My family moved to Rothesay, New Brunswick in July 2018. Our new home required a kitchen renovation and after hearing so much about the Irving group and its patronage in the local community, we selected Kent for our kitchen renovation & window blinds. The work was scheduled to be completed in Sept 2018.
Only after we agreed to the work and signed the contract, they told us that they needed 100% advance payment to start the project as this was their 'normal business practice' for home renovation projects. This was never mentioned during our meetings for the measurements and material selection, nor was this indicated in their contract. Having moved all over the world for our work, we've done many home renovation projects and have never been asked for full payment, usually a deposit or series of deposits. Since we had now committed, and wanted to get started immediately, we paid the full contract in advance for the Kitchen work.
They removed the existing kitchen counter, and as per their schedule, the granite was to be installed the next day. After removing the counter, they called me to inform me that their General Manager (GM) & Vice President (VP) from their Saint John head office had instructed them to stop the work. When we inquired as to why the project was stalled before it even started, they told us that despite paying the full balance of the kitchen reno, we had not paid for the granite counter in advance and they would not proceed until it was paid in full. Again, we were not informed that we had to provide a separate, full, payment for our Granite counter install. They refused to accept a deposit and ceased all work. They effectively held my family hostage with no functioning kitchen at home. What were we to do now?
When I pushed for answers, they could not give a satisfactory reply on the 100% advance payment. They sent me a generic letter from their GM & VP which did not explain why they did not include a clause for 100% advance payment in the contract, only that to proceed we had to provide full payment. We relented and paid the full invoice for the granite and hoped for the best.
Once the work started we found several mistakes in measurements, in both the upper and lower kitchen cabinets. The doors to the cabinets were not sized correctly. Floor tiles were damaged during the install. The most shocking was the kitchen cooking range and kitchen range hood were off center from one another by 5 inches. They looked ridiculous.
It became clear that their Kitchen expert had made numerous mistakes in the measurements and in the drawings, but she refused to accept responsibility, unfortunately, blaming their contractors for all the mistakes. We had to step in to clarify that it was not their contractor at fault, but the Kent kitchen expert who kept covering her tracks with misleading her management team.
Once that was rectified, they tried to stick us with the cost for fixing their mistakes, telling us we had to pay to correct their errors in measurement and the damage they caused. We were incensed. Being new to the community, we had selected Kent because we wanted to work with an established company who claimed to stand by their quality of service commitment, and we were coming to realize, we were misled.
When I insisted that they correct their mistakes and prioritize the work because we were now weeks without a kitchen, I was told by the GM & VP that I was being an unreasonable customer, that the value of my kitchen contract was only $10,000.00, and that they did not have time to deal with this.
Unfortunately, the GM & VP of KENT head office, and their staff, used corporate bullying tactics. We were even informed that we had no recourse and not to bother going to the media because their parent company owned or advertised with most of the media outlets. Due to the large scale of their operation and dominance in the region, they believe they can continue disregarding customers in this way.
After working and living in Europe, Middle East, Africa, Asia and Toronto, I can say that we had the worst customer experience of our lives with Kent in Saint John: there was no regard given to the inconvenience, loss of time and two and a half month delay to our projected completion date, compounded by the stress they created for my wife and I by their insistence that they were not responsible for their mistakes. Never once did anyone take into consideration how we as clients were made to feel during this process - insignificant, devalued and helpless - nor the disruption to our lives.
In the end, and after much stress, they corrected the mistakes by Dec.11.2018.
I am compelled to share our experience with others to make them aware of their dubious business practices, insisting on full payment while only giving partial attention to detail, commitments and customer service. read more
