ComplaintsforNu-Gen Cleaning & Restoration

• Initial Complaint

  11/15/2023

  Complaint Type:

  Service or Repair Issues

  Status:

  Answered

  More info

  On December 24, ******************** my master bath. It has come to my attention that I am not the only one NuGen taken advantage of/committed fraud against. I called NuGen to come in for a mitigation estimate. I was also waiting for Allstate to send a mitigation company out. After waiting hours and making it very clear I would could not pay any more than Allstate would cover, I signed the NuGen estimate. NuGen proceeded to rip apart 2 areas of my home down to the studs and removing carpet claiming damage was a Cat 3. I had a number of estimators and other mitigation companies confirm it was a Cat 2. NuGens mitigation invoice is over $13,000. Allstate will pay approx.$4450. NuGens has refuses to work with Allstate. They also told Allstate they will need to invoice them for phone conversations. NuGen put a lien on my home after 60 days claiming that would help get Allstate to pay more. The invoice has now increased to over $16,000 with legal fees , interest and finance charges. I am now receiving threatening text messages from a company claiming to be NuGens attorney. I have delt with this nightmare for almost a year now. I am happy to pay the $4450 received from Allstate. I now have to pay close to $10,000 out of my pocket just to put walls, floor, repair plumbing and replace personal property NuGen has destroyed in my home that insurance will not cover due to unnecessary demo, negligence or just trying to over charge the insurance company. I apparently not the only person Nugen has taken advantage of. Hoping by contacting BBB you can help with our current problem as well as stop NuGen from doing this to another family.

  

  Business response

  12/06/2023

  We are deeply saddened to hear of *************************** complaint against us. Here are the facts on this matter:

  
  We got the call during the 2022 Christmas Eve freeze to inspect ******************** home after an overhead pipe burst on her main floor bathroom. We consulted with her a remediation plan, provided a detailed line by line estimate for the work we proposed, and explained our entire remediation process. She accepted the estimate in the amount of $9501.36.

  
  12/24/22 Our team performed emergency services at ******************** home on the afternoon of Christmas Eve 2022.

  
  12/27/22  Asbestos testing (Required by OSHA) was ordered due to the holiday weekend (provided by a third party). Negative results were received on the evening of 12/27/22.

  
  12/29/22 We began demolition work. This was 5 days after the initial stabilization of her home due to waiting on asbestos clearance results and our schedule being completely full due to the catastrophic nature of the freeze. At that point, drywall and other wet materials sat wet for well over 120 hours. It is a known fact that microbial growth begins after ***** hours depending on the conditions of the environment. This is why we called the situation a Category 3 loss. Materials damaged by the water such as drywall, flooring, insulation, cabinets, carpet, etc. were all removed and disposed of appropriately.

  
  12/30/22 to 01/03/23 We began the drying procedure once all of the non-salvageable materials were removed and the structure was thoroughly cleaned (from demolition debris and microbial growth). We use a Deep Assembly Moisture Point reading to ensure that the structure reaches the proper dry levels.

  
  01/03/23 Equipment was removed after the drying goal was reached.

  
  1/05/23 Our updated and final invoice in the amount of $13160.28 was sent to **************** for her to review. We explained the increase in price was due to a longer dry time to reach the drying goal, per the ***** Standards. She didnt disagree with any of our charges.

  
  On 01/07/23 (Saturday). **************** called about potential issues with her plumbing. Our PM arrived onsite and noticed that the plumbing was a pre-existing issue. She stated that the previous owner did all the renovations himself thus there were a lot of issues in the basement which included plumbing and electrical. Our team didnt touch the plumbing that failed but we offered to have our team drop off 2 air movers to dry the areas that the new water affected. She agreed and we left extra equipment for over 1 week at no charge.

  
  1/09/23 the invoice was sent to her insurance company for them to pay (as it normally goes).

  
  Our team made over 10 attempts to communicate with her insurance carrier to get our invoice paid. We continuously didnt get any updates and **************** also was unsuccessful in getting an update until 02/06/23 at which point the carrier was trying to point the blame at the Homeowners Association.

  
  02/28/23 Our team sent **************** information on a Public Adjuster that could potentially help her in the claims process.

  
  03/08/23 I spoke to **************** about us placing a lien on her home to protect our companys best interest since have had not received payment for the services we rendered. I explained that the lien doesnt do much to harm her or her home it just protects our companys financial interest in the event we dont get paid in a timely manner and she sells her home.

  
  Mechanics Lien definition: a statutory lien secured by real or personal property for labor or materials used to improve, maintain, or repair property. The mechanic's lien provides a security interest that can be enforced by the holder against the piece of property if the debt is not paid.

  
  03/21/23 ***************** filed an official complaint with the ******** ********** of ********* against Allstate for failure to resolve the matter about our outstanding invoice. At this point Allstate had assigned numerous adjusters to the claim and were consistently delaying the payment process to Nu-Gen.
  
  4/10/23 It came to our attention that Allstate did pay **************** an undisputed amount of $4457.91 on 03/09/23 for the services that Nu-Gen provided her with during the Christmas Freeze of 2022.

