RainSoft review: no money refund from rainsoft! 49

I bought RainSoft water conditioning unit and R/O system 4 yrs ago. assured it would end my rust problems. told it would require little or no service. wrong. continued rust stains in tub, sinks, shower head, toilet, on clothing. service people have come 5 times. no improvement. now the water line to the R/O system has rusted closed. contacted dealer. their letter to me blamed me for not calling more often for service! at $80+ for basic service call, can't afford that 2-3x/year. plus 2 bags of salt per month, R/O filters every 2 years $150, plus 3rd R/O filter that's changed every 5 years costs $200. have contacted corporate office, waiting for reply; also reported dealer to BBB waiting for that outcome. could not recommend RainSoft to anyone.

I have had rainsoft for over 5 years now and I would not live without it, I hate when people have one problem and assume that the whole company and system are trash. I would not live without Rainsoft, whether you have city or well water, it is mostly needed, in fact there are plenty of homes in my area being built with cheap filters already put in. That goes to show you how water conditioners are needed. I had a culligan filter before and that was crap. Bought cheap but spent twice in service and false lifetime warranties. We did have a few concerns about where the system was going to be placed but once i found a good zone for it everything was groovy. My son's eczema faded away slowly using the rainsoft system water, my wife loves it for here hair and the clothes and food etc. I did have an iron problem before the system and found out that the cheap culligan system could not remove the suspended iron from my water. the culligan salesman didn't know what suspended iron was. the rainsoft guy automatically knew and recommended the proper equipment. I also enjoy the natural soap that they have given us for over 5 years and we still have some of that stuff :) Anyone who has some common sense will understand that this money is already being spent so you can choose to spend it on your crappy tap or get a system and if you dont want a top notch system then go get one from home depot. Regarldless I WOULD RECOMMEND RAINSOFT TO EVERYBODY AND ANYBODY! TWO THUMBS UP.

I totally agree with Mr. Stevens. I'm a very skeptical person before I buy anything. I researched the company thoroughly and finally made the decision to get the system instead of anything else on the market. I did follow up with some of the complaints that were listed online and found that most of them were false, some people just wanted to ruin the company's reputation due to small concerns. One was a lady not getting a box tea that was promised to her, then she went on saying that the system wasn't working properly and she stopped taking care of it and so forth. I happened to get a reply from her husband who assured me that the information from his wife was false and he would have recommended rainsoft any day to anybody. There was no more chlorine smell coming from the water, it definitely tastes different than the tap or bottled water and it helps with the skin and the laundry and stuff. Me and my family are currently enjoying our rainsoft filter that we paid cash for to avoid the interest rate from the banks. I totally would recommend the system to anyone. People are not stupid and it's not magic, i have research their chemicals and had my township perform the same test and the results were very similar to the rainsoft's test results which i was skeptical about. I do not regret at all getting this system.

Raisoft is one of the best systems out on the market right now. I recently found rainsoft advertising at home depot which totally blew me away that they are part of such a large company. I asked some questions and spoke to some CEO's and presidents of some companies that use the system such as UL headquarters, McDonald University and some other places, they reassured me to do some other research and figure out exactly what was it that i needed from a water system. There's also a difference between water softener and a water conditioner. I never knew the difference but i learned that the conditioner from rainsoft worked a lot better than the cheap softeners from lowes and home depot. I just started using the system and besides buying my home being my greatest investment, i think this system is definitely the second best investment anyone could make.

How dumb must one person be to believe that the original complaint and follow-up complaint sat around for months and then three positive reviews happened all on the same day? Wow! I was considering Rainsoft for my home but not now. Discovery Marketing seems like a very shady company that I do not want to deal with.

I purchased the system with high hopes from the testing and presentation. Signed the contract and the system was installed. Now it has become a nightmare. I have had to purchase different soaps, creams, medicines, cleaning products, mold and mildew product more now than ever. Wasn't this supposed investment, going to illiminate this from happening and me spending all of this money? That's what they told me. Now all of a sudden there's this 3 day rule for cancellation. If your product is as good as you say and is suppose to be worthy of a lifetime warranty, why is there a 3 day cancellation policy, especially when it's going to take more than three days to figure out if the system really works as presented. Well I had demanded that someone check something, because it just wasn't working and they finally sent someone out to test the water and this was after having it for 10 months, guess what? My water was still hard. So I was asked to turn the system off for a couple of months and then turned back on to try it again. I did and nothing has changed. I called back to have them pick up the system and they won't. I ask them to put it in writing, the refusal to pick up the equipment and my complaint about it and they won't do that either. The Rainsoft management said that I should have the finance company call them and they would talk directly to each other. Go figure. So basically I told them that I was not going to pay for something that was causing more harm and money than good and savings.

