PINELLAS COUNTY — St. Pete Beach homeowner Vincent Tormenia said it sounded like a gun went off inside his indoor air handler in the moments before his air conditioning died July 10.
No AC in the middle of a heat wave pushed the temperature inside the couple’s home to as high 104 degrees over the next few days.
“It was horrendous what was going on in here,” Vincent told ABC Action News.
The Tormenia’s invoices showed a Home Depot vendor installed a brand new unit last November.
“I expected for the next 15 years not to have a problem,” Vincent said.
To fully appreciate this homeowner’s situation, you'd have to go back to May of 2020 . That is when the couple purchased a $14,700 unit from Home Depot.
According to Vincent’s paperwork, Home Depot’s installer has replaced the air conditioner six times since then. He told ABC Action News that “every single one of them came damaged or was not operable.”
When the last unit, the one installed last November, self-destructed in July, Vincent complained to the manufacturer, Home Depot’s installer and the store where he bought the AC.
A third-party inspection determined the problem. It turned out the air handler and outside compressor were incompatible. The air handler is marked as a three-ton but the inspector found it is a two-and-a-half-ton unit. The outside unit also referred to as the condenser is a three-ton.
Vincent told ABC Action News he waited days for Home Depot and its installer to help before making a call for action.
But after our call Home Depot supplied the couple with a temporary cooling unit and in an email to Vincent from “executive escalation support” stated they were "….working on a resolution." In a phone call, Home Depot’s corporate office said they would replace the unit.
The Tormenias have since hired an attorney and are seeking additional damages. Home Depot told ABC Action News they are working with the couple's attorney and their own installer to settle the case. The Tormenias, meanwhile, are getting by with three temporary units in their home.
