If this company thinks they can get away with it then they'll try it! They will drag their feet, blame delays and screw ups on everything but themselves and contradict their story every other conversation you have with them. (Can someone tell me how to upload audio.)
I highly recommend not using them if you lost your house due to a disaster or incident. They will drag out your project until your insurance can no longer cover your hotel stay, and then they will drag it out four months longer, all while telling you every week that a "week is left on the project".
A & M Services is probably the biggest collection of sociopaths I have seen. If you hear, "I like you, I'm going to do you a favor." RUN FOR THE HILLS! Unfortunately, my house had been damaged for 3 weeks and the previouse company I had was doing things behind my back. I saw a good BBB rating and went with this company. I was told that my house would be ready in a few weeks. This was not the case. It has been five and half months! Fortunately after being lied to about what a Power of Attorney was I decided to start tape recording and documenting my experience with them in case I had issues getting my house fixed.
So, I started covering my self, but I had no idea just how crooked they really were. When they verbally refused to do what my insurance company had listed, and were still putting the job off, I decided to fire them and write any relevant Attorney's General.
You think it would be over like that. But no. It seems the company is interested in getting some contractor justice. That's right. They have threatened to put a lien on my house. How? You might ask. How can they do this when they have $22,000 of your money and have done less than 15% of the job, half of which is in poor condition (see pictures)? Apparently, they can put a lien on my house by simply filing and lieing about the situation. I will have to go through all the hoops to get it lifted, by proving it to be fraudulent. It's simply a way for them flip the bird as I report them to everyone I can.
So, that's what I am doing, warning as many people as I can. (I'll have a website up in the next month.) But I am still waiting god knows how long to get my $22,000 back. About that 15% of work done over a 5 months period, half of it stinks. The drywall is crooked in areas. Apparently when the insurance company said to remove the floor boards and install new floor boards, they decided to leave them there, and since the floor boards had two layers of drywall behing them, they have curve the mud out. Talk about lazy! It looks as if they put more effort into making it look bad than doing it properly and as laid out in my insurance scope.
That's not all though, they were beginning to spray paint my old vent covers! Although the insurance company was paying for new vent covers, I guess they thought they could save a couple of buck and spray over the grimy dirty and damaged one. They even attempted to reuse my broken kitchen cabinets instead of buying new ones. And did they clean out the vents as they were paid to do, ofcourse not. H**l they even conceded in two of my recordings, to laying carpet over damaged hard wood floors instead of replacing them, as they were paid to do.
They also hired unlicensed subcontractors. In fact in my particular situation they only paid the unlicensed subs $1,000 for $3,000 worth of work, ($3,000 had it been done properly!) (I should mention if my review is read on the BBB webpage, I forgot in my BBB post that they were being paid $5,000 for everything which included a long list of unfinished items.)
But we're not done yet. When he called to threaten me about the mechanics lien and to say that he would "own my house", rendering me homeless, he ask for the last insurance check payment of $8,000 to stay his vengeful hand. He was basically trying to extort me. He wants $30,000 for doing nothing or he will file a lien on my house. I don't know about you, that's text book racketeering.
But you know what's worse than even the time it will take to get a judgement against them--allowing me the ability to fix my house? It's the fact that, in spite of all the evidence I have, they will still file a fraudulent mechanics lien as punishment for me reporting them to the BBB and three Attorney's General's offices. It a twisted crazy sociopaths version of justice for someone who doesn't take their abuse. It's punishment for me being so insulent as to report crookedness and thievery! I got the extorive call yesterday! Maybe they won't atempt it, god knows it would be the most unethical act known to man. And talk about shooting your arm off to make a point. (I thnk they can be heavily penalised for fraudulent liens, I don't know yet. Still looking into it)
And that's the problem. They can put this bogus lien up and then put me through the added stress of going to court, retaining a second attorney, after suring them, and showing just how rediculous their claims were. They can do this and they probably won't have any citations until I prove my case in court.
