Our Process
ENP is a time and material shop (hourly plus parts). We are not "flat rate" or "fixed rate" or "by the job." We provide transparent, good faith estimates for all work prior to beginning any job with a breakdown of labor, materials and permits (when permits are necessary). Official estimates are only available onsite and in-person, we will ask for your consent before proceeding with any estimate. When giving estimates we charge our labor rate in quarter hour segments - a separate charge from the work being done. We do not credit estimate fees paid toward the final cost of a job. We consider estimate only visits to be a professional service where we advise and educate customers. We will not sell you anything you don’t need and our plumbers do not earn commission on any job.
We schedule time based on the intention of the visit after a discussion with either our GM (Justin) or our owner (Erik). Both of whom have almost 25 years in the trade each as licensed plumbers. We will do our very best to allocate the proper amount of time for a visit after the discussion whether it be by phone, email or text. Justin and Erik are willing to discuss potential costs based on average or standard situations.
HOWEVER, please keep in mind the average or standard situation may not apply to your specific situation and may end up being a disservice to you. Our licensing is our livelihood and our licensing obligates us to follow the MN State Plumbing Code and MN State Fuel Gas Code. Some deviations or variances are allowed under certain circumstances for existing homes but they do not apply to every home and every situation.
Our minimum charges are based on the outcome of a visit. Each of our minimums are billed by the quarter hour after the associated time has been extended. We do not charge multiple minimums on top of each other, the final bill is simply based on the relevant time spent on site. Please see our Rates/Services tab on this site as well for more information.
Lastly, working on older, existing homes that have had multiple owners over the decades can be unpredictable at times - many of us live in these type of homes and when making recommendations we think of a customer’s home as if it were our own. We will do our very best to stay within our estimates but there are times that costs could exceed the estimate. In this case, we will stop and show you the concern then discuss the next steps forward. On occasion our estimates also come in under what we proposed and then we will charge you less.
Thank you for your interest! We look forward to building a trusting relationship with you.
Sincerely,
Justin, Erik & the entire ENP Team