Hey, I just had one of those salesman at my house last night. I could tell right away by his actions it was all a preconcieved routine. WE have a culligan system with reverse omosis (this was installed 12 yrs ago and works fine - no problems). Knowing he had to prove our system was not doing the job, we spent three hours on testing city water, bottle water, and treated water(not the R/O).
I admit that the clorine levels were high after treatment and his testing of his treated water wasn't any better( note: his treated our already treated water).
When he tested the city water it was just full of clorine (very cloudy white sediment). The bottled water had some sediment in it and our treated water (not from the R/O) practicely nothing noticable.
In short at the end, I told him and (over the phone) his boss or manager or whatever, that I would not buy until the culligan broke down. Of course, the salesman was a bit upset.
This took about 1/2 an hour and it was well past 11:00 pm.
I hope that many of you learn to shop around FIRST, before you buy.
Thank you

Look at all the competition, SCARED OF RAINSOFT... they are aligned with Home Depot, WOW! Say goodnight to any so called competition now "aka" all the complaints on this board. lol

I have one and I think is a bad experience for the money you paid.

Dude screw this company and I can not believe Home Depot lets them sour there name. I filled out a card at home depot one day to get what I thought was free water testing. While I week went buy and I got a call from rain soft saying they were Home Depot and that I won a weekly drawing and that I would receive a $500 grocery gift card. So I ask the person on the phone is this some sort of scam like those stupid travel companies. She was like "oh know this gift card is straight from home depot, I assure you its legit." So I thought nothing of it and assumed she was telling the truth and scheduled the the water testing since she died over and over she was from home depot. She told me the water tester would be dressed in a home depot outfit.

They called the day before to make sure I would be home and again said they were from Home depot. So the guy shows up, no signs that he's from home depot. I thought to myself "well heck I would want to wear that dorky outfit either". He starts testing the water and saying all this dumb crap to my wife and right then and there I knew this whole thing was full of crap. We listened to his stupid speech and presentation and got down to the outrageous price and i told him no like 4 times after all the stupid crap he said he would throw into the deal. Like that free hippie soap and and cleaning supplies.

So finally the guy gives up and says, "so what did you pick for your free gift". I was like "free gift WTH, they told me i won a drawing for a $500 grocery gift card?' so come to find out it was a damn coupon book and then he acting all innocent like and said "oh i can't believe they told you that". What a peace of ****. This really pissed me off cause this guy already wasted an hour and a half of my life. Then to top it all off he asks well you can have a free vacation instead which one would you like. I said "I don't give a **** I just wanted to eat dinner and hour you wasted your time here." So he gave me both bogus gifts. This whole experience just made me so mad, I would have never thought Home Depot would let a company come in there store and trick people into getting a free water testing and then lie there ### off to the customer. I knew they would try and sell me something but I didn't think they would try all these weak ### pressure tactics.

Who ever supports this company on this board either works for these SOB's or they are extremely brained washed and deserve to get bent over and taken for there hard earned money.

When I arrived home tonight at 8:13, the RainSoft guy was waiting. We told the people calling us that we worked late every night, but they were relentless. My wife didn't arrive home until almost 9pm, and he didn't want to start without her. He was a good salesman that knew every mind-bending trick in the book. I just couldn't rationalize paying $7250.00 for a 'whole house system.' Especially paying 17% interest when my wife and I have never had to pay more than 5% interest on our home or vehicles. He was asking for about $125 a month, I can't imagine what the finance charges on that would have been. This guy kept pushing and pushing. I finally told the guy that I was offended at his tactics and that I told them from the beginning that I don't make buying decisions under false pretense of urgency. This guy just blew me off as a dick, which I may be, but I am no idiot. The products sound just fine, but I couldn't agree with anything the guy wrote down on paper. I still want a system, but not from somebody who is afraid to let me do some checking around. I told the guy that I wanted to check out their company and so I went to the computer. The guy ran downstairs when my wife told him what I was doing and he told me to go to the RainSoft website to see what customers have to say. I asked him, don't you think it is wise to get an unbiased opinion (non-company site), and he said, 'no.' What a nut job.

