Athens Custom Flooring,Inc.

Flooring was installed ok with some minor mistakes. After the job, they performed poorly in returning furniture and other items to their original locations. Some items were just ignored and left where they moved them others were haphazardly put in the general location but not neatly. They left wood scraps and pad trimmings all over the drive way and sawdust throughout the house. They knocked the glass out of a cabinet door and did not even acknowledge it. They removed the anti tilt bracket from the new gas range and never replaced it, When I called the office about it, they said the owner would call me back. He never has called. We had to order and intall the bracket ourselves and get the range reinspected.

Carlos is a good guy, but once I agreed to the contract, he was never seen again.  Spoke to him on the phone several times, to clarify details about the job.  His workers arrived (not subcontractors) and suddenly they attempted to change the scope of work and cut corners.  For instance, the foreman stated he would not pull out the oven or fridge to change the tiles underneath.  Instead, he'd start the new tile just a few inches behind the fridge and stove face.  I was forced to call Carlos and "fix" the situation.

The foreman and crew liked to mock me in Spanish.  I know a little, since I work with lots of Customs and Border Protection / U.S. Border Patrol agents, and I had 2 years of Spanish in high school.  But, once they have your floor torn up, the last thing a person wants to do is fight with the folks who are contracted to fix it.  I felt trapped in a very unprofessional, uncomfortable situation.

The foreman rarely arrived on time.  His excuses were:

1. "I have to go pick up one of the workers in Virginia Beach."  Apparently, they didn't feel the need to get to my house at 0900, they start gathering people and supplies at 0900.  One of their trio got to my house at about 0900, but worked alone for several hours a day.

2. "I'm going to pick up the tiles on the way to your house.  Loading the van at the tile shop will take time..."  Apparently, supplies aren't gathered prior to commencing a job.

3. "I need to go to the hardware store."  He didn't have the right spacer sizes to lay the tile. Incidentally, he asked if I wanted 1/8 or 1/16 spaces between the tiles, and when I said I wanted 1/16th, he said he couldn't do it.  Really?  Why bother asking then?

When it was time to grout, the foreman asked, "What color grout do you want?"  When I asked him to show me the color palette, he said, "I'll drive back to the shop to get it."  I stopped him before he could leave again, and called their showroom.  I asked the salesperson to simply pick a good color match for the tiles I'd selected and make sure the foreman had the bags of grout when he departed the shop the next morning. 

I know and understand that flooring jobs are tough, considering you never know what the subfloor looks like until the original floor starts getting torn up.  But a job that was quoted as taking 2-3 days ended up taking 5 days, Wednesday through Sunday. I firmly believe it'd have taken only 3 days if all three workers had been there from 0900-1630; a standard workday with travel times incorporated.  

They couldn't or wouldn't match the quarter-round in the kitchen to the pieces they removed. I was not told of this before they ripped the old stuff out.  I was forced to settle for quarter-round kinda like what was there before. Same situation in the hallway.  Initially, the foreman didn't want to paint the hallway quarter-round the same semi-gloss white to match the ones they removed.  I handed him a quart of matching paint and said, "I require this quarter-round to match."  A person can only make so many concessions.

Finally, though they did removed the gas stove to tile underneath it - as was the original plan - they refused to hook it back up, saying that they were uncomfortable working with gas lines.  Ok. I get it.  An honestly, if they're not certified to reattach it, I'd rather not risk an explosion.  However, I was never told that I'd have to contract someone else to come back out and hook up the line, which cost an additional $95.00. 

In the end, the floor looks nice, I'll give Athens Flooring that much.  And, if all of Carlos's employees could be as professional as he is, it'd be a fantastic company.  In a way, I feel bad for Carlos, because the man obviously worked really hard to achieve success.  I hope he takes a good look at what his employees are doing to his business.  

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Carlos and his team at Athens Flooring were very professional, patient, and incredibly articulate with their work on our new floors.  They were very  helpful in all the questions we had.  They all took pride in their work and prepping for each job.  We had just recently had a very bad experience at our main residence with a new flooring being installed by another large contractor (Jenkins) and had one issue after another.  I would recommend Athens to anyone in the future and hope to use Carlos and his team again in the near future

