Geoff in London

As a former home builder, and professional tradesman, I was going to install some new flooring myself, but later decided to contract with Alexanian's London store to install my simple engineered hardwood drop lock floating floor. They were to level the subfloor and install the flooring, and I would do everything else including installing new baseboard. They subsequently failed to level the floor to the manufacturer minimum required specs, and the floorboards later started to develop breaks at the various uneven locations. They agreed to fix the issue, which involved once again removing all appliances, including a hard wired dishwasher, and trim in several locations. I did the appliance removals, and they removed the trim and broke a couple pieces in the process, but fortunately I had some saved for this repair. Since the flooring had already started to yellow in various areas where it was exposed to sunlight, I pointed out to their manager Tyson that the boards need to be marked and reinstalled in the exact same locations from which they came. I noticed their installer was not marking the boards, and even offered him a marker to be sure this portion of the job would be done correctly. Tyson told me, he was a pro and he has his own method of insuring the boards would go back correctly. I worked with the installer to fix the subfloor levelness to the proper specs. He started reinstalling the floorboards, and I left him to finish this while I did other work. When I later returned I immediately noticed that at least 25% of the boards did not go back in the same location, and I now had major discoloration issues. I contacted Tyson to state this was not acceptable, but agreed to let some areas try to blend over a six month time period, and we both agreed that the severely yellowed boards in one area would never blend and would have to be replaced in six months when I would be available for this. Although the floors still looked bad after six months, I agreed to let them just replace 8 boards in one area and that all we would just have to remove the kitchen cupboard kickboards to dismantle this small area. Their installer showed up, and said he wasn't sure how to do this, but started the job anyhow. He damaged my kick board, despite me telling him not to grab at that end. He then said he would need a special tool that he had only seen others use for this, and didn't have the time to do this job. He put back the boards and left the job. At this point it was the third and final attempt I would allow Alexanian's to get a merely acceptable job done on my floors, and I told Tyson, that I would "ONLY" accept a cash settlement for the completely botched work they did, and would never ever allow any unprofessional incompetent Alexanian installer in my home again. I will have to fix my floor myself. Update: This issue has been submitted to the BBB(Better Business Bureau) and Alexanian's failed to respond and were given a C+ rating because of this. I urge Alexanian's to show some degree of business ethics and to respond to the BBB immediately. Update: As per the response from Alexanian's to call their district manager for a resolution, I in fact did call numerous times and he never ever called me back. The floor is still the same and it is a daily reminder of why one should never do business with such an unscrupulous company.