Fake HVAC sites behind Orlando contractor’s lost business

An Orlando-based HVAC contractor says that skewed Google results have devastated his business. 

What’s happening: Chris Elsis, owner of Smart Home Air & Heat, last week told TV station Fox35 that over a year after starting his business in 2024, he was pulling in about $150,000 per month; however, in January, calls and website traffic suddenly — and mysteriously — dried up. 

• “I’ve had to let go of five employees. I’ve had to sell two vans,” he said. 

Go deeper: Google searches for HVAC services in Orlando are now returning dozens of generic, seemingly AI-generated websites, pushing reputable contractors far down the results. 

• A Fox35 reporter visited some of the addresses listed on the fake sites and found herself in shopping plazas with empty storefronts and residential neighborhoods. 
• She also called the listed phone numbers, finding they did not connect to real businesses or led to non-HVAC businesses. 
• A website designer told the TV station that “somebody” has been spamming the Orlando market with fake websites, and that those sites are surfacing despite Google’s stated intentions to prioritize high-authority domains. 

The big picture: Similar situations have been reported across the U.S. 

• A Tampa-area TV station, for instance, found a victim of one such website purportedly for a local electric company. The victim paid $149 for a maintenance contract, but no technician ever came, and her credit card was charged by an entity with a different name: Premium Home Service (PHS).
• Reporters found that PHS was run by a Lamborghini-driving Chicago man named Yosef Shmuel Bernath. PHS operated a web of websites for phantom companies — more than 7,000 listings associated with nearly 16,000 phone numbers — and faced consumer complaints in the U.S. and Canada. 
• Another victim who set up a website to expose the scheme wrote that PHS operated using a call center in the Philippines and was being investigated by authorities in Wisconsin. 

Yes, and: Denver TV station KARE, investigating similar complaints last year, found that “companies associated with PHS hijacked Google listings of some legitimate home repair businesses.”

• A whistleblower ex-employee told the station that 90 phone operators in the Philippines fielded calls from U.S. consumers who thought they were speaking with local contractors.
• One victim was told by the technician who showed up that he’d been hired via Craigslist and sent to the home, and that he had to email a photo of the work after it was performed. The victim paid $7,000 for a faulty furnace install. 
• The whistleblower showed the TV station — and federal investigators — company data suggesting that PHS brought in more than $79 million between 2018 and 2023.

What they’re saying: Elsis warned that the Orlando sites could be problematic for unsuspecting customers, perhaps leading to untrustworthy people entering their homes. 

• He’s been reporting the fake sites to Google, but “the problem is, it takes time,” he said. “And by that time… I won’t have any customers left or any new customers coming in.”
• Elsis did not return a phone message from Homepros by press time.