I am wondering if someone can help me out with some advise. Here is some context.

I just had a Rainsoft salesperson over tonight. We accepted for him to come under the pretence that this was a free water test. He was nice and was not pushy. We knew nothing about water testing but what he said about the water being hard and what not seemed reasonable.

The system seemed attractive to us. The only problem is that it seemed to expensive. My wife and I told him that we needed to talk it over. He said no problem. He told us that he could get us a nice no payment no interest deal for the first 6 months if we agreed to call in to confirm in two days (today is Wednesday so we would have to call Friday by 10 am). Then he had me fill out an application for credit and also one of their contracts on which he wrote that I was not agreeing to purchase until I called in to confirm. Then I signed ( I now realize that I shouldn't have). It did not take long for me and my wife to decide that we did not want to make this purchase since we can probably buy a less expensive softener that would provide the same benefit and avoid the high interest rates and extra costs.

My question is Do I have to cancel the contract I signed (of course within their required 3 business days) or is it enough not to call to confirm that I agree to purchase since that is what the sales rep wrote on the contract?

WE PURCHASED A RAINSOFT WATER CONDITIONER IN 1997, WHAT A TERRIBLE INVESTMENT. THE INSTALL JOB WAS OF POOR QUALITY, THE SOFTNER DRAINS INTO THE WASHING MACHINE DRAIN AND IS TAPED IN PLACE WITH DUCT TAPE. THE POTASSIUM TANK HAS MALFUNCTIONED AND 2 ROOMS OF LINOLEUM FLOORING NEEDS TO BE REPLACED. I HAD COMPLAINED TO THE LOCAL RAINSOFT DEALER WITH NO RESULTS. I ASKED TO RETURN THE UNIT TO A LOCAL RAINSOFT DEALER - JUST TO GET IT OUT OF MY HOUSE-THE DEALER REFUSED TO TAKE IT. THIS TOOK PLACE IN 1997 AND 1998. SPEED FORWARD TO 2007. THE CLOSEST REPAIR MAN IS ALMOST 100 MILES AWAY. THE SOFTNER HASN'T WORKED IN YEARS!

THIS IS ONLY MY OPINION, BUT I WOULD NOT RECOMMEND A RAINSOFT WATER CONDITIONER.

I can fully understand how these people may feel about their experience with their local product dealer. I have been marketing RainSoft products for 10 years now and wish to emphasize to anyone looking to purchase a system that the products themselves are very good products - some of the best in the business. The fact is there are close to 6 million rainsoft owners worldwide and that RainSoft sits at over a 98% customer satisfaction rating. This means there are around 5.88 million satisfied customers out there! You've just heard of 6 complaints in two years... think logically and do the math. It's just as possible to have one unit with a defect as it is to purchase a car with one. In either instance, the corporate offices will do anything they can to resolve it.
When looking into purchasing water treatment, my best advice to anyone is to look up the dealership's credentials - the company that sells the product in your area. Just as Ford has hundreds of dealerships, so does RainSoft. Check out with the local BBB to see if there are any complaints for your area. The reason being is Rainsoft truly has the best warranties in the business, but you need to make sure the person or dealership servicing it has a noticeably clean track record. Be a smart consumer.

I have had a Rain soft system for @ 9 years. As far as I can tell it has worked fairly well. Today I had it serviced as I do yearly and was informed that my carbon filter has disintegrated and some other part is bad and it could cost up to $1000 to fix or replace it and replace my Multi-pure undersink water filter for around $4000. My lifetime warranties and manufacturers literature does not mention any replaceable filters on the unit or the need to do so. Nor does anything mention a normal lifespan of the unit. I may be an idiot but I thought lifetime warranty referred to my life time not my grandfathers. Oh sorry he died in 1998. Interesting enough no one servicing my system in the last eight services mentioned the possibility of repacing filters to preserve the good working condition of my system. So end all shouldn't my warranty cover all necessary repairs? Anyone have any info I would love to hear from you.

Wow, yours is worse then mine. The rainsoft did install mine but it don't even work. Their reverse osmosis? It's worse it clog my ice maker and my refrigerator water is clogged also. Their promise of year supply of soap. It never lasted for a month. So I decided to look for the company, they are crook,lier and cheater. Get my softner right. That's all I ask or give my money back.

