The internet can come in handy when I’m about to make a purchase. One of the first places I look are forums or sites with product reviews. For anyone about ready to buy a tankless hot water heater, this real life experience can be valuable information.
There are really two kinds of reviews, one where people are ask to give a review as soon as they receive their purchase. This is good if you are looking for a reputable dealer.
The second kind is from the person who has had the product a while. This where you can find out what people really think of the product once they’ve had a chance to use it. For tankless hot water heaters this can be telling, for both the product and the buyer.
A common review topic is about customer service, which often revolves around long waits on hold or talking to someone that knows no more than the booklet you are holding in your hand.
My response is, yeh it happens, but while this is generally an area that could use improvement, most manufacturers strive for a smooth transaction because it’s the most profitable. A returned item is bad for the bottom line.
Another common tankless heater topic on review boards comes from people who can’t get enough hot water from their tankless, or have fluctuations in temperature while they are showering.
For many of these people the problem is that they don’t really understand how a tankless hot water heater works. And it’s not really their fault because manufacturers don‘t do a good job of explaining this.
Anyone interested in buying this type of on-demand water heater should understand there is a relation between water temperature entering the house and the temperature at the faucet. The bigger the difference, the fewer gallons per minute of hot water there will be.
As an example: two houses, one in Florida and another in Wisconsin with the same size tankless water heater. When winter comes the Florida house might have 5 gallons per minute, while the Wisconsin house would only have 2 GPM. And may be struggling to maintain a constant temperature for that.
The next time you are reading customer reviews about products like tankless water heaters, keep an eye out for “what’s missing from this review,” like a zip code. It could be the part that is left out that would be most useful.