Complaint Review: Meridian Design Center - Internet California

I purchased mosiac with this Meridian Design Center around Feb 2011 for a bathroom remodel.  The tiles are actually beautiful; however, I would not recommend this company to a friend and will not use them ever again and here's why.

The mosiac tiles I purchased were over ordered.  Yes, the mosiac tiles were a special order subject to specific terms and conditions - which I FULLY UNDERSTAND.  This is not the issue.  

The issue is that several weeks ago my contractor called Nanette, the employee assisting us at Meridian Kitchen, to let her know we had extra mosiac and to see if we could return them.  Nanette said YES minus a 35% re-stocking fee and even made a call to the mosiac tile company to confirm this.  

Based on this information, I drove the following Saturday to Meridian Kitchen and Nanette was not there on this day, so I spoke with Yossie who told me these tiles were not returnable and there was nothing he could do and that Nanette would contact me the following Monday and handle this.

Two weeks later I had not heard from Nanette, so I emailed her on 4/5/11.  I still didn't hear anything, so I re-sent my email today 4/6/11.  I then received a call from Yosi at 9PM the same night.  Yossie told me that Nanette has been out of the office, which is why she had not responded.  I had no way of knowing this because there was no out of the office auto responder set up.

I explained the issue to Yoseie just as I did above and also explained that I did not want to post on Yelp, BBB, to receive a resolution to this matter, etc., and is why I went directly to trying to contact Meridian Kitchen first to make an effort to resolve this issue directly first.  That was not a threat - simply a statement of fact.  

Yossie continued to refer to the contract and stated that if I'd posted on Yelp, he would just send them the contract I signed.  I know there is a contract, but Nanette stated after the fact that the mosiac was returnable; therefore this no longer is a contract issue, and is now an employee issue.  The company is responsible for their employees and for their training.

I asked for $100 credit as a gesture of good faith for my time that I took to load the heavy tiles into my car, drive over there, gas (i'd never ask for gas money but at $4/gallon, eek).  I would have never went over there or never even thought about returning the extra mosiac tiles if Nanette hadn't told us it were possible.  I was really just looking for the smallest gesture of good faith showing me that he knew his employee mest up and he was going to take responsibility.

Not only did Yossie not take responsibility and try to make the customer happy, but he continued to harass and threaten me via email.  

Yossie called me and asked me to put the resolution I sought per our phone call the following evening in writing to him and he would run it past the store owner, Rachel.  So in writing, I asked for a $100 credit to my account, which I don't think is too much to ask for since I spent $5,000 with them.

I received the response below and was saddened to say that this company would allow a manager to speak to and/or interact with their customers who have spent $5,000 this way.

"jen i am sorry to say we dont want to deal with people of your character and believe me we will not give you any credits at all for trying to black mail against negative reviews. I was in touch with yelp and they are investigating your account i have already submitted all legal documents to them. Any further derogatory remark or defimation of character towards meridian design center in any means shall bring you severe damages and legal actions; so  govern yourself accordingly and consult with legal counsel before you let any more fingers of yours do any more false reports,allegation or bashings. You just seem like the person who is looking for free bees and leaching off businesses."

A few things -

1) I never stated anything derogatory against their company - everything written is 100% fact.  I'd be happy to prove it as I have everything in writing.  

2) I did not black mail them - I simply stated a fact that I wanted to work this out with them first and hope that they would consider a resolution prior to going to third parties such as the BBB, Yelp, RipOffReport, The Attorney General, etc. to help me get resolve to this issue.

3) You can not threaten legal action against an individual for using online services to post reviews.

4) To threaten me with legal action so that I don't post online is blackmail.

5)  "You just seem like the person who is looking for free bees and leaching off businesses." <-- Funny!  Why would I pay them $5,000.00 and be looking for free bees?  That just doesn't make sense.