Angry Customer
Robert Brooks

My wife and I agreed to allow a rep from Rain Soft to give us a free water test. The rep was a nice enough person but only had enough informaton on the product to try and make the sale. We have just bought our home and told the rep that we were interested in possibly bying the product but, needed some time. As with most new home buyers, there are expenses that need to be delt with first before buying what I call a luxury item. I told the rep that we needed some time to get our expenses in order and see if we were going to be able to make the added 150 dollar a month pmt. She was very persistant. She would call her supervisor everytime I told her that I would prefer to wait. She would come back with a counter offer to try and get me to buy. I began to become upset and felt over pressured. The rep would not let up on trying to push the product on me. This caused an argument between my wife and I and the rep continued to try and sell. This was very disrespectfull on the part of the rep. In the end, we did not buy the product. We spent three hours of our time which, we were 90% sure were were going to buy the product but, after this, I will never buy anything from a company who has to have thier reps push and push to sell the product.

Serveral weeks ago we participated in a grand opening giveaway at our newly built "Home-Depot". Not long after that we received
a phone call mentioning the giveaway entry and that we'll receive a free water test.

An appointment was sceduled for Saturday 1pm. We were under the impression that we were dealing with "Home-Depot", test it and leave. No mentioning of "Rain Soft" sales reps showing up at our door steps for a demo of some overpriced water treatment system we've never heard of, that would take up the rest of that afternoon.

We have to admit, there is a lot to water quality and the whole demo made sense. Even though we have our own well and don't feel we have a problem with our water, the whole thing was interesting enough to wanting to look deeper into the subject.

Well, he made us an offer that would only be valid today.
"Only 135$ monthly on your Home-Depot card with 6 months interest free!.
(Yeah, right! For how long with those interest rates ?!)
The price tag was 7000$ ! (That was after all those so-called discounts he gave us. He thought he sounded so good.)
Just like these cheap sales pitches on TV:"but wait, there's more" he reached for the panic button. Now we getting all these other things for free. Cleaners worth in excess of ... , more interest free months on the credit card.
We weren't too impressed with the offer.
When I reached for my own calculator to do some calculations, that didn't sit well with him. Now he was really getting persident on getting the deal done which annoyed us even more.
He started to belittle us more or less for wanting more time for research: "I told you all you need to know, it's obvious you will have to purchase a water treatment system sooner or later. Everybody will have to have one. If you don't buy this now this deal will be off and you will have to buy it at a highter price."
I couldn't help but laugh at him.
They had arrived at 1pm and left at 4:30pm
Needless to say they left empty handed and P.O.ed

They tell you only what they want you to know. If their product and reputation is as good as they claim then why the hurry in trying to make me sign the deal right there right then.

We may eventually purchase a water treatment system.
"Rain Soft" ? No, thank you!

I was directed to this site by someone who had a bad experience with a Rainsoft salesperson. I can see that there are a few bad sales people out there! It's just too bad for those buyers because I had a great salesperson who was patient with my very detailed questions (I did research before they came over). He was respectful and very personable.

There are many many local distributors. Each needs to stand on its own merits. You don't hear about the Rainsoft system failing, but the installations/local distributors failing. Rainsoft has a solid product.

I have had the system in my home for 2 years. We love it! We had a great installer who put it in the correct place on our property and did a professional tie-in to our existing plumbing.

Our city water was horrible. It tasted and smelled bad and forced us to use bottled water for drinking and coffee. I was sick and tired of driving to Sams 2 or 3 times a month to buy more water. Since having the system we have only purchased bottled water for trips or sporting events for the kids. Also, our skin is not dry and our plumbing fixtures stay clean without constant attention.

Sure it was expensive, but aren't most good things in life?

Bought rainsoft about 10 yrs. ago. Salesman gave a price of 5000 dollars. We refused, he finally came down to 1200. Don't agree to the initial offer..they will offer you a better deal! The instalation went fine and the system worked great for about 5 yrs. The special 24 volt transformer plug died, i found one at a salvage store and replaced it myself for ten bucks. Yesterdaya tech. came out for routine service and the regeneration unit won't run. The cheapest fix will be 700. They try to tell you your system will work great forever but they have built in obsolesence to make sure you'll be paying them forever. The quality of the softening was great the thing really does work, but somewhere down the line it WILL break down. Beware

I just have a few comments. First, the Rainsoft system itself is a good one, BUT it is way too expensive.

