The Master Craftsman

Wish I had read the reviews first before contacting this company. My experience with Mastercraftsman was similar to some other customers: high-pressured sale tactics salesman, ridiculously expensive estimate at first, then they offerred a "steep discount" provided that you signed the contract right away. Now I know why when we booked the appointment, the receptionist kept asking if all the decisionmakers would be present when the "estimator" arrives. In this way, we were forced to make the decision right away and we could not say that we have to discuss itwith other family members first before making the decisions i.e. no chance or time to think it over.

Their customer service needs to improve: the salesman called Joe said: "if you have any questions, please don't hestitate to call me." Guess what: his cell phone is always busy and you cannot even leave a message. Gave me the impression that once he made the sale, he does not give a damn anymore. He was also supposed to deliver the fabic samples for us to choose. Never did. He has apparently screwed up the order. I ended up dealing with someone called Wayne. While he was polite enough, it could be difficult to get him return phone calls. I have to call him several times over the course of a week before he would return calls.

Then of course, there were this "highly recommended" repair and additional procedure that was not quoted in the contract. My original contract price was about $2,200, my final bill ended up close to $2,800.

As for the workmanship, they did an OK job on the drawer but I told Joe before that I wanted my furniture in the same colour (chestnut brown) as before. Now the drawer is a lot lighter in colour like honey brown. As for the chairs, the legs had many scratch marks and animal bites. Joe assured me that "Don't worry, we'll fix up the legs and the chairs will look just like new". So I assumed that they will re-sand the legs, fix up all the scratch marks and have them repainted. Well, then came the surprise, during my last phone conversation with Wayne, he said "by the way, we won't do anything about the legs." Well, I didn't know what he meant and I was afraid to ask. I was sure that anything we want them to do, it's gonna cost extra and by this point, the cost is just too expensive and all this business of chasing him to return calls has become a hassle. Well, what they did was paint over the major scratch marks making them not as noticable but they didn't do anything about the smaller marks.

In conclusion, I find it just too expensive. People should shop around and do their homework first. For that price, I expected a complete job: new fabric, cushions INCLUDING repairing the legs, not just a half done paint job. Of course, they would say everything (what work is included and what not) is clearly spelled out in their contract but then aqain, we were not given any time to read it before signing, so I would advise everyone to READ CAREFULLY the contract before signing it.

I am sorry to say that while my experience was not as bad as the others, I still don't think I will recommend this place to other people.