Romeo Computer Company

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As someone in the IT field, it pains to me to have to knock a fellow «brother» like this, but I am officially fed up with Romeo Computers.
I typically do the IT work for my wife’s company as they are rather small and there is not much to do. Basically just simple Server Maintenance stuff that I can remote in and do once a month that takes all of 10 minutes. Occasionally there are bigger tasks that I typically handle on the weekends as I have a normal 8:00 to 5:00 job.
Prior to me taking over and on rare emergency situations when I cannot get there they have had Romeo Computers come out. While their hourly prices for work are competitive with others in the industry, the lack of knowledge their technicians possess cause them to take longer than normal to fix issues thus you end up paying more in the end.
Alright, time for some nerd speak. I split the main Hard Drive which is 2 TB in size into two separate partitions when I built the Server initially. One is smaller and just houses the Operating System (C:) and then the second (D:) uses the rest of the space for Programs to be installed to. There is also an External Hard Drive (B:) that I have designated specifically for Backups of their Server and Clients.
Every time I connected after they were out, things were a chaotic mess. I’d find multiple copies of very large files saved on all three drives for no reason whatsoever other than to eat up space. Most importantly they’d dump stuff on C: which would cause performance issues. I’d also find programs installed that were not necessary or needed and ones that were removed which were crucial when it comes to protecting the machine.
In non-​technical terms think of it this way. You hire a carpenter to come to your house to knock down a few walls and do other various home improvement projects. While they eventually finish the job they were hired to do, in the process one of the walls they removed was load-​bearing and is needed for structural integrity so your roof doesn’t cave in. Also they fail to clean up after themselves and you find sawdust, nails, scrap materials, and debris all over the place. That’s basically what I have to deal with every time they «work» on my Server.
I also noticed that they had messed with the program I use to remote in to the Server with and I am not sure if they did it on accident or they were trying to be malicious to prevent me from doing my tasks in hopes to get more business. I really hate to think it was the latter, but after what has transpired last Fall I am starting to give it a second thought.
While I was away on vacation there was an issue that required Romeo to come out and take a look at things. While correcting said problem they created another HUGE one. One of the Clients that backs up to the External Hard Drive connected to the Server had a virus on it. While the virus was technically on the Server now too, it was lying dormant and hadn’t infected the Server. The technician who came out, knowing it was a virus (and admitted this as well to one of the ladies up front), opened it up which essentially hosed the entire machine corrupting everything in its path.
This lead to them being there roughly six hours to correct this blatant and highly avoidable mistake. I get it, mistakes do happen. I have had my fair share of them as well and no one is perfect. However what gets my goat is that after things settled and working (somewhat) properly again they submitted the company with a bill totaling close to a grand! No joke! I could have purchased a brand new (fairly basic) Server and set it up for them for that price.
If this had been a legit issue and they were just charging their normal rates and the job did take that long then I would just bite my tongue and tell them to pay. But the fact that they again knowingly and admittedly infected the Server by opening up the virus, it should be on them to eat the cost. If you took your car in for an oil change and in the process they bricked your engine, that’s not your fault and you shouldn’t have to pay for them to correct it. What’s the difference here?
The best part is (and I say this sarcastically) they didn’t even fully remove the virus and I spent another three hours myself cleaning it up and then fixing all of the other stuff they moved around and/​or broke while they were there. Some of these things included removing a no name freeware antivirus they had installed and replace it back with a legit one the company purchased and configure all of my backups again. I also found they created some backdoor Admin account to gain access to the Server without letting anyone know. Not cool and most importantly not professional!
After discussing things with my wife and her company they decided to completely cut ties with Romeo who also hosted their website and email (which I host now) and I will look for a more reputable company to use as needed for emergency situations.