A whole house system can be purchased for $59 at Lowe's. I found several and it was the best of the reasonable ones. Replacement filters are $31 and only use 2 per year. Far from $7000
Rainsoft is an aweful company because it is evident in the shady practices of the salesreps.

These reps very clearly get so starry eyed at the prizes or commissions that they will steal from their own mother to get it.
I was shopping for a whole house unit and remembered an impressive demo I had seen years before and looked it up only to find this.

THANK YOU. THANK YOU every one who got ripped off and spoke up about it. You helped save someone from a costly mistake by speaking up, I assure you.

The unit is NOT WORTH thousands of dollars, but maybe a couple hundred... also, to the guy "John Stevens" above, Eczema is not likely because of your water, it's metabolic, so the water alone can help, but not cure it... clean, clear water is not only achievable with these ripoff artists.

Lastly, I remember the guy years ago stating that the carbon filter in the unit lasts a lifetime ("absolutely forever!") and it's reverse flush cleans it.

NO! That is a lie. NO filter lasts a lifetime. I would never purchase a unit that claimed a filter lasting longer than a year... carbon or not.

I am employed by a local RainSoft dealer as a service tech and installer. I installed a system last night and the customer had told me about this site. While I was reading, i knew i was NOT going to comment.. untill i got to the last couple. First of all, Chris, I do not beleive a whole house softner can be purchased for $59.00 (or even remotely close to that) anywhere. It sounds like you may be referring to the filter under the sink. these filters do not even compare to the quality of water you will get from a RainSoft filter, same as comparing a Yugo to a BMW. As most of the other comments have stated,John Stevens included, you really do need to check your "Dealer's" credentials and not the products. I have had my system for almost 12 years but have only worked for my dealer for 7, I started working here after i stopped in to buy some replacement soap products, the soap is high quality and will last you, as long as, you follow the instructions. It would also help other people checking there investment if others would put the part of the world (yes RainSoft is world-wide) that they purchased their own system. And finally, come on, this is the "complaintboard.com", I'm sure you will find a tremendous amount of positive feedback about RainSoft on the web, just something to keep in mind.

Thanks Home Depot for allowing these people to use your brand to drive me crazy with their used car sales pitch. The guys actually called his boss to get approval fora coupon book to sweeten the deal. I will never get that 2 hours back and will punish Home Depot by not shopping there.

I have moved into my new home about a year ago and since I live in Florida my Well Water is extemely hard. It wasn't before long I got a phone call by a lady telling me that the florida government in undertaking a study about the quality of water in residential areas and there would be a $50 gift certificate in it for me. We scheduled an appointment and the "so called" government representative came on the date agreed upon. It turned out that the representative was actually a Rainsoft sales pitch. The sales rep quickly proceeded to "test" our water.

What he didn't know was I AM A FREAKKIN LABORATORY TECHNICIAN. He proceeded to tell me about the hardness, pH, and Iron Levels in our water. Obnocious and sarcastic as I am by nature, I played out the whole spiel and asked him questions about what reagents and test equipment he used. Since he couldn't answer even 10% of my questions, I moved to something simpler. I asked him how hard my water was in ppm or grains per gallon. The only thing he could tell me was that it was "very" hard, wich is a "brilliant" remark in itself because that holds true for about the ENTIRE STATE OF FLORIDA. He finally talked money and offer me a "Deal of a lifetime". Only ca. $7500 if I took the offer now. Otherwise it would go up to a whoppin $10, 000. Upon hearing the price I refused to purchase a system, upon wich his tactics shifted from the "savings this phenomenal system would bestow upon our family" to scaring me into buying it. The first argument he had was that long term exposure to high levels of iron would lead to infertility in men. He didn't know that I have tested it prior and found the iron levels about 0.2 ppm perfeclty acceptable. He just wouldn't stop telling me about the blight I would bring upon my family in not buying this system. After that didn't work he kept calling his manager to lower the deal and put in some extras, like the cookware mentioned in comments before and of course the famous line of soaps. After about two hours later he resigned himself to the fact that I was REALLY not interested. He did leave the promised gift certificate (thank you) and left the premises.

