AAA TIMBERLINE INC

Service Provider Response

My name is Marc Gagne. I am the owner and General Manager of AAA Timberline Inc. and have operated my company in Western New York for 39 years. We are A+ Members of the BBB of Western New York, The Home Improvement Council of Western New York, The Chimney Safety Institute of America, The National Fireplace Institute, The National and New York State Chimney Guild's and The Buffalo Claims Adjusters Association. I will address each of customer's concerns as follows: 1.) Description Of Work: Insurance claim. Company was hired to repair/replace masonry and mantle/columns. Yes, the customer hired us to inspect and compile a repair estimate of the water damage that we observed. 2.) Their contract is not in the customer's best interest. The following is the standard contract that we use with NO fine print: Upon acceptance, this proposal must be signed and returned with a $000.00 deposit. A payment of $000.00 will be due on completion of the first day’s work. A $000.00 payment will be due after the brick face has been installed with the balance due on the day we complete your work. This proposal is for completing the job as described above or on the previous pages. Any alteration or deviation from the above specifications will become an additional charge over and above the original estimate. All agreements are contingent upon strikes, accidents or delays beyond our control. There will be no deposit refunds on special order items. Purchaser agrees to pay for all costs for collections, including attorney’s fees. We may withdraw this proposal, if not accepted within 10 days. *This proposal does not include any priming, painting, wallpapering or repairs to any concealed damage that is not visible or readily accessible. TOTAL: $________ COST OF WORK OUTLINED ON PAGE 2. - DEPOSIT: $________ CHECK NUMBER: _____________________ DATE: ______________ $________ BALANCE DUE AS PER THE PAYMENT OUTLINE ABOVE Acceptance of proposal: The prices, specifications and conditions are satisfactory and hereby accepted. You are authorized to do the work as specified. Payments will be made as outlined above. SIGNATURE: X ________________________________________ DATE: ______________ Please sign and return a copy of this page with your deposit. We will call you as we are approaching your name on the work calendar, so we can arrange a tentative date for your work. If you have specific dates that the work must be completed by or if there are days or dates that will not be convenient to have this work completed, please indicate your needs on the line below. This contract was given to this customer and she signed it before the work started. If she didn't like the way it read, she should not have signed it and addressed her concerns to us at the time. 3.) My mantle is nothing like the one removed. Yes, she is correct and we did make a mistake regarding that aspect of the job, however we did give her the option to have us either install a replica of the existing mantle that was there or we would install a different mantle and make up for the inconvenience with monetary refund. She decided on the later. 4.) The masonry work was never cleaned or sealed. Woodwork that was removed was not replaced; thus, the work was unfinished. This customer selected a stone face as opposed to the brick face that was originally outlined in the proposal. We installed the stone face at no additional charge. The stone she decided on does not require cleaning as brickwork does. We found additional water damage to the drywall behind the brickwork of the fireplace that extended up to the ceiling and behind the wood coping trim. We completed the additional repairs to the drywall for no additional charge and we told her that the coping woodwork at the ceiling would have to be repaired. It was not in our contract to do that work. 5.) The employees were rude. Highly disappointed. On 12/18/14 This same customer gave us a Angie's List Review previous to signing a contract with us. She gave us straight A's except for one item, price, which she gave us a "C". She gave us an Overall rating as a "C" even though she gave us 3 A's. It pretty obvious to me that she was not pleased with the price quote and disregarded the A ratings she gave us. I believe a large part of her decision to discredit our company was based on price. Member Comments: Awful. In the future, I will ensure a contract serves my needs - not the contractors. Contractor Comments: A good contract is beneficial for both the homeowner and the contractor. Contracts are written to protect both. If you read the overall majority of the reviews on Angie's list, the BBB and on our website [hyperlink removed], you will see that over the past 39 years in business, the great majority of customers we serve have been extremely satisfied. However, although we try, we cannot please everyone. My apologies go out to this customer for not delivering her the service that she expected, because we certainly tried. It is always our intent to serve all of our customers with respect and professionalism on each and every job we complete. Thank you Angie's List Members for allowing me to respond. Marc Gagne