  
  From April to 06/06/23 there were numerous communications with Allstates new adjuster on the claim, ********, who indicated that more funds would be released. Since then, we have not received funds.
  08/25/23 Our team sent a text message to **************** to collect the undisputed amount. We also were attempting to find **************** another Public Adjuster that would work her claim.

  
  08/26/23 **************** replied I can send the $4457.91 from Allstate nxt week. What is the current total? We sent the updated invoice which included late payment fees and the lien processing fee.

  
  08/28/23 We sent information for another Public Adjuster to assist in Ms. ******* claim.
  
  9/12/23 **************** emailed us stating that the Public Adjuster we recommended was not responding to her calls or emails. The Public Adjuster is a third party person who is not affiliated to Nu-Gen. There was a conflict of interest between the Public Adjuster and Allstate thus the Public Adjuster could not assist *****************

  
  10/27/23 we asked **************** about the payment once more, to which she asked for the updated invoice.

  
  10/30/23 We received an email from **************** making claims that we destroyed her home, destroyed her property, accusing of us over inflating our invoice, demanding that we release the lien on her home and settling her account in that amount for her to pay us the undisputed amount that was issued by Allstate since March.

  
  10/30/23 Nu-Gen formally engaged a collections agency to pursue the invoice for services rendered against *****************

  
  Fraud definition: wrongfulor criminal deception intended to result in financial or personal gain.

  
  11/15/23 **************** submitted a formal complaint against Nu-Gen in response to the collection agency being hired against her to collect funds for the services rendered.

  
  11/22/23 We sent **************** an email stating our disappointment in the way things have developed. In gesture of good faith, we offered removal of the collection agency in exchange for the undisputed amount to be submitted to us. We formally removed the collections agency against her. We also brought in our attorney at this time.

  
  12/04/23 **************** replied to our email once again requesting the removal of the Lien on her property and settling the claim for the undisputed amount in exchange for releasing the check that she received on 03/09/23.
  
  To summarize, we are truly saddened by the actions that **************** has taken by writing this complaint against us. We never anticipated that this project would get this out of hand since we follow the same procedure for every single job that we do. Allstate has paid us for extremely similar scopes of work before and after this project. We provided a full estimate with our pricing up front before beginning any work. We worked at her home during the Christmas holiday weekend. We documented the entire project in a very detailed manner. We provided further services at no additional charge. We submitted a 42-page report to support our invoice. We graciously and patiently waited for Allstate to cover Ms. ******* claim. We also attempted to connect **************** with other professionals that would assist her in getting our claim paid out. To date, **************** has not paid our company a single *****, much less the undisputed amount sent by the insurance company for Nu-Gen,so we do not understand why she is accusing us of fraud, negligence, and taking advantage of people. Sadly, all our efforts to help **************** were met with defamation of character against our firm. Presently, we are engaging **************** to hopefully resolve this situation and help her seek payment from her carrier;****** cannot afford to not get paid on services it provides and it must act according to its best interest as well as maintaining the trust and goodwill it has established with its customer base.

  Customer response

  01/15/2024

   
  Complaint: 20876200
  
  I am rejecting this response because:
  I have attached screen shots of updated communication with NUGen.  As you can see, I have not heard back from them in over a month and of course have no resolution to the situation.
  I apologize for all the attachment but I wasn't sure how else to forward them to you. I'm not getting any further ahead with them. When and if they respond, all I'm getting is the same very lengthy trying to justify what they did. I don't want lengthy emails, I want a resolution.
  I appreciate any thing BBB can do to help get this resolved as well as alert any other consumer of their business practices so this doesn't happen to another family.  Over a year later and we are still trying to recover from what they did. 
  Thank much,
  ***********************

  

  Business response

  01/19/2024

  ***************** is withholding money that was paid to her by her insurance company for our services. She received this payment on 03/09/23. We sent her a notice of intent to lien for failure to pay her outstanding balance on 3/23/23. She withheld from telling us that she received a payment from her carrier but we found out on 4/10/23. We filed the lien on 4/19/23. We have not been paid a single ***** for the services that we provided. This matter is now being passed onto our Legal team due to the many discrepancies in ********************* claims. 

  Customer response

  01/22/2024

   
  Complaint: 20876200
  
  I am rejecting this response because:

  NuGen was very well aware of when the check from Allstate was recieved.  The chck was issued by Allsstate on 03/09/2023, not recieved that date. I was completly transparent as to where we were in the process.  This is very clear via phone conversations and emails between ******, Nugens office and I.  NuGen can even go back and listen to conversations I had withe their office per their recorded line as to when I had told them the check was issued.  On 3/19/2023 ******** from Allstate tried to have a conversation with ****** in regard to the claim and ****** told her we would not speak without Allstate being billed for the conversation.  If he would have spoke with her she also would have mentioned payment was made. I have numerous emails to NuGen stating I would be happy to send the the $4457.91 recieved from Allstate once we come to an agreement as to a final invoice.  Those emails date all the way back to 3/15/2023. This response from NuGen is just another attempt to try to excuse their accountability and blame someone else for their complete mishandling of this situation,starting on day one. Both Allstate and I have kept Nugen updated every step of the way thru this process. We have both been very transparent and have welcomed any communication with NuGen.