However,
I do now own a RainSoft system despite my prior experiences. What made the difference? I bought mine used for about $7000 less than the initial offer.

In all fairness to the other reviews I must say that it does work. For instance iron is now only detectable in traces and the hardness, after some adjusment in the salt dosage, has significantly lessened. (from over approx. 150 to 60 ppm.
Would I recommend RainSoft? Yes but not for the price they are asking.

Gosh... I finally saw a lovely RainSoft saleswoman to the door after 4 hours of painful waste of time. My family thoroughly enjoyed the experiments at the beginning, but we all despaired when she began to force the deal upon us, saying that we can only get a special offer if we sign the agreement now. My wife and I like to talk things over, especially when someone wants us to make a 12000 dollar investment. As well-bought up adults we politely implied that we would consider this offer but we needed time to consider their offer and information. The more we protested, the more persistent and forceful the saleswoman became. She repeatedly shook the bottles containing the filtered water and the tap water asking us if we wanted to keep the sandy looking tap water. When I thought that my mind would actually snap ... she finally made her way to the door undoubtedly realizing that we were hopeless to brainwash.

If you see a little parcel in your mailbox asking if you want free water testing... THROW IT OUT IMMEDIATELY!

After paying a large amount for the unit and having it maintained every year for a sizable amount, I just recently came across my first problem with the unit. Aside from the fact that it took several calls simply to schedule a service call, because the service manager set his own hours, they stuck me with a $107 "discharge fee" in order for them to look at it.

They reset the time for regeneration and claimed they solved the problem. Two days later the problem began to reoccur, but not as sever. Again trying to contact the service manager, who was the only person authorized to schedule service calls, I was told that while I didn't have to pay the discharge fee, again, that I probably would have to pay $25 for each 15 minutes the technician was at my home.

When I stated that this was a follow-up, since the problem wasn't fixed, I was told it didn't matter.

The unit is in it's last year of it's warrantee, and it seems that they simply want to string me along until it expires.

It's been a very frustrating experience, and the problem is yet to be resolved.

A word to the wise: Research everything you can get your hands on to ensure that you're not only getting the best for the buck, but that the company you're dealing with is reputable and ethical.

In this age of the internet, it's much easier to do than it was a few years ago.

Would I recommend RainSoft products? The product might be okay, but the baggage that comes with it isn't.

I've read of many of the experiences families have had with RainSoft and the money and time they lost and won't get back. I'm sorry for your bad experiences. If any are considering a high quality water treatment system please email me, I can help you. I offer salt-free, non-electric systems that are eco-friendly. I offer well over a hundred different products designed to fix water. Also, I offer the best service in North Florida.

Sincerely,

Dan-D-Water

We had just moved in our new home about a week earlier when Keith from Rainsoft stopped by to introduce himself. We thought something was wrong with the dishwasher until Keith started to talk about our water. He offered to test the water and explain what we were experiencing. My wife and I talked about it and checked with the BBB and called Keith back 2 days later to say we were ready for some good water. Your installers arrived on-time, were very professional and answered all my questions. Keith stopped back a few weeks later to say thanks and see if everything was OK. We love our water, please tell Keith.

Thank you,
Tim A.
Cinncinati, Ohio

Oh well... several months ago, I bought and swallowed the RainSoft hook. Looking back, I would think my years of experience in persuasive sales would have prepared me well. Most of the time it does. I admit that I paid too much for the system and was taken-in by the water test demo to some extent. For my defense, my wife leaned on me a little, and I'm not the best lab chemist in the world so the lab experiment water-test caught my attention.

My biggest problem was the financing. I was led to believe that with good credit, we were looking at 8% tops. A little over 30 days later (if paid in full in 30 days, no financing charges would be added. How convenient.), we received the first payment bill at 18% interest and a letter notifying us that the rate would change in 30 days to 21% compounded daily like the average credit card.

Of course, had I known the financing was going to be this ugly, we wouldn't have bought the system, or we would have paid it with a low interest Credit Card. We quickly moved to do a balance transfer. Our bank sent a check, which Aqua Finance took almost 3 weeks to "receive". During that time, I paid interest on the full amount to Aqua Finance and my bank. When they finally received the check, after we had called no less than 10 times in the last two weeks and zeroed the account, they refused to close the account over the phone. They said that they wanted a written letter or fax to close the account. No other finance company wanted more than an over-the-phone voice approval once an account was zeroed that I have dealt with. So, I just sent the fax. I'll call in a couple days, maybe I'll give them 5 solid business days to get my fax.

