Hired company 10/07 for new roof & siding. Paid 1/4 of amount up front. Week into job, contractor begged for another 1/4 of money because other homeowners had "stiffed" him. Believing him, we paid. Work started slowly. Contractor told us "Do not hire sub-contractors. All workers work directly for me". Found out quickly, this was untrue. Took 10 days for old roof to be torn off and new one placed on. Grounds around house were disgusting. They did not tarp house when removing old roof and left old roof pieces all over. Came home from work one day to discover, roof was not the one we ordered or paid for. Discussed with contractor and compromised. Did not want him to have to lose about $3,000.00 on roof. Roof complete, more delays before siding begins.
Week later, some siding torn off house and trash strewn all over property. Dumpster that contractor sent to our home was overflowing. We asked multiple times for him to remove it. He stated it could be filled even more. Found out this was another untruth coming out of his mouth. We finally called dumpster company to remove dumpster. That is when we were told by them that the reason dumpster was sitting at our house was due to a "bad credit card" used by company. Naturally contractor had an excuse for this also. Contractor also had us paying roofing/siding company directly. This should have been our warning sign that he had bad credit. We ignored all the red flags because we believed contractors excuses.
Meantime, his supposed supervisor, who had told us he would be on our job daily to make sure it was done properly, never showed up once during the roof installation or the partial siding installation. We were given a lame excuse for that. The super did show up when siding was partially done, looking for more money, which we did not give him. We then paid another 1/4 of job and discovered that a window was broken when some of the siding was being installed, along with our rear entrance door was broken.
Contractor said "Not a problem" and we again believed him when told he would pay for the damages. Siding subs walked off our job after a few days, told us that they were not getting paid. Of course, contractor turned the story around, told us the sub had "Stolen" from him. Again, being trusting and honest people, we believed him.
Toward mid-December, other subs were brought to our home to look at job by contractor, Hank Buhner, none wanted the job, they left. Finally one came back to our home, told us that he "Felt badly for us" and would do the job but only if we guaranteed he'd be paid, because Hank Buhner was notorious for bad credit, checks and none payment. We guaranteed this subs money and work finally began again on home. We told the contractor, VASS SIDING, owned by Hank Buhner, that we guaranteed the subs money. He told us it was not necessary to have done so.
A few days into the new sub doing job, they came to us for the money, said that Hank Buhner, nor his supposed supervisor, Larry Jones, had shown up to pay him and his crew. We paid the sub immediately. Sub also told us he would not be back to finish job. He did not like working for VASS SIDING and had many problems with both Buhner and Jones. Then he went into detail about the two men and their 'crooked' businesses. We thanked him for making the home at least a bit presentable and also for cleaning up over 1,000 large roofing nails and trash left strewn all over our grounds, by the previous work crews. Also, each crew stood around for hours/days waiting for delivery of supplies. All were shocked that we had paid for the supplies instead of VASS and that they were not being delivered. Each time, we had to call supply house to send out the supplies. Days wasted once again.
This began the odyssey of trying to have VASS SIDING and Hank Buhner get another crew to finish our job. We were given more excuses. End of December, contacted the Bucks County D.A., our attorney and Bucks Consumer Affairs. Found out there were already TEN judgements against Buhner and his companies, along with open case in neighboring Montgomery County for "Theft by Unlawful Taking, "Bad Checks", etc. We were a bit astonished by this information as we had believed and trusted BUHNER.
We were told the steps we needed to take to file a suit against VASS and BUHNER. We began by filing a local police report. We then called the maker of the siding to come look at the work. He was astonished at the poor craftmanship and informed us that the siding was not installed correctly, therefore voiding any thought of a company warranty.
At this point, we are into this siding job by over $15,000.00 and counting. We also were informed we needed to send a letter detailing the job to the contractor, VASS SIDING, Hank Buhner and requesting a finish date for job. Certified letters were sent, one was signed for, however; no finish date by BUHNER. He continued calling us with one excuse after another. Finally in early March, brings another! Sub to the job. Sub knocks at my door at 9:30am, never met him previously. He asks me to call BUHNER because he never showed up to meet them and when he called BUHNER all he was getting was voice mail. I called, received same voice mail. Sub then asked me to "Walk around" our house and point out the punch list items. I did so and he and the other worker he was with, were more than a bit dismayed over the sub-par job done on the house. One of them said "Not doing this job, too much, it is a mess." I ignored the comment thinking he would change his mind. I then went into my home and the sub and his workers said they would wait in the truck for Buhner. When I left my home ten minutes later, their trucks were gone. I thought they went to get coffee.
Imagine my surprise when I returned home and saw no work had begun on house nor were the workers here. Buhner called that evening and told me that the men left the job because "You yelled at him." I told Buhner I had not yelled at anyone. What a ridiculous statement coming from Buhner's mouth, but then again, at this point, considered the source and moved on. Realized it was another lie for him to not finish the job. I challanged him to have the sub come back and tell me face to face that I had "yelled at him", knowing full well the sub would not do so because it never happened.
We are now into the sixth month of a siding/roofing job that should have taken three weeks maximum. We are also out over $17,000.00 paid to VASS, along with monies to our attorney, the Courts, etc.
Supposedly workmen were to be at our house this week, but the supposed secretary at VASS, who was "working on securing a crew" to finish the house, is in the hospital. We are not sure how this reflects on no crews showing up to the house. If they were scheduled to be here, they would be here, regardless of the supposed illness of the 'secretary'. Called VASS and have not received any calls back from this over the matter.
We have given them more than ample time to fix this problem, show that they are upright, honest people and have been treated as imbiciles by them. We now are in the midst of filing with the Courts, along with local authorities (who are checking into other problems with Buhner and crew) and hope that once it goes to Court, the matter will be settled. How a company with 10 judgements against them can continue to deceive, basically steal money from honest, hard-working people, is beyond us.
We do have in our favor, besides paying for an uncompleted job, a host of people that have worked with or for VASS, along with a supply company they use and the dumpster company, agreeing to go to Court with us against VASS. We also were told to get three estimates for finishing the job, to be taken to Court with us. We did so, calling three independant contractors. Estimates from them were between $18,000.00 and $24,500.00. All told us that the job had to be completely redone.
With a favorable judgement against this company, we hope that the only siding Buhner will be involved with, will be when he is housed behind four walls owned by the State of Pennsylvania. That way he will not be able to hurt any other people, financially or morally.
In addition, there are websites that when any of Buhners company names are put into, come up for "Reviews". We put in unfavorable reviews in each of them and they were immediately removed, replaced with favorable reviews, all of which are bogus. This will cause other potential customers to be misled, sadly.
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