My daughter urgently needed a dishwasher fitted as her child is extremely ill in the Children's Hospital and hygiene when they return home is paramount.

Called Metropolitan Plumbing, who said they would send someone out to give me a fixed price quote, as “they couldn’t give a price until they’d seen the job”.

The job was in fact purely to fit a cold water splitter, providing water to both the cold tap and the dishwasher. No cupboards needed to be cleared out, no holes needed to be cut, no pipes or cables needed to be run, no new outlet was required, no power points need to be fitted, the dishwasher didn’t need to be fitted into the cabinet space, the dishwasher pipes didn’t need to be run under the sink – all of the above had already been done. All that was required in terms of plumbing was to fit a $30 cold water splitter – full stop.

The plumber arrived and told me that there was a flat fee for fitting a dishwasher: $790. I asked why he needed to come to assess the job if it was a flat fee and why I wasn’t told what the flat fee was when I contacted Metropolitan Plumbing in the first place? He didn’t know. On top of that he was also charging an additional call out fee.

I had no choice but to go ahead as my daughter and grandchild would be home and I had no time to get another plumber, so stupidly I agreed. I shouldn't have, but I was desperate.

From the time the plumber walked through the door to the moment he left was 25 minutes. The cost was $839, including a part supplied worth about $30, so the cost of having him here was more than $1900 per hour.

If you want to pay $1900 per hour for a plumber then Metropolitan Plumbing is for you.

Approximate cost: $839