Complaints

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• Initial Complaint

  Date:05/03/2024

  Type:Service or Repair Issues
  Status:

  AnsweredMore info

  Complaint statuses

  Resolved:

  The complainant verified the issue was resolved to their satisfaction.

  Unresolved:

  The business responded to the dispute but failed to make a good faith effort to resolve it.

  Answered:

  The business addressed the issues within the complaint, but the consumer either a) did not accept the response, OR b) did not notify BBB as to their satisfaction.

  Unanswered:

  The business failed to respond to the dispute.

  Unpursuable:

  BBB is unable to locate the business.

  There is a detailed BBB review of this on 4/10/24. My Ocean City condo had water damage from the upstairs unit. I signed a contract with Paul Davis Restoration of Delmarva (PDR) and the work has been in progress since 1/22/24. The completion date in the contract was the week of 2/12/24. The repairs paid by insurance included painting the walls of a very small kitchen, a medium size living room and very small hall; installing 10 new cabinets; installing a laminate countertop; a living room carpet. At the very beginning of the project I requested the purchase and installation of a new water heater under the countertop and a new garbage disposal. At the time PDR was happy to add those 2 items to my project and bill me. The work has dragged on for 3+ months. The cabinets were not even ordered until around February 9, which was just a few days from the contract completion date. I had requested flat paint for living room and hall walls. Instead, walls were painted satin, and had to be redone. Then the countertop was mis-measured even though they had the old countertop in their possession. The length was almost 5 inches longer than the original and partially blocked the path to the living room. It had to be removed and fixed. During the painting and repainting of the walls there was damage done to my sofa and my vertical blinds. The sofa was moved across the room near the baseboard heater. A very heavy lounge chair had been turned upside down into the sofa cushions. When returned to its regular spot, the sofa skirt had been damaged and stained and is not fixable. Next trip to the condo I found 2 slats on my blinds were damaged and would not return to the wall .The project manager took it upon himself to purchase all new slats without even allowing me to choose them. PDR has refused to pay anything for the damaged sofa unless I withdraw a review from Yelp. Suddenly, according to PDR everything I have complained about for 3 months is now my fault.

  Business Response

  Date: 05/08/2024

  There are many inconsistencies in the customer's statement.  Like any project, there are obstacles that need to be overcome to have a positive experience.  Since this was an insurance job there was a lot of back and forth to get to the final contract.  The first draft was written to insurance on 10/11/23 and revision 26 was on 2/16/24.  We then wrote two additional supplements on 2/16 and 2/19/24.  As you can tell we exhausted many hours to make sure all coverage concerns were addressed and remedied.  
  
  Concerns: PAINT-The walls were painted satin and should have been painted flat.  This was an oversight and the walls were repainted.  COUNTERTOP-The countertop was measured on-site and verified by the customer that she requested an 1" be added to the countertop.  The overhang on the peninsula was approximately 3" longer than her one previous.  The countertop was then taken back out modified and returned to her liking.  STAIN- The insurance allowed for only content manipulation and not content storage offsite.  As she stated, the unit is very small but we were forced to move items around during construction.  There was a blemish on the skirting of the sofa.  We do not know if it was there previously but we hired ******* ******* to clean the blemish (it helped but did not remove it completely).  BLINDS- Two blinds had chips in the top corner of the blinds.  We do not know if this was our doing or not but we agreed to take care of it.  Our project manager replaced them free of charge.  Since the blinds were almost a decade old they were impossible to match.
  
  We did offer on two separate instances to give the client back money for any inconvenience.  We first offered $500 and then $1,000 to satisfy our customer.  I can only hope every company tries as hard as ours did to make this customer happy.  Sorry our best was not good enough.
  
  This was an email sent 5/1:
  
  To summarize our conversation on the phone.  
  
  You have two items.  
  
  The sofa skirting has a blemis.  The origin of the blemish is unknown but could have happened while we were there.  ******* ******* was sent out to have the stain removed and could not completely get it out.  
  There were two blinds that had the very top corners broken.  These blinds were snap in and approximately 9 years old.  There is nowhere that you can pick up UV faded blinds that would match.  Instead, we went above and beyond and provided brand new blinds free of charge. 
  
  The account has a balance of $614.52.  
  
  Some of the issues you experienced on your job were self inflicted with custom requests.  These requests we thought were to your liking.  You made it very apparent they were not to your liking.  We then remade the countertops a second time free of charge to make you happy.  
  
  We offered $1,000 for your inconvenience and you would not accept this.  We are now closing this job in our system.
  

  Customer Answer

  Date: 05/09/2024

   I am rejecting this response because:  This is an misleading response.  First, there is only one Contract that I signed for the repairs on the condo that deals with the completion date, the week of 2/12/24.  There were 2 other adjustments to the contract that I am aware of, but those  had nothing to do with the timing of the completion of the project. They were related to costs with the insurance company but should have had no affect on the completion date. 

