I called Mid-Atlantic because a friend of mine had waterproofing system installed by Mid-Atlantic in her home about 8 years ago and she said her basement has been bone dry ever since. The salesman came out in the evening and spent about an hour and a half with me. He seemed to know what he was talking about and showed me all kinds of diagrams of the system. He also told me about many "high profile" customers for whom Mid-Atlantic had installed systems. He also told me that Mid-Atlantic had won the Torch Award for Business Ethics recently. I was aware that some of these basement waterproofing places were very un-ethical and often scams, I thought that since Mid-Atlantic had won this award, they must be reputable. The salesman took measurements and made a detailed diagram of the system they would install, including where the pumps would be placed. He told me that it may be subject to change because when the "engineers" get here they may need to put the pumps in different places. He spoke many times of the "engineers" who would be working on my system. He also mentioned several times that he was "engineer", not a sales guy and that he wasn't making any commission on sales. Hmm.
When doing the pricing he brought the original price down about $5000 because he wanted to send me “engineers” instead of the "regular" guys to install my system. He then used the classic aggressive sales tactic of "you have to decide by tomorrow or you might not get these guys" and that he “couldn’t guarantee this special engineering price” if I didn’t decide by the next day – due to scheduling the “engineers”, of course. I felt like he was pushing me but I also didn't have the time to go out and get another estimate and wait. Furthermore, I have no way of knowing whether one waterproofing system is actually better than another other than from friends. I only had the one recommendation from the one friend, so I decided to go with Mid-Atlantic. The cost very VERY high, but I decided to pay it since they offered a life-time guarantee that went with the home, not the owner.
Installation day came and I was shocked to get a phone call from my mother who was at my house to let them in that the "engineers" wanted to know where to put the pumps. WHAT? I was told that the people who came to my house would know what they were doing - they were supposed to be engineers, after all. Also, they were supposed to have a copy of the diagram the engineer/salesman gave me, but apparently didn’t have it with them! So, I had to leave work and go meet with these installers to show them where the pumps were supposed to be. On the way home, I called Mid-Atlantic and told the manager there that I was not at all happy about this.
When I got home, I then got my second shock. These were not engineers at my house. These were construction workers! I am not trying to be derogatory to any group of people here, but there were about 8 of them and only 1 spoke English. Clearly they were NOT engineers. It doesn’t bother me that they were construction workers and didn’t speak English. It’s just that the salesperson told they would be engineers and used that fact to get me to sign the deal within 24 hours. This is the deceptive and aggressive part of this whole thing. He should have told me that a construction crew was going to show up. Maybe he thought I wouldn’t by his product if I knew non-English speaking construction works would be installing this so called “highly engineered” system. So I called Mid-Atlantic again and told the manager that I had expected that at least one person in the group of installers would be an educated engineer. The manager's response was that "it wasn't rocket science." That is exactly what the salesman led me to believe!
Part of my basement is finished and the salesman told me that they would be cutting the dry wall and I would have to fix it. That is fine, I agreed to that. He did not tell me that they would be cutting the studs so that the dry wall would have no support!
Furthermore, they did a few things that were just plain sloppy. They caused a complete mis-alignment of the door to the closet in which my water heater is located. I had to pay a contractor to push and re-secure the wall back to the proper place so that the door would close again. Also, they placed one of the pipes that carries the water to the outside about 8 feet into my front / side yard. What an eye sore! Not only was it a complete eye-sore, it would prevent me from mowing that part of the lawn.
I called about both of these very sloppy things and a guy came out and cut back the pipe in the yard. There were other places they could have made the pipe come out – like under the deck which was only about 3 feet away from where they put it, which was not under the deck. They say they are going to reimburse me for the cost to fix the door, too. I am glad about both of these things, but I would not recommend this company to anyone without first telling them that construction workers come to install it and not to fall for the special “engineering” pricing. Consumers should also make sure they know exactly what is going to be destroyed at their home in order to install it AND know exactly where they are going to place to pipes that take the water to the outside. Lastly, get at least one other estimate. I am sorry I didin't.
After my experience, I am really surprised that Mid-Atlantic got the Torch Award for Business Ethics. I found the salesperson was not quite ethical.
0 comments