If I could give negative stars, I would. I have worked with many contractors to do jobs and this is far and away my worst experience and really one of my only bad ones. I would recommend working with anyone else at twice the price. I am not a contractor, but I am reasonably knowledgeable for a homeowner.
With most contractors, you sit down and talk through all the details, sign all the contracts, then pay your down payment. If there is significant design that needs to be done, you might pay a partial down payment prior to that happening, but only enough to cover that design work.
With Paramount Granite (PG), they come out and measure and give you an estimate. You pay 50% down, which is non-refundable. The issue is that THEN they start giving you lots of legal paperwork to sign. If they wreck your walls - not their fault (they did do damage to our drywall that needed repair). If they damage your cabinets - not their fault (we have a couple big scratches in ours). I review lots of legal documents for my work. PG's documents are very one-sided. If I had seen those before paying the deposit, I'd have gone elsewhere.
There is no sit-down discussion, just a pile of forms to sign, some of which require you to provide design details. Where most contractors sit down and say "based on our experience, here are your options and my recommendation," PG just asks you to fill them out and sign that if there are any errors, it's your fault. If you have questions, you can call. However, the person who answers the phone gives you an answer but is contradicted by even more forms that come later. When asked about that, the response is "Oh, those forms don't reflect our current process, they need to be changed." However you still have to sign them.
Then, after all the forms are done and the install is scheduled, you get an email with your receipt for your final invoice. Final payment is due at the time of install. Again, I never had to do this with much larger projects. We missed this requirement in the email (our fault), so we didn't expect it on the day of install. When they asked for payment, my wife said she wanted me to look at the install before we paid (because by this stage we had no trust in PG fixing something later). The installers said they were going to take the granite back out and leave us with no counters or plumbing if we didn't pay immediately. My panicked wife called me. (My wife should never by panicked by your business processes!) When I called customer service, they confirmed that is their policy. When I asked to speak to a supervisor, she indicated that she had worked there 11 years and he would say the same. Ultimately, I worked out a $500 holdback and paid the balance. Just left a really bad taste. We did pay the $500 after I inspected the work. The counters were fine, although there was damage to cabinets and drywall.
Overall, with the exception of Brian, the measurement tech, every interaction we had with them I would characterize as "unhelpful." With most contractors, I would say people go out of their way to make sure you have everything you need and are fully educated. With PG, they have your money and you can't leave, they seem to treat you accordingly.
Here are my recommendations to Paramount:
1) Know your customer - contractors and homeowners need a different level of communication in the process. Make your process reflect that difference.
2) Treat your customers with respect and trust and they will do the same. Your adversarial stance breeds the same.
3) For homeowners, have a sit-down discussion over the install details in person or even over the phone. Make them sign them when you're done, but don't make them guess at the answers and tell them it's their fault if they are wrong.
4) Train the people who answer the phone. She should not answer questions for which she doesn't know the answer. Instead of answering and being wrong, she should get someone knowledgeable on the phone or say "I don't know, let me find that answer and get back to you."
5) Make sure people know your final payment expectations BEFORE you schedule the install date. No communication about those payment expectations were made until after install was scheduled and I couldn't be home at that time.
Based on what I have seen elsewhere, I expect PGC to write a response saying this is a bogus review. It's a real review based on real experience. read more