I'm guessing that after about a month, many phone calls, certified letters, empty account charges, minimum account charges, and probably some legal threats on my part, I'll be done with that part of the Hydra.

I really like the softener system, but their financing company has to be the absolute worst that I have ever had the horrible stupidity of doing business with. Yes chalk that up to some stupid tax. I have not paid any in a little while, it seems.

We bought a Rainsoft water conditioner 25 to 30 years ago and it is working fine. We love it. The company still has us on file and calls us every now and then to ask if we have any question or need any service. We moved into a newer home after we bought the unit and installed it in our garage. I have never had any rust problems and our house is so much easier to keep clean without the hard water build up. I would highly recommend this product. Sorry to hear about those who have had negative issues.

the rainsoft man came to our house tonight. he was nice and courtious at first then he became annoying . all the things he showed us were interesting, but then the free water test that was supposed to be from the "city" turned out to be a sales pitch from the company. then THE FREE GIFT! we chose the gift card turned out to be a cupon book in witch you have to pay 2 dollar processing fee for every 10 dollars in coupons. when the guy was trying to pitch us we wanted the talk it over b/c were new /first home owners you know money is tight. he didnt want to hear it . it took 2 hours for the 40 minute test and a half hour of that was just us saying no and him telling us to buy it. all in all waist of time if you get a call with this go clean the garage with your spair time haha

p.s. they contact you by mail too. we got a letter saying that we have been trying to contact you for 3 weeks please call us asap there was no company name what a pain in the a$$

Rainsoft is the best water treatment product money can buy. If you don't like it, buy something less expensive. The bottom line Rainsoft uses dealerships like the auto industry. Each dealership has it's trouble. Again on and for the record. The best water treatment products money can buy = 1st place Rainsoft 2nd place Eco-water 3rd place Culligan. Lifesource honorble mention, but does not filter water as clean as the rest, does not use salt though. Calcium and Magnesium are still present with it. Enough about this. I have RainSoft! I can not even begin to explain how great it feels daily from bathing to drinking RO water. This world has it's good, bad and ugly. Choose wisely! If you expect perfection you will be disappointed with what ever water treatment system you buy. BEST OF LUCK!

We have a Rain Soft unit in our house (whole house filtration). It was installed in our house a year and a half ago. It has been great, however, it BREAKS DOWN. Twice now in this short time the timer has gone bad. The local distributor will fix the timer for $170.00 an HOUR and the corporate office does not care that the local distributor can charge this amount of money. The repair man better give me some law advice or give me a physical for that amount.

DO NOT BUY ONE unless you are prepared to pay this amount to get it fixed every 9 months or are very mechanically inclined.

Rain Soft needs to wake up, when customers are price gouged on labor repair fees, no matter how much someone likes a product, this is what happens... bad publicity travels faster than good publicity.

http://www.rainsoft-letters.com/

We have had our RainSoft for almost 20 years now. In that time period we have had it serviced 2 times for minimal trip charges, hence the lifetime warranty. We recently talked to the manager at our local dealership about updating our system, he came out to our home free of charge, retested our water, and gave us the option of putting a new computerized head on our unit, or trading it back in for a complete new system. I was very impressed as the trade in amount was not far off of our purchase price 20 years ago. What other companys out there will even take THEIR OWN water systems back on trade after that long at any price. None that I'm aware of. Hats off to a wonderful product and exceptional service. Oh and I did ask our RainSoft rep about some of the posts on the internet. He chuckled and said we've been in business here since 1984, and have thousands of customers from our office with a satisfaction ratio of 98%. If you buy a bad cheesburger from McDonalds in California does it mean McDonalds in Minnesota is bad too? Of course it doesn't. All we can do is try and provide the best service to OUR customers that we can. Again my wife and I were very impressed and I couldn't agree with him more. I would recommend this product and our dealer to all of my closest friends and relatives. LOL actually I already have and most of them have one. 8)
P.H.
Dent, MN

