Jackson F.
10/05/2015 12:00:00 SA
I am struggling between 3 and 4 stars. I had what some would call a very bad experience, but they do have some great people working there that made things right. I heard about the AZ Painting Company through KTAR. My house was going to be free of people during a 3 week period, so a perfect time to get the interior painted. I called up on Wed afternoon, the salesman said they were booked, but would check to see if an HOA job fell through, as that is common. That was the case, but they would need to start on my house the following Mon.
While most of the house was being painted, the largest room was not (& 1 bedroom, half dining room), as it would take the longest, is the least used, and would be the most expensive. I confirmed on the phone twice that the price that would be on my invoice would not be the price I paid due to this room not being painted, and that it would be a good chunk off of the painting job total. It was recommended that I immediately get in touch with their color coordinator they use to pick the colors. I was told that when they came out, they would take pictures and show what was being painted & what was not, and that would help determine how much off the total house estimate would be without the largest room painted. When the color coordinator arrived though, they said they had no idea how the pricing works, that they don't measure anything out for the painters, that is normally done by someone at the company. She was just a consultant (very good at her job I might say). This was Friday.
Due to the timing, no one from AZ Painting had time to come themselves and survey my house for an estimate. This I understand, as generally you take the sale first, & figure out the details later. (Key part is the company figuring out the details, not the customer, but more on that later.)
So late on Friday or over the weekend, she gave her information to the company who then gave it to the painters that arrived. Travis was the main painter, along with others that showed up to help afterward. Travis did a great job and understands paint. He has come back once afterwards for touch-ups (Will need him once more as I noticed a couple other places). Travis is honest, hard working, and gets the job done.
The painting took longer than expected (was supposed to be done Thurs, went to Fri, and then Travis had to spend the whole day Sat finishing up).
I noticed it was odd that when I came back the first day during lunch to check up on things, the helpers were only just arriving. (They should have been there earlier to help Travis.) I also noticed that I had left cash, and a checkbook out on my office table (I know, silly me) that first day, and that night, I put them away in a sealed bag for my own peace of mind, but still on the desk.
Any way, once everything was painted, and the plastic taken off, I noticed a light dusting of dried paint on.... well pretty much everything. It seemed to have gotten everywhere. Even under the plastic in some cases. Needless to say, instead of having my entire house put together when everyone got home after the 3 weeks, I instead was cleaning every square inch of the house for the next 3 weeks (including after the family was back). As you could imagine, that was pretty frustrating.
The next week after the job was completed, I contacted the salesman again to get the cost of the job minus the large room. They said they contacted the boss, who then said that the invoice was correct (even though it was established earlier that it was not) and that there would be no discount. I asked if they were sure about this, since we DID have that earlier discussion, and was told via text by the salesman that my price was for a 2 story job, and that a 1 story home had different pricing (makes no sense, two different stories now). Either way, poor communication of a poor excuse for bad news.
When the very nice and helpful employee at the Arizona Painting Company contacted me to see how things went and regarding the charging of the rest, I explained this whole story to them and they also felt that there must have been an error on their end, and the next day, let me know that my charges were reduced. I shouldn't have had to go through all that though.
Back to that cash... so I had 3 rolls, with specific amounts (fantasy football league), and when I went to check, they weren't in rolls anymore, they were all messed up, and of course, money was missing. I let them know, they apologized, and said that they had dismissed those employees during my house, which was their first job, which they were terrible at (but good at stealing). Also stole my checkbook, which I had to cancel.
AZ Painting refunded me that stolen amount, but I even offered to have them survey the house after the fact to see how much to take off, and I shouldn't have had to do so much on my end to get to the agreement that I was told twice via the phone. Still, the finished product looks nice.