Complaint Review: Daniel Alvarez - California

Yesterday, we had 4 guys drive in a red pick up truck.  It was a larger truck (GMC??), they came and explained that they can help save our lawn from crab grass and wanted to show us a 5 min demonstration.  They had bags of soil and came and did their demo.  Then the guy (I thought his name was Daniel Alvarez) said he can start on a section of the lawn with 10 bags.    My husband asked "how much?" The guy said "we have to wait and see how much your lawn will need.  He had broken English, so it was hard to understand. 

He explained that it was $8/bag and it was very good soil and they will add the seed and weed killer and it will help our grass.  He then started doing it, but didn't tell us he was going to keep going with the bags of soil.  He said ok, that section is 10 bags and now we have to add more bags to cover the seed.  So we said 'ok'.  By the time he finished that section.   He asked us for the next section and we said ok, which we were thinking another 10 bags!!  By the time they were going, it was all these bags and I was thinking, that's well over 10 bags!

Things were moving so fast, we didn't have time to think.  By the time he did half of the lawn and I went in the house and they KEPT bringing bags and bags of soil out and all of a sudden it was over 150 BAGS!!!! 

He should have warned us it was going to take that much soil.  He took advantage of us and didn't warn us it was going to take so much or they purposing kept dumping the bags of soil.

By the time I saw all these bags on the ground, I almost had a heart attack and said "stop!! how many bags is it?? "  He said "about 150", I was like "What?!! No, stop, no more!!  How are we going to pay for all this?"

He said "I give you a good deal!"  He knocked off $1 and said "I will give you a good deal."  I said " you have to stop, we cannot afford all this.  when he did the calculations, it was already over $1,000.  My husband and my heart stopped, as we HAD NO INTENTION OF spending this much money on the lawn.  We thought the most would be $300.  The guy didn't warn us it was going to be that much and we should have told him, but with the language barrier and the guy going so fast, we didn't have time to think. 

I asked if he could take half the payment now and half next week, as this would tap our checking account out!!!  He said "no, we can't, we need to pay for the material."  As we didn't want any retalitation, we relunctionaly just paid him. 

He gave us his business card and I was trying to call him back that night to tell him what he did to us was wrong because he didn't tell us it was going to be that much and they over brought the bags of soil out so quickly, we didn't have time to think!!  By the time we realized it was so many bags, the damage was already done.  He said he would give us a discount and just charge us $1,000 for everything and he will finish the job.  I reluctantly said 'ok', but we feel sick about what happened and afterwards realized we were scammed. 

Now I tried to call them and it was the wrong phone number on the business card and on the hand written number, it was a 510-723-4074 for a OC business?  That number is in Hayward, which gives me an indication that it was probably a disposable phone. 

We don't know what to do.  We don't think this is something we can report to the police as there is no way to get a hold of the people. 

We wrote him a check and he cashed it under the name David Alvarez, but now I"m wondering if it was a fake ID? 

Do you know what our options are?  :(  We feel the guy was dishonest with us and should have told us upfront it was going to be over $1,000, instead of saying "Oh, we have to put the soil down to see how much it will cover"