Bad quality, impossible to get hold of. Warranty not provided.
In December of 2017 I had a raccoon breaking into a side attic of my house. The raccoon had ripped a cover from one of the vents, however I have managed to drive the raccoon away from the attic. I needed to raccoon-proof my 2 roof vents (one broken by raccoon and one still untouched but at danger of also being broken). A friend of mine used the GTA Complete Wildlife Services just a week prior to that and recommended me to call Alex. Alex did a great sales pitch over the phone and quoted a reasonable price for fixing the broken roof vent and raccoon-proofing the second vents - together for $160. This is a lower than usual price because Alex did not need to install the one-way trap door and be responsible for driving away the raccoon. The next morning (Dec 11th) Alex and another (much older) gentleman have shown up and were in-and-out within an hour swiftly taking cash and leaving me with a 5 year warranty paper. No safety ropes were used and all the work was done by the older gentleman in a great rush.
This was where the reality check had started. Unlike most of Alex's customers, I did have a direct view of the vents from my windows and did not have to trust the sales pitch to see the results. The work was done in such a haste that the screws were attached without removing newspaper that was taped to the broken vent to verify that the raccoon did not re-enter the attic (see the photos below). The broken vent cover was simply dropped into its place and not attached to anything and ready for a next raccoon or other animal to simply lift it. But even worse - it did not provide any ventilation for the attic since there was no air gap between the roof and the cover. Not having air gap increases humidity in the attic and can lead to much worse consequences for the attic than raccoon.
From the photos you can see the difference in the gap and how it affected the snow - where the good vent had a gap, it provided ventilation and snow did not build up. Where there was no gap, snow immediately covered the vent. You can also see a piece of newspaper being screwed into the roof - a stylish signature of Alex's team.
Now the worst part of this ordeal was communicating with Alex. I have discovered the issues with installation the very next day (Dec 12th) after the work was done by Alex and his companion. It took me a week of calling, leaving voice messages and texting Alex before I managed to get hold of him. He would either not pick up the phone or (when I called from a different phone number) tell me that he is very busy and would call me back later (which he never did). Finally, I managed to get hold of him on Dec 18th and explained the situation. Alex asked me to send him photos, which I did the same day (the first three photos below). Three more days passed without Alex getting back to me. On Dec 21st I called Alex and he texted me promising to call back and never did.
Few more weeks of chasing Alex and he has agreed to re-install the broken vent when I buy it.
Alex's messages were getting increasingly rude, eventually he texted me this: "you have not been polite or nice about this hole (Alex's grammar) situation for me to consider fixing it for free".
At this point I had enough of chasing done and even more importantly had zero confidence that Alex would do a half decent job fixing it. I have sent him a message that he is fired from this job.
An additional important detail: a friend of mine (R from Brampton) had a raccoon re-entering his home few weeks after Alex "fixed" the vents. Needless to say he had no luck getting hold of Alex to provide warranty.
UPDATE (19 Feb 2018):
Alex had time to provide a response to this review, however did not have time to comment on the facts or the photos. Grammar has nothing to do with this review or work performed. Warping facts does. Alex did not argue any of the facts or photos, however focused on imagined discrimination instead. I have added a screenshot of Alex's text message to prove that Alex is not admitting the truth even about his grammar.
- Approximate cost of services:
- $160.00
- Company Response
PLEASE READ. PLEASE READ.
I agreed to fix the problem even though it wasn't my fault but he refused it. I have proof.
Hello to all who is reading this review.
I have all of our recorded conversation to show you that we did nothing wrong, but I don't wanna take your time. But I will tell you this to decide.To my client, I wish you the best in life. I sincerely do.
But I'm sorry to say that your discrimination and prejudice is not called for. You are lying again but this time to everyone and not just me.If I can push your attention to 2 details of my clients so called story of what happened you'll realize what personality my client had and what I had to deal with.
1. "Alex and another ( MUCH OLDER ) gentle man"
He is our field supervisor and his 41 :)
Besides what does that matter to him?
I smell discrimination here. That says a lot about someone, doesn't it people?2. "You have not been nice about this hole situation
( ALEX'S GRAMMAR )"
I did spell it right, (whole) but I don't know what his saying. But even if I did, it's so low of someone to wanna put me down because of a spelling mistake. Feel a hint of discrimination again.If you read our other reviews you'll see that we have tried our best to be the best our clients expect.