The questions the dispatcher actually gets asked

A person answers, not a voicemail box and not a call centre in another state. Our dispatchers work out of the Phoenix office on a rotating night shift. Between June and September we run two dispatchers overnight because that is when the volume is.

No. Our rate at 2am on a Sunday in July is the same rate as 10am on a Tuesday in February. We took the after-hours premium out in 2019 because in this climate a night-time failure is not a luxury call, it is the normal case.

Median arrival across the metro over the last twelve months was 47 minutes. Central Phoenix, Tempe and Ahwatukee usually beat that. Surprise, Queen Creek and Cave Creek usually do not. The dispatcher gives you a real window on the call, and if the crew is running late you get a text, not silence.

Switch the thermostat to off rather than leaving it calling for cool, because a system running with a failed component can turn a cheap repair into an expensive one. Open the electrical panel and check whether the AC breaker has tripped. If it has, reset it once. If it trips again, leave it off and tell the dispatcher, because that changes what we bring on the truck.

A flat $89, credited against the repair if you go ahead. You get the price of the repair in writing before any work starts. We do not quote hourly, so a slow diagnosis is our problem and not your bill.

Run capacitors, by a wide margin. They are a cheap component that lives inside a metal box sitting in 115 degree sun, and heat is what kills them. After that: contactors with pitted or welded points, condenser fan motors, and clogged condensate drains tripping the float switch. Compressor failure is much rarer than the industry likes to imply, and any company that reaches for it as a first diagnosis deserves a second opinion.

Electronic detection first, then a nitrogen pressure test to hold and isolate, then ultraviolet dye if the leak is intermittent and we need to come back to it. What we will not do is top up the charge, take your money and say nothing. Refrigerant that went somewhere will keep going there.

Our working rule: if the repair costs more than a third of a replacement and the system is past year twelve, replacement usually wins. Two things override that arithmetic. An R-22 system with a failed compressor is almost never worth repairing because the refrigerant is out of production and the parts supply has dried up. And a system still inside its compressor warranty is often worth keeping even when it looks marginal on paper.

That is what a Manual J load calculation answers, and it is the only honest answer. It accounts for your square footage, orientation, glazing, insulation, infiltration and duct losses. Rules of thumb like 500 square feet per ton produce oversized equipment that short-cycles, never dehumidifies and dies early. We run the calculation before quoting, and we will show you the output.

SEER2 replaced SEER in 2023 and is measured against a higher external static pressure, so it reflects real installed ducting rather than a laboratory ideal. A SEER2 number roughly 4.5% lower than the old SEER figure describes the same machine. Whether extra efficiency pays back depends on your runtime. In Phoenix, with 3,000 or more cooling hours a year, the step from 14.3 to 16 SEER2 usually pays for itself. The step from 18 to 22 often does not, and we will say so.

Under the AIM Act, new residential systems manufactured from 2025 use lower global warming potential refrigerants, in practice mostly R-454B. R-410A is not illegal and your existing system is fine, but the supply is being phased down and the price is rising. That matters for the repair or replace decision on an older R-410A system with a significant leak.

In the Phoenix valley the heat pump usually wins. We see roughly 1,100 heating degree days a year, so the heating season is short and mild, and a heat pump running at an HSPF2 of 8 or better delivers that heat for less than gas at current Arizona rates. The case for gas gets stronger at elevation, and for homes that already have a sound gas line and a furnace with years left in it.

Two reasons. Dust driven into the condenser fins insulates the coil, so head pressure climbs, the compressor works harder and draws more current, and the capacitor sitting next to it cooks. Then the humidity spike loads the evaporator with latent work it does not normally do here, and any marginal system starts freezing up. A coil wash before July is the cheapest insurance in the Phoenix homeowner budget.

It is the Phoenix default and it is not ideal. Attic temperatures reach 150 degrees or more, so every foot of duct up there is fighting that heat, and any leak in the supply side pulls that air into your home. It also means condensate leaks show up on your ceiling. We recommend a secondary drain pan with a float switch on every attic install, and R-8 insulation on the duct rather than the R-6 that meets minimum code.

Indirectly, and more than people expect. Valley water is hard, and scale builds up in condensate drain lines and pans. A blocked drain trips the safety float switch and the system shuts down, which reads to a homeowner as a dead air conditioner. It also accelerates corrosion in the drain pan itself. Clearing and treating the line is a standard part of every maintenance visit for exactly this reason.

Yes, licensed, bonded and insured with the Arizona Registrar of Contractors. This is a demonstration website, so the licence number shown in the footer is an obvious placeholder rather than a real registration. On a live site you should be able to take the number straight to the ROC website and verify it, and you should do exactly that with any contractor you hire.