pro.

He is working on our home as part of a major remodel and the furnace work (add new furnace) was just a line item. We had no idea we needed details on this -- when we hired him we assumed he was legitimate based on his license.

He tried to install a 80k BTU furnace (80%) for our single story, 1500 sf home. After all this started, I did some research online and discovered that we did not need this size furnace, in fact it would probably be extremely loud for our home. I feel lucky that we actually did the research and called him out on it. Unfortunately he has been paid for the word. We've had other issues with him including threats of walking and tearing out materials if we didn't pay, even when the work was not finished.

Can't wait to be rid of this guy -- he should be fired by now but we are nearing the end of this project.

80K should be about the right size for your house unless it's a super insulated house. Only a heat loss calculation would confirm that.

High efficiency furnaces come with more parts and therefore cost more. How much? I don't know.

If the original furnace was uncrated or otherwise scratched during movement, the seller is unhappy to take it back and might charge a return fee. I work in this field, so I know.

I wouldn't be too quick to judge your installer unless he is dishonest with you.

It just sounds like you and the contractor are not on he same page.if He bid the job for a 80 % furnace then this is what he was simply doing. You your self was not sure either from the sounds of it. If this was a 2 stage 80 % then He was most likly correct btu. If I bid on a 80% then you wanted an upgrade, He must be paid more money. Unless you are the type of homeowner whoexpects the best but pay the least.If he comlety installed thisand 2 month later you want more be prepared for battle.
Good luck.
I to was quick to judge the contractor.

Let's go back to my original subject: where is the receipt? He cannot produce one.

The receipt can be produced by him contacting whoever he bought the furnace from. 80K furnace is about the minimum you can buy and I doubt that it's oversized for your 1500 sq. ft. house, unless you live in the deep South.

You wanted a high efficiency furnace after the fact, so, if he already installed the first furnace (not clearly stated) (per your contract, right?), then I would expect him to charge to remove the first furnace, take it back, and then put in the second furnace.

His receipt is his business; you only need to be concerned with what was in writing between you and him in the first place. You have a receipt from him, right?

If you found a furnace for $1500 online and he wants to make some money installing it, and some profit, what's wrong with that? He has to pay insurances, labor, etc.

You should consider yourself lucky that ANYONE will install a furnace that you bought online and cut him out of any profit. If you would pay him time and material to install a furnace that YOU bought, you should be happy with that arrangement.

There has been alot of miscommunication between you and your installer and I can see why he's dragging his feet on this one.

Where did the furnace come from? Ask him.

Possible bad reasons he cannot: it's a left over unit from previous job, and has actually been in his inventory for some time. And he doesn't want you to know this. Because that means it wasn't selected for your needs, but for his.

It is a scratch/dent or closeout from the distributor and non returnable. He got a good deal, and doesn't want you to know how cheap it was.

For any of these reasons, he may be reluctant to show you the receipt.

Neither of these are that bad, but they may not be what you ultimately would want. If one of these turns out to be the case, I think it may indicate that he was trying to get you the best price on the furnace, and that he based his work to you on this good deal on the equipment.

So if you want something else, get something else, but be prepared to pay the fair difference. If you think he would respond, then consider telling him that you understand he based his price to you on the cost he could get for the furnace he chose, and the time and work and accessories it would take to correctly install it. Say you want something else, and if he will be up front with you about the costs.

Use this example. If you had asked for a standard dishwasher, and then said you wanted a better one with a custom front, you would expect that he couldn't use the "builder's special deal" dishwasher to do this.

The fact remains that it came from somewhere, and that distributor or source should at least be able to find out, based on serial number of the unit, when it was sold to him and then backtrack into their accounting records and get a receipt.

80k is not the smallest furnace, I have a 60k BTU on my single story 1700 sq ft house.

As for the receipt, based on what you've said so far, I wouldn't be surprised if he didn't get one to begin with. He could've bought it off ebay, second hand, from a shady character, etc.

Is this a general contractor doing work in your house? Is he subbing out the work to an HVAC contractor? Is this a Goodman furnace?

HVAC equipment is not sold to the general public. The only exception is Goodman equipment. HVAC equipment is sold through manufacturers' distributors. The receipt story is nonsense.

Get the name of the distributor where the contractor bought the equipment (assuming he bought it) and the serial number of the furnace. Call the distributor and tell them there has been a design change in renovations and this furnace needs to be swapped for another more expensive furnace. If this was a legitimate transaction, the distributor should be able to track down the record of the invoice for this furnace.

I have some theories as to what is going on, but I will wait to see if you can get as far as I have suggested.

The serial numbers are indeed recorded. I don't know if this is gas, propane, or oil heat.

Proper sizing is important when buying equipment, but the difference between 60K and 80K is insignificant. An oil fired unit can be downfired easily.

At 60K, your unit might run 8 hours a day and at 80K, your unit might run 6 hours a day. Same amount of fuel is used. I won't go into fine details about efficiencies, etc. by being over or undersized. But I could. I'm wrapping up my career in heating equipment manufacturing, technical and sales.

This seems to be a personal issue at this point, not related to heating equipment.

There are a few more details here. Mike, this is a GC and he's doing the furnace install himself. We wanted a high efficiency furnace and he said he would do this and then brought in the 80% which we had no idea was low efficiency until we started looking into what type of rebate we would get. One month later, nothing has been done and he comes back to us stating there is a problem returning the furnace so he wants more money, $900. We agree on the condition that he provides the receipt for the original furnace. He cannot do this - he tells us he is unable to find the receipt (for a furnace he just bought a month prior.) We agree to pay the $900 for the upgrade without him providing a receipt.

A few days later, he is back claiming that our furnace will cost him $3300. We'd have to pay that extra cost. That's when we took matters into our own hands and located the furnace ourselves and had it shipped to our home for $1500 - you can buy these without having a GC or HVAC license. Got to a site called ACWholesalers.com. You just have to a licensed contractor install it.

Baymee, we HAVE paid him to install the furnace and it was a fair price. This is not about him not making money on the furnace - he's already made money on the furnace job alone.

Again, we ask him for the receipt for the original furnace's receipt which is how this all started. The funny thing is this thing started because we were curious about whether we could get a rebate on this new furnace and discover it is the lowest efficiency you can get and does not qualify. It has dragged out past 12/31 and now we no longer qualify for the rebate.

Gas heat?

Missing out on the $1500 rebate hurts. Some states, like PA, had additional rebates.

I now now beginning to understand the story. You asked the General Contractor to install a furnace which would qualify for the $1500 energy tax credit. He purchased an 80% efficiency model not understanding the minimum qualification was 95% efficiency. Once you discovered this you would not qualify for the tax credit, asked him to swap it. In the process he has missed the installation deadline of Dec. 31.

You are not going to like my advice. My recommendation is to hire a qualified HVAC contractor to install your Goodman furnace. The General Contractor does not know anything about furnaces. He probably purchased this furnace through some contact and now cannot return it. He is not in the HVAC business and will likely do a poor installation and you will continue to be upset.

the GC had no buisness trying to be a hvac pro and it ended up costing him money and you good quality intalled product.

Do as Mike suggested

Its too late. The job is done :-( We originally did not intend to add a new furnace. We live in a mild climate and did fine with electric baseboard heaters last year. He talked us into adding the furnace after the job started and now we suspect the reason why is that he had this furnace from another job and that is why he is unable to return it (and unable to provide a receipt.)

Appreciate everyone's input and suggestions.