The flooring was purchased at Lumber Liquidators in Hampton, who also recommended Athens Flooring (which I greatly appreciate).  I called Athens for an estimate and Shushana just happened to be in my area that day (a Friday) so she fit me in and came over that same day.  The estimate took about 15 and in that time she had measured the areas and gave me the run down on what would go on for the installation.  She said that the estimate would be emailed to me when she got back to the office.  The next week I received an email from Anna with the estimate and a materials list of what would be needed.  She took care of scheduling everything to meet our needs.  Another thing that Athen's did was pick up the flooring materials when they arrived at Lumber Liquidators and deliver them to our home so they could acclimate to the environment properly.  That was great since I had no way to move 24 boxes of laminate flooring!
On installation day, Andrew and Miguel arrived and started right to work.  They put down flooring protection between the work site and the location where the materials were stored and the garage (which is how they got outside to do the cutting).  They immediately started removing the old flooring materials and prepping for the flooring installation.  The furniture that we have in our bedroom is extremely heavy and is not easy to move but they managed to do it (I could hear them being "challenged" from the other room).  Since they couldn't get the furniture out of the room they did one half at a time.  When the old carpet and flooring materials were removed, they checked to make sure the subfloor was ok to install the laminate.  They found that our subfloor was not level in a number of areas and were concerned that the flooring would "give" in low areas and that we would see it move.  They said that if necessary, they could use self leveler but it would mean that he job would take 2 days to allow it to dry, and then there was the issue of not being able to get the to the whole floor at one time due to the furniture.  They wanted us to be happy with the end result, so they made sure that they explained it all to us.  I really appreciated that they told us and gave us options rather than just installing the floor and not telling us.  We chose to have them just continue because we felt that once the flooring was all installed and connected that the impact would be negligible.  They continued the installation I don't recall how long it took, but I do remember that it wasn't as long as I thought it would take.
Andrew made sure that the furniture was all back in the right place and then thoroughly cleaned the floor.   They completely cleaned up after themselves and it never even looked like they were there except that the floors were different.  The floor is beautiful and we did not see any of the movement that they were concerned about. Andrew explained the care and cleaning of the floor and showed me the leftover materials and even recommended that I return the unused transition piece to the store.  
This was one of the easiest "construction" type of jobs that we have ever experienced.  From the estimate (Shushauna), to the scheduling and coordinating (Anna) to the delivery and final installation (Andrew and Miguel), there is not one thing that I can even think to complain about.  One of the best things was that they CLEANED UP AFTER THEMSELVES!  I can't even count how many contractors have come to do work for me that just "pick up" but still leave their mess for us to deal with.  Not this crew!  They were all very courteous, respectful of our home and just all around nice people.  Professional in every way.  And the price is excellent for the high quality work that they do.  I just wish I had more flooring to replace just so I can call them to come back!  Well, you never know, but if I ever do have flooring to install, I will be calling Athen's Custom Flooring.  Thanks Carlos, for having such a great team.

Very responsive company and professional but their quality was poor. They pre-cut the planks to a series of the same length and layed them so that a clear pattern formed on the floor. Quick and efficient for them but that is exactly how it looked - quickly done. Not professional. They also layed it with the surface too uneven even though I asked them to level it if needed. I had them pull up the flooring twice during the process. Once to fix the pattern and later again to lay down leveling compound because things were bouncing around when you walked by in 2 rooms. The result was them is still in the middle of laying the floor and rushing to finish while my movers were carrying in furniture and boxes and thus sloppy finishing caulk and trim work.

Carlos personally replaced the stairs. This involved custom fitting the pieces, which was time consuming but the results were very good. Very satisfied with the results.

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They were always on time, courteous, pleasant and professional. I was pleased with the finished product.

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The service was decent. This was the first time I used this company and overall it was a pretty good job.

The workers were professional and courteous (which included the owner of the business who was on the job the entire time).They completed the work in two days and I was very pleased with the results.

Overall experience is excellent. From start to finish Athens crews conducted themselves in a very professional way. Starting with Carlos, he did the measurements and explained all the installation process as well as the installation warranty. I was very impressed in his professionalism. Shaushana and Anna were very responsive, helpful, and patient when answering all our questions and concerns.
During installation, Hugo and his crew were punctual, responsive and show good professionalism. We did have a little misunderstanding during installation. We live in the townhouse community, and we would like to ensure that during the construction that the noise that were generated due to construction would not disturb other neighbors. So we asked that they worked between 9am to 5:30pm. One time that the crew work passed that 5:30pm because they thought they could finish up; however it ended up longer than they were expected. When I came to the house around 6:30pm, I was surprise that they still working. However, after I explain to Hugo the reason why I limited the work only to 5:30pm, he understood and apologized for the misunderstanding. We never had any incident after that.
Juan did the installation of the stairs, railing and balusters. He did a great job with them. We have two little boys, and the previous balusters installation were done in a rush and were not sturdy enough. Juan installed the balusters, so they are strongly attached to the railing and the base. I feel safer with the way they were installed.
Finally, the crew did a good job cleaning up their work area. We performed the final walkthrough with Carlos, and we noticed little damage on the wall. He said that he would come back to fixed the damage. Like I said earlier, I was very impressed with the way Athens personnel conducted their business. I highly recommend their services.

