Overpriced
Unethical business practices and extremely poor…read morecommunication. I was quoted one price via text message. I later called to confirm the work and schedule a date, and they put me on the calendar for two Mondays in a row to hold my place. However, they never confirmed the details of the job or sent a contract. The Friday before the appointment, I called to ask whether we should reschedule since nothing had been finalized. They told me no and said we would sort everything out on Monday when they arrived.
On Monday, the handyman came, took measurements, and went to the store to purchase materials. When he returned, he handed me a tablet to sign. The price shown was more than three times the amount previously texted to me. I explained that this number had never been discussed and that the prior messages included a dollar amount followed by the word "total," so I reasonably believed that was the total project cost.
Instead of acknowledging the confusion, the owner said I should have known the original quote only covered materials and that labor would be billed separately at an hourly rate. They also said they couldn't return the materials and that I was causing them to lose an entire day of labor. The handman later told me that they actually could return the materials.
The owner then offered to waive the material cost if I paid only the labor rate. Even that was still double the quoted amount, but I felt stressed and pressured and really wanted the project completed, so I reluctantly agreed. I said I might only do a day abd a half of labor and finish the painting myself to save money.
They charged $150 per hour for labor for a very basic radiator cover project. After researching afterward, I realized hiring a professional carpenter would have actually been cheaper, yet I was provided with a handyman. The handman also spent 2.5 hours at the home depot buying materials and that counted as time worked so I paid $375 for the home depot visit despite it being under 10 minutes from our house and the materials being basic. It should have taken 45 minutes max.
Unfortunately, the work itself was also poorly executed. One radiator cover was specifically supposed to function as a seating bench. I showed the handyman exactly how far out I wanted it to extend, and he initially cut it correctly. Later, however, he cut significantly into it to push it farther into the window area, making it too short to function as a bench. This completely defeated the purpose of the project and reflected poor planning on his part.
Additionally, we verbally agreed that the radiator grille would be centered. Instead, the hole was cut too far to the right. The handyman acted like correcting it would be a major inconvenience and implied I would need to continue paying the hourly rate for the correction.
At this point, we have already spent significantly more than the original quoted amount and still do not have a completed project. The bench cannot function as a bench because it is too short, the hole for the grille placement looks uneven, and we are now left sanding, painting, and installing the grilles ourselves. The entire reason we hired a company was to avoid spending our own time doing this wok/the reason we wanted custom was so one could function as a seating bench and it is too short for that.
To make matters worse, the handyman openly complained about the company to me during the project. He stated that it is their standard business practice to surprise customers with pricing at the last minute and claimed the owners frequently agree to projects that are "impossible to deliver on." He also said the hourly rate they charge is unreasonable for the level of service provided and claimed they get away with it because "people in Montclair are willing to pay." He even implied that some of their online reviews may not be genuine.
Despite the owner promising they would follow up with me after the 2nd day of work, no one reached out.
