Complaint Review: Carpet Depot - Levittown New York

 Just saw the owners rebuttal and had to respond. There was not ONE true statement in their entire rebuttal. As I said, they were done in an hour so all that extra time they claim to have spent moving furniture is nonsense. There was also absolutely no water in the house when they arrived. I was specifically quoted for an all day job and approved it as such, only to find out it took an hour. That's when I complained. The truth is that ABC news was so sympathetic to my story that they came to me to do a 7 on your side report and when they confronted the salesman at their store, he appeared to be mortified and literally ran off. The owner came out and was rude, extremely stubborn and unsympathetic. When all was said and done, Carpet Depot threatened them with a lawsuit regardless of fault and ABC did not want to deal with the threat of litigation. I gain nothing from any of this so I have no reason to lie or embellish. My goal is to simply warn others about this company and the way they treat customers. Readers can choose to believe my story and beware of this company, or believe their claims and take your chances. But you can't say you weren't warned!

As we have made very clear to this homeowner, Carpet Depot is a community based, family run organization that prides itself on a culture of customer service, quality product, and fair prices.  We stand by that.

It was disappointing to learn of this homeowner’s dissatisfaction, and consistent with our response to any complaint from a  dissatisfied customer, we committed to review the matter in detail.  What we found however is confirmation that the price charged was indeed fair and consistent with comparable services

As most people who know us will say, we have made good faith efforts to treat every customer fairly and reasonably. This report about me proves the old saying that people can say or write whatever they please, even if it’s not true, fair or right. So, I want to take this opportunity to answer this ridiculous report. Here are the facts.

A couple of days after Sandy hit, we received a call from this homeowner who asked for our assistance. Even though our own homes were badly affected by the hurricane, we spent time out in the community helping and responding to neighbors in need. When we arrived at this homeowner’s place, it was in terrible shape. There was 4 inches of water in the main level with debris and waste floating there. His main room was packed with furniture. In fact, it was so tightly packed with furniture that it was hard to walk through.

When we gave him our price, we explained the reasons for our charges. It was difficult to do business with shortages of power and fuel, with streets blocked and supplies hard to obtain. After we quoted our price and gave him our reasoning, the homeowner authorized us to charge his credit card for payment. This, of course,  gave him the option of cancelling the charge at any time or even disputing it after-the-fact. After agreeing to our price, the homeowner informed us that he was leaving NY for four days. We told him that the repairs and clean up should be taken care of right away and should not be put off to limit mold and other problems. Despite this, the homeowner  delayed the work and contacted us after four days asking us to get the work done. At this point, he had had plenty of time to cancel his credit card payment.

So that everyone has a sense of what was going on at the time and everyone should remember that gas and fuel were extremely hard to obtain. Our entire crew spent four to eight hours a day at gas stations waiting to get fuel - only to be told when we got to the pump that we could only get 10 gallons! This caused massive delays in getting things done and we incurred the cost of paying our workers for all their time, even when we were just waiting for gas. Because of this we incurred extra labor costs which we had to cover when we quoted our price to the homeowner. This was not overcharging, just passing on costs incurred - getting gas to move our trucks was a full day’s project!

When were doing the work, there was still two inches of water covering the floor - the carpeting and padding was very heavy being it was saturated with storm and sea water. The cost of the work included ripping up the flooring ang removing his extensive furniture - - the room was packed. Our workers spent a long time emptying out his belongings and furnishings- far more time than the $1,550 price represents.

It was only after the work was completed that the homeowner complained about the cost and we were sympathic and  offered him a $600 credit towards the purchase of replacement carpet or flooring to provide. We did this as a good faith gesture, it was intended to offer him some monetary relief during a difficult time.

As to our reputation and manner of dealing with our customers:

-   We have an A+ rating by the Better Business Bureau Rates - in the past 3 years, Carpet Depot has had four complaints, all of which have been resolved!

 Over the past 6 years we have serviced over 35,000 customers.  We have been in the flooring business since 1991 and we did right by this customer. There is no justification for his statement!

 As we have made very clear to this homeowner, Carpet Depot is a community based, family run organization that prides itself on a culture of customer service, quality product, and fair prices.  We stand by that. 

It was disappointing to learn of this homeowner’s dissatisfaction, and consistent with our response to any complaint from a  dissatisfied customer, we committed to review the matter in detail.  What we found however is confirmation that the price charged was indeed fair and consistent with comparable services 

 As most people who know us, we have made good faith efforts to treat every customer fairly and reasonably. This report about me proves the old saying that people can say or write whatever they please, even if it’s not true, fair or right. So, I want to take this opportunity to answer this ridiculous report. Here are the facts.

 A couple of days after Sandy hit, we received a call from this homeowner who asked for our assistance. Even though our own homes were badly affected by the hurricane, we spent time out in the community helping and responding to neighbors in need. When we arrived at this homeowner’s place, it was in terrible shape. There was 4 inches of water in the main level with debris and waste floating there. His main room was packed with furniture. In fact, it was so tightly packed with furniture that it was hard to walk through.

 When we gave him our price, we explained the reasons for our charges. It was difficult for us to do business with shortages of power and fuel, with streets blocked and supplies hard to obtain. After we quoted our price and gave him our reasoning, the homeowner authorized us to charge his credit card for payment. This, of course,  gave him the option of cancelling the charge at any time or even disputing it after-the-fact. After agreeing to our price, the homeowner informed us that he was leaving NY for four days. We told him that the repairs and clean up should be taken care of right away and should not be put off to limit mold and other problems. Despite this, the homeowner  delayed the work and contacted us after four days asking us to get the work done. At this point, he had had plenty of time to cancel his credit card payment.

 So that everyone has a sense of what was going on at the time and how difficult it was to get anything done,, I hope everyone remembers how hard it was to get gas and fuel. Our entire crew spent four to eight hours a day at gas stations just waiting to get fuel - and then when we got to the pump - we were told we could only get 10 gallons! This caused massive delays in getting things done and we incurred the cost of paying our workers for all their time, even when they were waiting in long lines for gas. Because of this we incurred extra labor costs which we had to cover when we quoted prices to homeowners. This was not overcharging, just passing on costs incurred - getting gas to move our trucks was a full day’s project!

 When were doing the work, there was still two inches of water covering the floor - the carpeting and padding was very heavy being it was saturated with storm and sea water. The cost of the work included ripping up the flooring and removing his extensive furniture - as I said the room was packed. Our workers spent a long time emptying out his belongings and furnishings- far more time than the $1,550 price represents.

 It was only after the work was completed that the homeowner complained about the cost and we were sympathetic to his plea - we offeried him a $600 credit towards the purchase of replacement carpet or flooring! We did this as a good faith gesture, it was intended to offer him some monetary relief during a difficult time. 

 As to our reputation and manner of dealing with our customers:

    -   We have an A+ rating by the Better Business Bureau Rates - in the past 3 years, Carpet Depot has had four complaints, all of which have been resolved!

    - Over the past 6 years we have serviced over 35,000 customers.  We have been in the flooring business since 1991 and there is no fair justification for the homeowner's stated dissatisfaction. We di right by him and he knows it or should know it.