So here it is all you mindful consumers. Beware. I am linking pictures of my house as it is now. If some tells me how I will link my tape recordings. That way some people can be saved before they enter the 7th level of hell that is this company coupled with an unfortunate house loss.
I hope at least a few people can read this and avoid half a year, maybe a year, of pain and suffering. (And don't be mislead by their BBB rating. I'm warning you.) Someone has to take this thing all the way so others won't be harmed by this den of thieves. I just hope readers heed my warnings. Satan shouldn't have to go through the hell this company has and is putting me through.
Here are some more specifics:
I was told that my house would ready in a few weeks, and we just needed to get one thing added to the estimate. But that wasn't a problem. I had an email from my adjuster agreeing to add it. I forwarded the email to the company along with before and after pictures, but it took the company 2 and half months to get the adjustments, which were already agreed to by my insurance company, approved. This was after they got a bunch of questionable adjustments that mostly involved inflated cost of labor in addition to overhead and profit.
I admit, there was a second item I was interested in asking my insurance company about, but it took me only a week to call my insurance company, meet with an engineer, and find out that it wasn't covered. This is important because by the middle of June the 5 month delay was being contributed to the week it took me to do this and the 2 and half months it took the company to forward the email in which my adjuster agreed to add the first item. But who ever said they were logical or honest.
At the beginning of March, after the company had received the adjuster's email and I found out that my basement wasn't covered, work began, and I was told that it would be done in a week, by 7 March. After a week, 8% of the job is done. And it sat as it did that day until 24 May. That's 2.75 months! Even if it was my insurance company's fault that the last adjustment wasn't finished until 30 April, no work was done for one whole month!
And what is really confusing, if my last adjustment had not been done by 8 April, why was I told to leave the house for a week so they could finish the job. (They had delayed so long that my insurance wouldn't cover my hotel anymore and I was forced to sleep in my broken house!) So, i left to Charlotte, thinking my house would be done in a week, possibly two.
Ofcourse it wasn't. But I was told that they only needed another week. My dad told me that some time contractors stall until the end of deadline to focus on bigger clients. So I waited. But around the middle of May I became concerned. So, I made arrangements for a local friend to stop by my house and see if the company was even working on it yet. She saw worker, but as they told her, they had just gotten there. Turns out they were sent there to be there when my firend got there. When I got back on 17 June I found that nothing had been done to it since then. And the workers didn't show up till I sent a 30 day Demand letter. They showed up on the 22 of June to do 2 hours of work. That's another month with out any work!! Almost two month since the apparently pertinent adjustments were added!
The workers, along with management gave a list of work that was to be done. The work was substantially less than the work the insurance company was paying for. They also refused to do the work that the insurance company is paying for and are cutting corners on the few things they said they were going to do. On top of that, after sending a 7 day demand latter, since the 30 couldn't be upheld if they were doing the wrong work, they began trying to extort me. They have lied several times and have not taken responsibility for their actions. They are vidictive, and all around scum! They can put on a front as being your best friend but if you keep your ears up will pick up on many lies. They are for the most part a congregation of sociopaths. I urge everyone to avoid this company like the plague.
They recently opened a branch in Garner, NC. I will try to post for that area too, because the salesman who dealt most with me is going to be managing that branch, and who know how many people will be done dirty in a new area!
I was going through my voice mail and phone record to make update my log for court. The house actually sat until 1 June. And that was actually the day my firend checked it out. I got back to Chatlotte to Florida on 26 May, and ask the company if my firend could check things out that Monday, 30 May. So that's three months it sat from the day the first week of work was started, and 1 month since the final adjustment was approved. On 3 June a Chris Mahilac said everything was done but the windows. This seemed right because the workers had told my firend that they had been there for a week, since 24 May and that it was a two week job. Got a text from the project manager a week after this saying the house, presumably only the windows, wouldn't be finished by the following day because i still owed money! This was corrected, but it turns out he meant anything in the house.