101mobility.com Avis 2

In late July, my mom broke her right arm. It happened on the staircase at my parents' home.

Since then, she has been apprehensive using said staircase. I don't blame her, despite making an impressive recovery.

We got an occupational therapist (OT) assigned to us. She visited my parents' place and suggested getting a stairlift. She said that the March of Dimes (MoD) had a home and vehicle modification program. You had to get a stairlift estimate and fill out a form.

She gave me a list of vendors. It was for everything from walking canes to stairlifts. I had to sift through it to find maybe five stairlift vendors. I contacted all five to see who would reply. The first one was Mobility 101. This location in Pickering serves eastern Ontario.

James called me. He is a mobility consultant who filled me in on the MoD process. Our OT never said who would fill out the application. With his expertise, he said that she would the one and I'd simply forward his estimate with photos to her.

We arranged for a time and date for him to come over to my parents' place to take a look at the curved staircase. It's more money and complex to have a stairlift for a curved one.

What was great about James was his sending me his bio with a photo before his visit. It was a nice touch.

He came over. He was friendly and knowledgeable. He looked at the staircase, and let us know how much it would be and what options we had.

He managed to get the estimate down to $16,000. Stairlifts aren't cheap! He took photos and provided more details about Mobility 101.

I sent his estimate and photos to the OT. That's when she sent me the income limits. I wish that I had them earlier. Both my parents are retired, but their income exceeds the MoD's limit to be eligible for stairlift funding.

I was bummed out. My parents were okay shelling out for the stairlift. Our OT said that we should apply for the Home Accessibility Tax Credit when my parents do their 2025 income tax return. They may be able to get some money back.

James made an appointment to get Matt, the owner, to come over to photo-survey the staircase. I also got Matt's bio from James.

James came over with his gear. He has an application, a scanner, and a laptop that captures staircase measurements based on markers that he places on the staircase. Sadly, when he booted up his laptop, it was dead. The battery had drained and he didn't bring his charger with him.

Bummer. It was a Friday. We rescheduled for Monday. He said 1:30 pm. It turned out that his appointment before ours had ended early. He called me to say that he'd show up almost an hour earlier.

He did have a fully charged laptop and let me observe his scanning process. I liked that he let me see the entire process.

This appointment required paying 50% of the stairlift. After its installation, the other 50% of the payment was needed.

Technology is interesting. Getting measurements through scanning markers was cool. Getting my dad to make these two payments through the app on my phone was another. We got it done!

James had extremely accurate estimates on when things would be done. My dad is super anxious about dates and seemed to want everything now.

Matt had buffers in place. He said that he'd send me the final measurements of the stairlift after engineers vetted it. Once we approved them, he'd move the stairlift into production, which would take between two to three weeks. It only took a week to complete!

I got a call last Friday to set up installation for Tuesday at 10 am. I let the person on the other end (I forget his name) that I had a dental appointment that typically ends at 10 am. I asked if we could do 10:30 am. Yes!

I got an estimate of four hours to install and train us on how to use the stairlift. It was much appreciated. It allowed plenty of time to remove the railing on the wall where the stairlift track would be installed.

Matt and Larry were the two installers. They were careful to lay down mats on the hardwood floor with their tools and parts.

They worked diligently to get the stairlift installed. They consulted with us on a few details, such as where the charging station would be (ground floor) and more.

Larry did the training. He was thorough with the demo, which included my taking the stairlift up and down. It felt like a relaxed amusement park ride. It was smooth.

He works part-time as a tradesman. It explains why I didn't get his bio. I got it verbally, which I liked.

If you need a stairlift, I'd highly recommend 101 Mobility in Pickering. They care and are competent. The stairlift has been great so far with helping my mom move between two floors with ease and without any apprehension.

We went to see the dealer on March 16, a Saturday. We bought the Elite model that day. Dealer gave a date of March 25 to come to measure our steps, straight & get the deposit. The dealer gave us our install date, then they changed it to an earlier date, which was great, they even sent us an email confirming the new date at 9am on April 10. Then I called March 29 to verify when the unit would arrive (woman said she would call us with this info but did not) & that's when they changed it back to a later date in May because Bruno was not shipping until April 12. It took 10 days for a man to come to our house to just measure. They won't order till they measure, which was unnecessary if a straight staircase of 12/14 steps according to another dealer. Now we are told the unit will not be shipped until April12 & the dealer has no idea of when it will arrive. So I decided to call another dealer who said they had 3 Elite units in stock & could install one on April 1 AND the price was $995 LESS. So I called my dealer to see if he could get one of the units from the other dealer & he refused. Let the buyer beware, we were not looking for a Bruno lift, we were looking for a good lift in a reasonable amount of time & at a fair price. We have nothing as of today March 29, except the owner will call us next week when he gets back in town. I called the dealer at least 8 times today, no response, so I kept calling & calling, there were 2 women in the office. Also, it does no good to call Bruno in Wisconsin because they have zero contact with the public, they only take messages & reply by email, even though I gave all the info to the message taker, thus wasting even more time. If we get this chair in less than 6/8 weeks I will be very surprised. They were very happy to take our half down deposit but, as they say, no service after the sale. Our dealer is/was 101 Mobility. Most people buy a chair lift because they really need it. 101 Mobility is just too slow & they don't have stock on hand and are very unaccommodating to say the least.. We knew they had to order it but they left us with the impression it would be installed on April 10. First it was in May, then April, & mow its May again. We need the lift now. Very disappointed. If you need a Bruno lift today, call Medi Equip in Chesterfield, they have backup stock. Now I am wondering if their warranty is any good?? If they had called me back when they said, March 26/27, we could have cancelled the order because you have 3 days to cancel in Missouri. Let the buyer beware.

Date of experience: March 16, 2024

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