Don't you people know that comment boards are full of crap! Do you honestly think that if Rainsoft was soooo horrible Home Depot would put their name on it! Honestly who has the time to post a blog 15 pages long about how Rainsoft screwed them over. I own a bed and breakfast and my system works great. It does what the rep excactly told me it would do! So all those ###s who live above their income needs to quit buying crap they cant afford. Everyone knows you pay for what you get! Sure Rainsoft is expensive but its worth every penny. But don't take my word for it or anyone on this site for that matter. Just call the BBB and Home Depot corp... and do some research on who has this product. That's what helped me make my decision cause i found out that 90% of all major hotels use Rainsoft. So unless these hotel companies are idiots i would say that Rainsofts doing something right. So if its the best for Holiday Inn and Marriott then its good for my little bed and breakfast. Hope this was helpful for those looking for a treatment system.

I can not comment on the product itself, but I can on the sales tactics. I searched the web, the night after the sale and my experience was the same as others. A couple of things stand out. 1. He never used or wrote down his first name.
2. When asked if he has a business card, he had them but had notes written on the back of them so he could not give them away.
3. When signing paperwork, he handed all copies over, but after we signed the "right to cancel" notification with cancel directions, he put that in his pile. We had to ask for it back.
4. He keep saying "we are always in control and can cancel at anytime".
5. Installation was scheduled for the next morning.
6. He was at our house for 4 hours until 11:30pm
7. When I called the office to cancel, they said I need to talk to the General Mgr (took name & phone number), never called back
8. Canceled the morning before install, was told by sales rep (he called on behave of installer) to follow directions to cancel (which is 3 days required by law)

I was basically lied to, where everything was stated as being able cancel at anytime with no further financial obligation. I directly asked this question several times.

If you do cancel, you have 3 business days and it must be in writing. Be sure to use certified mail and a return receipt. This is the only evidence of having sent a written cancellation. I contacted Home Depot with no response.

I recommend getting everything in writing if using Rainsoft if you do purchase, but I recommend not purchasing Rainsoft.

We bought a Rainsoft system about 2 years ago. I can't give it a glowing recommendation, but it worked fine.
We got several boxes of soap/cleaning concentrated products to go with it, and 12 bags of salt to go with it for
giving referrals. We would get rust stains in the toilets before the system was installed, and afterwards, it takes
longer for them to accumulate, and they aren't as pronounced, but they aren't gone by any means.

The salesperson was really nice, came in with the water test premise, and there was a pitch, but no pressure.
The pressure came afterwards, when we were called by the local distributor as a follow-up. It wasn't over the
top, he cut the price down a bit, and we bought it.

She promised all kinds of 'miracle' things from this water, and it sounded over the top, and was. Not that any of
that sold us, but it did sound good.

But I've kept salt in the tank, and I can say that there have been benefits to having the system, and nothing terrible
came to pass from this purchase. Maybe this was just an issue with the local distributor? I find it hard to fault RainSoft
in general from this experience, but I had a neutral-to-good experience, so maybe that taints my position.

We purchased our Rainsoft softner 8yrs ago for $3600. We were leary about paying that much, but we were young and just had our first child (sales paerson used this to their advantage). Unit worked well for first 5 yrs then the piston and motor started going out. We just replaced the unit today (have had to replace the motor and piston 3 times in the last year) with a better unit form a different manufacturer for only $1000. I don't believe the unit was worth $3600. You should not have to pay more than $1500 for a good system. By the way the company that sold us the unit went out of business a year after they sold us the unit (feds investigated them for fraud and illegal business procedures).

Rainsoft is a total scam. I wish I would have researched them better before I purchased. The only people I have heard say positive things about them work for them. I do not know a person with one of thier products that does not have a horror story. My unit only worked for a few years then it stopped cleaning itself. I called the dealer that sold me the unit and was basically told that the "Lifetime Warrenty" that thier salesmen go on about is totally worthless. "Warrenty" repair is $80 an hour plus parts! How is that a warrenty? You pay top dollar thinking you will be taken care of, but you get shafted in the end. I found this site looking for information on how to repair mine myself (diagrams, something) as I am sick of dealing with Rainsoft trying to get them to honor thier warrenty. I know I can get a lawyer, sue them and win but I would pay more for the lawyers than the filter is worth. I am sure thier whole business model revolves around everyone thinking the same way I do. Any law firms out there interested in a class action lawsuit? I would certainly sign up and from what my friend Mr. Google is telling me, so would a lot of others.