All City Commercial Interiors

We were first time clients trying to find someone to remodel an existing building and fix up some areas. At first the contractors seemed friendly and easy going. They agreed to a lot of things verbally and seemed willing to work with us. The few times we visited the place while they were working, the majority of the crew were resting (taking a smoke break indoors at a medical facility) with only a couple actually working and they seem to leave well before 3pm. We didn’t complain, chucked it up to unlucky timing on our part, and thought it would be ok as long as they got the job done before we opened for business. However as the deadline approached and it became apparent that they were no where near done anxiety and tension started. We gave them numerous extensions for them to finish and ended up delaying our opening by over three months. Even when we did open things were left undone and many things did not work thus the first month of business was hell. They eventually got around to most of the bare essentials then claimed that they were done and the remaining stuff is not part of their original contract. They refused to honor most of their verbal agreements. We had paid them 75% of their asking price up front to get things going and now they were asking for the other 25% with things undone and without compensating us for the delay and numerous problems. They expected us to pay in full and then draw up a second contract to do the remaining things we were asking for and pay them additional amount for the «extra» things. They tried to pressure us into paying by threatening legal action that very night or the next day and the reason they gave was «they needed to sink their teeth into us to protect their interests» and that is exactly what they did. They were never in a rush in previous meetings but in the later meetings they were in a hurry to leave and constantly talking about other business appointment they had to keep at 6−7pm. (who schedules multiple meetings so close to each other and after business hours?) Being a medical office with unpredictable patient flow we did make them wait over an hour or two on occasions.
To be fair it was not the contractor’s fault entirely as we were the inexperienced ones. Now we have learned to ask for everything in writing. Our communication could have been more clear and overall beter. We should have been firm and detailed upfront making sure we got what we wanted instead of being lax and trusting that they would do the right thing. They ended up taking advantage of the lack of certain specifics on our part and cutting many corners usually without telling us and the ones we noticed and asked about they promised us verbally we would not notice the difference and that they were simply trying to save us money. In the end we did notice and their price was not any lower than the initial estimate (actually higher by over 65%).
All in all we wouldn’t say they are bad people, Dishonest? Yes, Greedy? Yes, Unprofessional? Yes, Sleazy? Probably not. We ourselves being first timers were also unprofessional to a degree but we tried to be reasonable and fair with them.
We ended up hiring a second contractor to clean up the mess they left and finish things as we specified. We got lucky with the second contractor not being dishonest.