J-Services

I found Frank Garcia in a local Albuq'e advertiser.  He was polite, clean, well-mannered, and seemed reasonable priced.  The BBB showed no problems, and his website reviews were favorable.  He assured me he would install the water heater to code.  I wanted  to replace the dishwasher with cabinets, and told him he must lay tile partly underneath so no slab was exposed when the new cabinet went in.  I questioned him about laying new tile over the old vinyl tiles to save on cost, as I'd heard pros and cons about this.  Frank assured me this was no problem, but said he'd heat several floor tiles first to see how easily they came up.  I also questioned pulling up all baseboards, given the difficulty involved with exposed laundry room pipes that ran tightly along the baseboards.  Frank stated that running the new tile up to the baseboards would leave a small grout line that looked very professional.  He said the job would take 4 work days, Thursday Nov. 11 through Tuesday Nov. 16, and he'd start each day by 8:30-9:00.  I paid half up front, and Frank went with me to buy tiles, grout, mastic, and water heater.     

The first day he arrived on time and laid out tiles with spacers.  All lines were very straight, but I found he had not tried to scrape any of the old tiles up as promised.  He said they were so firmly stuck to the floor with age, he didn't need to.  I also noticed he was applying a small amount of grout on each tile back, rather than floating the tile.  He wasn't even covering the entire tile backs.  My kitchen floor was uneven, so this disturbed me, but Frank said tile was his specialty and he knew what he was doing.   When I also noticed uneven grout lines - some were deeper than others with bubbles or pockets -  I asked Frank to fill these in.  He seemed insulted and ignored me.

After day 1, Frank arrived anywhere from 11:00 to  2:00 and talked on the phone a lot.  This pushed him into the weekend, which worried him that this was taking too long for him to start his next job, so he brought a can of some kind of fixative to accelerate the grout drying, and sprayed this liberally.  When I asked about his tardiness, he belligerently said he was out drumming up other jobs. I really began wondering about his capabilities and casually asked what it takes to get a contractor's license nowadays.  I was stunned when he said he took a weekend course in Texas.  
 
When the tile was dry enough for my inspection, I discovered many uneven grout lines against the baseboards and along the kitchen cabinets; some were as much as 1-1/2 " from the baseboards, while others butted tightly against them.  The tiles against the carpet were also uneven; it was obvious the carpet would not fill in the gaps once it was rolled back down onto the carpet tack strip.  Behind the fridge, the water line had been grouted in and broke all the grout up when I moved the fridge.  Many tile cuts back here were really jagged, as much as 2" from the wall in places.  It was obvious Frank knew no one would see behind the fridge and stove and didn't care about his work here.  In almost every corner, grout was pushed up in globs.  Some grout throughout the rooms had a shiny, plastic-like texture which I assumed was where he'd used the fixative.  Worst of all, Frank had tiled the dishwasher completely in.  These tiles would have to be removed to pull the dishwasher out.  Also, I discovered the water heater was leaking at a plumbing seam.

To say this was a mess is an understatement.  I was sick and stopped payment on my check, then left Frank a message to bring his tile saw back Tuesday, his final day, to fix the problems.  Instead, he showed up about 3:00 demanding I pay him the balance.  "Just pay me what you owe me."  The job wasn't even complete, yet Frank became belligerent, telling me many people would be happy with this, and that I didn't understand how the tile saw works because it doesn't cut straight lines.  I've taken a tile class at Lowe's and have done small tile jobs myself so I know this is untrue.  Frank was unconcerned about the blobs of grout in corners, and insisted the shiny plastic look was my fault because I had bought the grout, even though he'd been with me when I bought all supplies at JC Tile. Regarding the dishwasher, Frank said it would be easy to pop the tiles out once I wanted to remove the dishwasher.  He seemed unconcerned about the dripping water heater pipe although water droplets had collected on top of the unit.  He was more about defending himself and attacking me than wanting to make anything right.

After a week and talking to an attorney, who recommended I pay for work done and just be done with Frank Garcia altogether, I wrote Frank another check to replace the first, but not the balance.  He agreed we were complete and I have not heard from him since.   Later I called in three tile setters for repair bids.  All were appalled at this shoddy work, and none could figure out what caused the shiny plastic grout.  Each suspected Frank used some kind of epoxy in the grout, because even the color is different, although Frank insisted he used only the grout I chose.  I also called several plumbing companies to check the water heater, Sunshine and Affordable.  They pointed out where it was not installed to code and confirmed the others' recommendations to add a flex line, put in new pipes where Frank had attached copper to steel, which I was told is a no-no, correct a valve, and some other things.   Affordable gave me a bid of $1000+ to resolve the issues.  The contractor I finally chose repaired both tile and water heater for much less, but had to pull up many pieces of tile and cut larger pieces next to the carpets so the slab floor wouldn't show.

I would never use J-Services again and advise your readers against using him.  He really doesn't know what he's doing and doesn't seem to care about the quality of his work.  Very sad, because if he had done a good job I'd have recommended him to everyone.  

When repaired, it looked like they did a good job. However, when we had a major snowstorm (12/16/2010), the skylight leaked about the same as it did before the repair. I have 2 complaints: (1) the repair did not fix the problem and (2) I have been unable, in 2 weeks of trying, to reach anyone from J-Services, and my calls have not been returned. (1) Didn't fix the problem: I know fixing roof leaks can be tough, so would be more understanding if they were available and came out to fix the problem. (2) I started calling on December 20 and have called at least 5 times since, the latest time this morning (1/4/2010), calling both the office phone and the cell phone. In all cases, I have gotten voice mail. I left several messages, but no one has called me back, much less fixed the problem.