On March of last year I signed a contract with the owner of International Cabinetry, Joe Martin, to build cabinets for our kitchen. First of all the cabinets we received at our home on July 2005 did not have the specifications we had agreed on per the plans submitted by our decorator to International Cabinetry. The first mistakes were corrected but we could still not open our counter depth refrigerator door properly because they did not followed the manufacturers instructions that I had faxed them (for which I still have evidence) on the distances needed to be able to install the fridge properly. As a result we had to knock down a section of the wall/opening to the kitchen in order to be able to open the fridge door properly.

During the installation process Joe Martin’s full time employees damaged and dented few doors and moldings. Not only that but the dishwasher machine wood panel door was cracked during the installation process and some trims were not stained and finished around the kitchen hood above the cook-top. They made a lot of mistakes during their attempt to do the final touches and the last time I met with Joe Martin it was at my home during a kitchen walk-through where he promised that he would order a new wood door panel for the dish washer machine and that he would fix all the mistakes that were made.

We waited, and waited for Joe Martin to return to our home to fix the mistakes himself as he promised, and made multiple calls to him but our attempts were not successful. Finally, we got a phone call from our decorator who indicated that Joe Martin was proposing to order the dishwasher wood door panel and that he would install it himself. In addition, he proposed to return to us a total of $ 500.00, from the full amount we paid him by check when he was 80% done installing our cabinets, in place of fixing all the mistakes they made during the installation process. Our answer was “no” because we wanted to have International Cabinetry, Inc., finish the job since, we suspected it would take a lot more than $500.00 to fix the cabinets. However, we had to agree to HIS PROPOSAL which WAS NEVER FULLFILLED. We NEVER GOT THE MONEY! We NEVER GOT THE dishwasher WOOD DOOR panel! AND WE NEVER GOT OUR CABINETS FIXED! But what is worse is that we have had several companies come by to our house to give us estimates to fix the cabinets and they won’t even write a final estimate because they cannot guarantee finding the right stain color to match the cabinets. What this means is that we would not only have to fix the mistakes but also have to re-stain the entire brand new cherry cabinets in our kitchen.

We are very tired of making phone calls. Therefore, I sure hope that nobody else experiences the headaches and financial loss we have experienced.