Warning...emergency plumber John Kennedy from Pronto Plumbers in Gateshead totally exploited us, charging £830 for 50 minutes work.
We had a burst pipe in our house at about 9am 22nd June 2026. Understandably, we felt very anxious and worried about this. We had to turn our electricity off so had no Internet connection. Our neighbours found us a few numbers of emergency plumbers to contact and Pronto Plumbers was one of them. John Kennedy, plumber from Pronto Plumbers arrived 11.10am/11.15am. On the phone my husband was told that Pronto Plumbers covered East Lothian. We found out later that John Kennedy had come from Gateshead, quite a distance away. He told us that he would take about 90 minutes to get to us and we presumed he was at a job and probably coming from Edinburgh or nearby. On arrival he told us the call out charge was £80, plus £250 for his assessment of what the problem might be. As we were feeling very stressed and vulnerable we reluctantly agreed to this. The job was relatively simple....a pipe from the attic into our linen cupboard had a break in it. John Kennedy replaced the broken part of the pipe. He then told my husband that his charge would be in total £830....£80 + £250 + £500 for his work. John Kennedy was in our house for about 50 minutes at most. We feel that he totally exploited us and I would not want him to do this to anyone else. I would advise anyone to have nothing to do with him.