  The last invoice I recieved from NuGen (I had to request the updated ivoice) was now over $15,000.00. This invoice included legal fees, interest and finance charges. I'm not even sure what the invoice total is to date.  NuGen just keeps dragging this out and keeps adding to the invoice.  Their original estimate was $9501.36. , I am sure it is well over $16,000.00 at this point. Unbelievable!!

  All I am asking for is to reconcile my invoice to a fair amount that reasonably covers NuGens services and cover the damage they caused.

  
  
  Sincerely,
  
  ***********************

• Initial Complaint

  02/10/2023

  Complaint Type:

  Service or Repair Issues

  Status:

  Answered

  More info

  December 28, 2022, my family returned home to a burst pipe. Our estimate is that the water has been running for two days. December 30, 2022 Nu-Gen was contacted to provide a mitigation estimate. I started I needed to work through insurance. Nu-Gen pressured me to sign the estimate before hearing back from insurance. Nu-Gen's mitigation was overkill, they treated it as a class 3 loss, rather than the class 2 loss that it was. State farm attempted to point this out and when they refused to take a more conservative approach they were removed from the project. State farm had reasonable disputes to the invoice from Nu-Gen.Nu-Gen's ******** was a personal attack against our adjuster, the threat of charging for the creation of the email and the threat of pending fees and interest. In the interim while under review their front office clerk called me every three days to harass me regarding payment. The email was such that the management of our claim adjuster asked him not to respond and to compile a comparative mitigation estimate that was accurate to the Cat 2 loss. Additionally, our new restoration company had to perform additional mitigation measures, as Nu-Gen's plan was an entire gut job, and they did not take measures to save the insulation in the walls or the wood floors that could be refinished. Nu-Gen billed us for $17,116.57. I issued an email on 2/8 asking them to consider working with me, as the insurance would not be covering the whole cost. There was no ********.I went in person this morning, 2/10, to pay this invoice, over $15,000. I heard back from insurance that they will pay $7178 of this, a difference of $8000 will be coming from us personally. The business practice is clearly of the mind set that insurance will pay for whatever they do, and that has not been the case for me. What can be done to advocate for my family?

  

  Business response

  02/18/2023

  Thank you for notifying of this complaint. We have been trying to resolve this matter since our client, ************************** terminated our contract for mitigation services. This matter may end up as a legal issue involving courts. Everything that we proposed to do and did at ********************* home was in compliance with the ***** S500-2021 Edition (water damage restoration standard), OSHA, and EPA laws and regulations. The reason this project will likely end in a legal dispute is because we believe that the adjuster assigned to his claim acted in bad faith against us and steered ***************** into cancelling our contract and inserting the adjuster's preferred vendor. This adjuster made baseless accusations against our scope of work. The fact of matter is that the category of water is determined by the restorer. We made the determination that the loss would be a Category 3 based on the time elapsed since the damage occurred to when we were able to address the issues. ***************** did not make us aware that the water company determined that the loss occurred 2 days before she discovered it. We were called in on 12/30/22 to assess the damage. On 12/31/22 (after-hours), we began the mitigation process by tearing out the affected and foul smelling carpet & pad. Asbestos testing was not possible until 01/02/23. This made the time elapsed way beyond what is acceptable by all standards. Microbial growth is known to start growing after ***** hours. This is a fact. We made the decision to tear-out affected non-salvageable material because of this fact. The adjuster originally made claims that the family room walls were not affected at all. We have this on voice recording and in writing. He made this determination using no moisture meters or water detection equipment while we had all proper documentation proving that all the walls and ceiling were severely affected. All of those walls also have insulation and there is no way to properly remove that insulation without removing all of the walls. ***************** does not believe us, the restoration professionals, but chose to believe the adjuster's opinion. We charged for all of the services that we performed and our contractor clearly states that we charge for time taken to explain and rebuttal when adjusters or third party groups question our paperwork that had all of the necessary documentation and support for our billing and practice. At the time of this complaint being made, ***************** cancelled a check made to us. This is in bad faith in our opinion as well since she was fully aware of our charges and all of the explanations to how we created our invoice. She wrote an email to us at the time of this complaint being filed that she would only pay us what State Farm paid her (which omitted a large amount of 100% justifiable line items) via a certified check. 7 days later, we still have not received a check. She has now proceeded to write us further emails stating that we are threatening her with statements of liens being placed on her home. Those are not threats. Those are 100% justifiable and legal procedures when a client does not pay a contractor for services rendered. The lien will be placed in approximately 7 days from now since the legal procedure has been in full motion and the account has not been settled. We are in full regret that this fairly standard and basic large loss escalated to this situation. We still maintain that we acted in ********************* best interest to ensure her home is safe, healthy, and free of mold after sustaining such a large water loss.

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