  Second their response to  the $1000 payment for the sofa skirt  fails to mention that  their  reimbursement  was contingent upon my withdrawing their  company review that I sent to Yelp.   I had sent other  reviews to other apps that were never mentioned in the discussion about the $1000.  To me,  that means that  PDR was just using the Yelp issue  to  avoid paying for the value of the  skirt damage caused by  a PDR employee(s) who carelessly mishandled my property.  My sleeper-sofa which is only 8 years old, looked like new because I do not rent my condo and only visit a few days each month.  Current prices would make it impossible for me to replace the sofa for one that cost $2450 on 9/19/15.  Big company PDR who refuses to reimburse an 86 year old senior for her damaged property that they know they are responsible for. They were there to see a heavy lounge chair that had been  dumped upside down into my sofa cushions as it stood next to the baseboard heater.  

  Third, The blinds were also damaged by PDR.  Someone likely tried to pull the curtains without opening them and the slats got caught  along the way.  Two slats where chipped off at the top and the blinds would not return to the wall.  Project mgr. said he found a wire on the top track that kept it from the wall, and he left it on my table to show me, It was not a "wire." My own research showed it was a C-clip that is used to keep  carriers in place on vertical blinds. So there is still damage to my blinds that has not been addressed.  Project mgr. was looking for a replacement for the slats, but when he couldn't find any, he went to Home Depot and replaced MY personal property custom blinds with cheap blinds of HIS choice. He never even contacted me to ask my permission or give me a choice of the replacement.  There is no valance to match and my old valance  is now being used above these very different, and cheaper, slats. 

  Fourth,  as for the countertop, it was NOT measured in the condo.  It was measured in the possession of PDR.  I have several text messages from the project mgr that frankly lied about the progress of the countertop laminate.  To prove that PDR was beginning the project on time, on 1/22/24 my kitchen was completely cleaned out, cabinets, countertop, carpet,  The microwave was dumped on top of the refrigerator.  The condo was essentially unusable.  It was not until 2/2/24 that I was allowed to go to the showroom where I expected to be able to choose my cabinets, countertop, and carpet.  All I got to see was carpet. That still remains an issue for me. However, there were no pictures or actual samples of cabinet doors, and nothing had been done to investigate the laminate samples that I had left  at my condo on 1/21/23 when I had cleaned out the cabinets and took things out of the way for workers.  There was no further progress in ordering cabinets until 2/10/24 which was a week away from the completion date stated in the contract. Essentially, there was NOTHING done in my condo from 1/22/24 till around 2/10/24.  And as for the measuring, I requested a 1 inch longer spot were the countertop meets the stove,  If that was going to cost more money, then I should have been notified.  I never was, and anyway the 1 inch was actually mistakenly made into 2 inches and the long part of the countertop was 4-5 inches too long and interfered with entry into the living room.  These errors were distinctly PDR errors, and had nothing to do with the 1 inch I had asked for that turned into 2 inches.  Someone at PDR  needs a better ruler.

  There is so much more, but the real reason for the delay in completing the job is that the project mgr was "learning" as I was told by his boss. For proof,  I have many text messages where he mislead me constantly about what was being done.  Then it wasn't done.  Then he would set another completion date  that never materialized. That big learning  issue, coupled with the fact that I am an older senior citizen who doesn't live at the condo, meant to PDR that I was the most unlikely person to complain about anything and so my project was pushed aside, filled with frustration, damage, and  delay after delay.  PDR' is determined to do nothing to reimburse me for the delay, or at least reimburse me reasonably for the skirt and the cheap, inferior blinds that I hate, but now hang in my condo with a mismatched valance.  The project managing  level of the PDR employees is telling modified stories about the delay and the damages to the management.  That is the only reason I can see why all these issues that any customer would be subject to would be ignored by a major company, especially a major company that would withhold any reimbursement  until  the customer withdraws a true review from the public, .

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

  Business Response

  Date: 05/09/2024

  The original offer was $500 for the blemish on the sofa skirting.  The customer said that was not enough money and she wanted more.  I then offered $1,000 with no strings attached from myself as written in the email.  We are speculating the blemish and the slats were damaged by Paul Davis.  We have attempted to make the customer happy but we do not believe this is possible.

   

  We have now installed two countertops, replaced the vertical blinds, hired ******* ******* to do a blemish removal, and offered $1,000.

   

  I say the customer leaves all of her bad reviews and accepts the $1,000.

  Business Response

  Date: 05/13/2024

  We can not continue to go back and forth regarding this.  

  No body knows when you skirting blemish or the blind damaged occurred.

  I put no strings attached to your $1,000 credit.

  You told me you wanted enough money $3,000 to replace both your sofa and matching chair, I told you no.  

  I will gladly pay you $1,500 to stop all communication.

  We have consecutive documentation to the 26 contract revisions.  We have sent over a contract and draw terms for each.  I will have Tracy go over these if you wish.