Service Provider Response

Angie's List Members, I’d like to clear up some confusion with Angie’s List members regarding this complaint. First and foremost I want to let everyone know that I took pictures of this chimney as I do all of the chimneys we repair. I take those pictures to have a record so that the crew chiefs of our company can review the repair estimate and the photos to determine what type of scaffolding and rigging they will need to complete the job. After completing a thorough evaluation of the chimney from the attic to the basement I discussed the repair options with Ms. Dixon. Since I determined that the chimney was not being used I explained that she has more than one repair option. I explained that the chimney was not plumb and that if she would like us to fix it so it was plumb, we would have to dismantle and rebuild it. Since the chimney was not being used, I explained that the cost to rebuild it wouldn't make sense if she was not using the chimney. I offered another repair option, which was to repoint the chimney to make it sound and remove and replace any bricks that were loose. Since I was unable to get to the top of the chimney to actually feel if the bricks were loose, I told her that we would remove and reinstall and loose bricks if there were some present as we always do. The reason why I couldn't go to the top of the chimney to feel if the bricks were loose is because it would have required a 40' ladder and 2 men to get to the top of the chimney and if I felt it was necessary I would have told her that that's what should have been done. My 37 years of experience told me that this wasn't required to give her an accurate estimate and it was accurate to the penny. It turns out that there were no loose bricks, just large gaps between the mortar joints, which are 4" thick. We ground back the crumbling mortar on each and every horizontal and vertical mortar joint of the chimney by approximately 1/2 inch in order to create a sound surface for the new waterproof mortar to adhere to the brick work and the original mortar. This is exactly how it was written in the estimate and that is exactly how it was completed on the job. In the afternoon when the technicians were nearing completion Ms. Dixon called and told our office manager that we twisted her chimney while we were repairing it. I immediately called Ms. Dixon and told her that her chimney had a twist in it and I have pictures to prove it. Ms. Dixon's chimney above the roofline weighs in excess of 1 ton/2000 lbs. and each one of those over 200 brick and internal flue liners have been mortared together for almost 100 years. In order for us to make the chimney twist we would have to move it in that pattern and there is no way 3 men or 10 men could twist the chimney without it breaking into pieces. I recommended that the chimney be strengthened not straightened, made watertight by repointing and waterproofing, which is exactly what we did. Since it is not being used I also recommended that another option for repair would be to dismantle it and roof over the opening. I never said we could straighten it out, because I knew that it could not be done and there is no way I would try to create controversy with my customers. Thank you for taking the time to read my rebuttal. Respectfully Marc A. Gagne General Manager AAA Timberline Inc.

Service Provider Response

Good morning [member name removed], I spoke with [member name removed] who contacted me on your behalf on 12/23 regarding the problems you were experiencing with our service. I explained to her that our offices would be closed for many days during the upcoming holidays and I also told her that I would be in touch with her or you after the holidays to make an appointment to come out to inspect the work that we completed for you and address your concerns. If you could provide me with a written list of your specific concerns when I arrive, I will address each one individually in a written report to you after I have gathered facts from the work I inspect at your home and from the technicians that completed the work, including the estimator that provided you with the repair proposal. Please accept my apologies for any inconvenience that we may have caused you. Marc A. Gagne' General Manager AAA Timberline Inc.

Service Provider Response

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Service Provider Response

Dear Customer, [member name removed] I’d like to clear up some confusion with Angie’s List members and your complaint. First, I’d like the members to know that we did no repair work for you. Second, the $13,000.00 dollar quote our technician discussed with you was a verbal “ball park” quote to address the multitude of problems, both safety and structural, that exist in your fireplace and chimney, that you asked us to inspect. The fireplace and its chimney was examined on both the exterior and the interior by a 14 year experienced, bonded, licensed and insured technician employed by my company, AAA Timberline Inc.. He also used a closed circuit, video inspection camera to determine the condition of the fireplace and chimney in internal areas where viewing it with the human eye is not possible. Based on his experienced, he gave you the verbal quote you requested, for purposes of comparison. He did not put that quote in writing, it was just a quote to give you an answer to your question. He also told you that there were other options to repairing your chimney. He mentioned another repair that would correct the leak problem you were experiencing and we did provide you a written quote to complete that work in the amount of $3384.00. I would like to think that you chose AAA Timberline Inc. to inspect your chimney based on the fact that more than 25 Angie’s List members, we did complete work for, gave us an A rating. When I started the company 36 years ago I’ve strived to provide a quality product and service to all those customers we deal with. I’d like to think that we could satisfy each and every one of our customers to give us an A rating, but we all know that’s not possible, but yet we try with each and every customer to give them an A rating experience. In an effort to try to resolve your complaint, I would like to find out answers to the following questions. You have said in your negative review of our company, that you had a company fix your chimney at one tenth of the price of our “ball park” quote of $13,000.00. My question is that do you believe that the person who fixed your chimney for $1300.00 did the same amount of work that our technician told you that we would complete for $13,000.00? Because that is exactly what you have said! If indeed this company did tear the entire chimney down and rebuilt it for $1300.00, I will gladly write a check to you for $1300.00, because you would certainly be correct in saying that we were trying to rip you off. If you are saying that you had some other type of work was completed for $1300.00 dollars, I would ask you to tell me if he completed an internal video inspection of the chimney and fireplace and also I would like to know the level of his experience in this field of work. Is the company that did the work for you show you their license, are they bonded and insured and do they have 25 positive reviews on Angie’s List, are they a member of The Better Business Bureau, The National Chimney Guild, The Chimney Safety Institute of America, The New York Chimney Guild, The National Fireplace Institute of America, The Western New York Fire Marshals and The Home Improvement Council of Western New York? Did he provide a building permit and a certificate of insurance to you before he started the repair work? Most important of all, can you share with me the scope of work that he completed for you. If so, I will provide to you a written estimate with a similar work scope and then you can compare our quote to his. That would be an accurate way to compare prices and compare apples to apples. All I’m asking for is the opportunity to prove to Angie’s List Members is that your assessment of my company is totally inaccurate and we do not “rip off” our customers. We have honestly and conscientiously delivered a quality product and service in Western New York for the past 36 years and will continue to do so for many years to come. I cordially invite your response and I thank Angie’s list for allowing me to respond to your comments. Respectfully, Marc A. Gagné General Manager and President AAA Timberline Inc.