It's just business!
The real gravy, the real profit is getting much more money than what the services supplied are worth. Which is best done by getting people to pay for one thing and delivering much less.
And to keep that easy profit rolling in it is well worth it to spend a little of that sweet easy profit addressing any impediments to it's flow. This HVAC biz shows how successful such tactics are, they have been making very good money for a very long time. It is capitalism.
Well, it is modern capitalism which has learned there is more profit in rigging the system, corrupting the system, than actually trying to compete fairly or supply reasonable and fair services. Competing fairly is expensive and the only goal profit so expenses are best be kept down. Morals have no role in business, laws maybe but even then only those enforced to the point it impacts profits.
This little company is just doing what large companies and global industries are doing, making profit, capitalism in the 21st century.
If this HVAC company was big enough there would be no reporting of their actions, in fact they might have had enough profit to buy a change to legislation that would make their actions legal or at least ensure their actions would receive little or no attention.
As it is a larger company is quite happy we are talking about the practices of such a small company, but hey maybe that is just a coincidence.