Gulfstream Marbledust Ned Begis Bad worksmanship and harassment of the consumer North Bellmore New York
The issue involves the quality of work performed and collection practices associated with the contract.
Firstly. Gulfstream Marbledust did a poor job in quality and when pointed to the issue refused to address the issue. The company was alerted to the following issues with worksmanship:
a. Marbledust covering of the pool not even, bumpy, discolored all around the pool and foreign objects(small stones are sticking out) can be observed
b. Top of the skimmers' covering(MarbleDust) is not even and not straight
c. Work performed by Gulfstream around the pool is not of good quality. Bricks that were laid down, have a much wider gap between stones as the rest of the Patio.
d. Workers have not been careful during the work and dropped cement spots all over the patio. The patio stones will need to be replaced as cement is not coming out even with powerwasher.
e. Silicone that was used to edge the pool was applied not evenly. It needs to be re-applied.
2. Owner of the business, Ned Begis, has used profanity and intimidated me with physical threats and legal action to demand last portion of the payment.
There were multiple interactions, and at this point we believe got to the end of this interaction and we have to take further steps to get the issue rectified.
Ned has not replied in writing to the letter that I mailed with my concerns about 2 weeks ago.
Prior to Ned making threats and physically intimidating me, I wanted the issue to be rectified by Gulfstream Marbledust.
In order to address these concerns we wanted Ned to come in and FIX all the issues. Once all the issues rectified we would have made the final payment for the work performed.
At this point, I have received a letter from an attorney asking for the money, but without any mentioning of the issues involved.
I would like BBB and other consumer sites to make this issue public, so that we warn consumers in Nassau County from bad practices of Gulfstream Marbledust and its owner Ned begis.
Thank you very much
Respectfully,
Henry
1 Updates & Rebuttals
Ned Begis
north bellmore,New York,
USA
Allegations Unfounded
#2REBUTTAL Owner of company
Fri, February 19, 2016
I am the owner of Gulfstream Marbledust, Ned Begis.
I am responding to Mr Podolsky's unproven complaints. Both the Better Business Bureau and the County of Nassau Office of Consumer Affairs have closed their investigations (by several different industry investigators) citing that the allegations are unproven. All work was preformed according to industry standard. Anyone can contact either agency for inquires. In fact I've had to retain legal counsel to counter the deformation of my business name and Mr Podolsky has not paid his bill in full. He still owes $5000.00 which he has refused to pay.
I will address several issues that the customer complained about. First I'll speak to the marbledust material. It is hand troweled using natural materials and thus shade variations in dyed marbledust are inherent and to be expected. This was explained to the customer at the onset of the work. As far as discoloration, the customer was instructed (in writing) to fill the pool with clean potable water. He used well water which has a high iron and copper content which causes discoloration of the marbledust.
Next as far as the coping work...the customer chose coping that was 1/2 inch larger than the existing 25 year old coping against my advise. He did not want to replace the whole patio due to additional cost. I explained it would not be level but he insisted on using this particular coping.I did use joint expansion which would level itself out over time. He knew the problems of trying to marry up new with old. In order to make the customer happy I went back several times and relaid the bricks at my own cost.
Moving on to the clean up, I always tarp the entire area. In fact I power washed the entire patio. The customer always wanted more than he contracted for, always asking could you do this for me or that for me. I always do extra for customers but in this case it cost me approximately $2200.00 in labor and materials for which I did not charge the customer.
When I tried to collect the balance of the bill Mr. Podolsky became belligerent and irate so I called the police.Several days later I contacted customer to discuss an amicable resolution. I offered to settle the bill for $3500.00 considerably less then he owed. He declined.