Everything went smooth as silk from the beginning dealing with Anna, to Dennis doing the initial measuring and right through to the end of the job with Carlos and his entire crew. 
Athens showed up on time.  Carlos (the owner) explained the process, moisture readings, taking up the vinyl, installing the bamboo, etc.  His crew walked in the door and immediately got to work.  Everyone seemed to have specific jobs and there was no confusion or dilly dallying.  I was amazed at the care they took not to mark or scuff the newly painted walls!
When the work was completed, the men cleaned up everything and hand wiped/polished the floors.
Great company, great crew, very well managed!  The floors lookfantastic!
And yes, I will absolutely use Athens Custom Flooring again for other jobs.

Company has excellent customer service!  I had over 1,000 sq.ft. of wall-to-wall carpeting removed, slab was cleaned & sealed, flooring installed - no muss, no fuss, no hassle!  Great product choices, and I felt like I had friends working in my house - they really cared about what they were doing!

Excellent

The job itself was average, but the customer service was horrible.  The gentleman that was sent to complete the job was never on time.  He was always somewhere between 30 minutes to 45 minutes late.  On the last dayof the job he showed up two hours late.  I called the company to find out where he was and I was told they couldn't reach him, which is an unacceptable answer to me.  When he finally showed up, I confronted him about his tardiness and he actually laughed in my face.  I dealt with him and then called the office to speak with the owner of the company.  The owner apologized and said he would come out to my house within 30 minutes to deal with it.  Once an hour passed, I called yet again to find out where the owner was and was told he was stuck in traffic.  Again, unacceptable; I understand traffic happens but he should have called me from the road to let me know.  He also showed up two hours late.  To add insult to injury, they drilled a hole through our bathroom all the way into our second bathroom.  The owner corrected it, but used the wrong color paint to finish it.  For me, although the price of the job was fair, there are plenty of other contractors out there that will also give good pricing and actually show up on time and handle concerns promptly.  

Athens was very helpful throughout the process. We had personal attention fom the owner as well as his wife. Unfortunately they have relocated from Newport News to Virginia Beach.

This project was for a beach house rental property about 4 hours from my home, so,  it was important to have someone I could
trust to do the job with out  looking over their shoulder the whole time. 
I interviewed 4 prospects for the job.  When I met with Carlos, I was immediately impressed with his professionalism and his "can do" attitude.
My instincts were right!  He went beyond what I feel the others would have done.
When he pulled up all the carpet and vinyl, he found rotted subfloor.  In some places rotted all the way through.  When he found this he immediately took pictures and E-mailed them to me.  In fact through out the whole job he kept me informed with pictures sent from his phone.  I changed grout color because of pictures sent.
When it came to the stairs, after removing the treads he found that the stairs were not supported in the middle and so reinforced them with 2x6's.  Now they look great and are very solid!
This is only a brief summary of the problems found and how he corrected them.
When I replace other flooring in that house,  I will be calling Athens Flooring!!

The contractor was a day delayed to start. The old flooring was removed to reveal the cement. The prep-work that was expected to even out the concrete if needed was not done. Instead, we were told that "the corners of some tile may pop up because of the bumps in the concrete"! The tile is applied with vinyl adhesive. Everything should stay in place! Checking for level and preparing the surface was understood to be part of the prep-work when the contractor came to evaluate the job (as sub-contractor for the retailer) and give the estimate, and he said so. There was an area that was askew and unacceptable and I asked for it to be replaced. When it was pulled up, some of the sub-floor broke off with the tile. A patch was placed, but while still damp, the new tile was cemented on top of it. The directions contra-indicate doing this. The box of tile also advises to not use petroleum based solvents on the tile. Some puddles of solvents (paint thinner) were left of the tile as the workmen were wiping seams. I absorbed it with paper towels when I saw it. We have two bathrooms, both of which were disabled for at least six hours at the same time! My husband used a coffee can and I went to a coffee shop to use the facilities. It wasn't necessary to take out both toilets at the same time. The contractor was here for two LONG days. Four pieces of wooden furniture were damaged as the were moved out of rooms, stored and moved back in by the workmen. I had to refinish the top of a desk and make other repairs on the other pieces. A piece of glass from a picture frame was broken, and they just threw the pieces away and never told us. The VillaStone is a nice and forgiving product which looks okay in spite of the workmanship. $5100.00 is a lot of money to us. We wish we could feel like we got our money's worth on this project.

They were really very good. They were $2000 cheaper than anyone else. They were very responsive to any little problems that arose.