Shortys Contracting

Firstly, let me state that we have never worked for a company named Shorty’s Jackhammering, The English Carpenter works solely for home owners rather than businesses. By claiming that you are a business that I worked for you are clearly making a false statement from the start, so anything that follows should be taken with a pinch of salt as you have already tried to deceive future readers of this post – not the best start really is it?.

Secondly, I have only ever been in this situation once which makes it easy to figure out who is hiding behind a false alias.

Thirdly, you state that I did not complete your project as I had another larger project, contractors always have a few projects running at one time in order to stay busy.
The real reason as stated in previous emails (that I have kept) dating back to 2010 when the project was running that there were areas outside of my scope of work that needed to be dealt with before I could continue.

You did not resolve these.

Fourth, I had offered to complete the items without charge for additional work if you held up your end with the issues I raised in my third point – you never did and instead found someone else as you knew that you were clearly in the wrong.

Fifth, as with any contstruction job when you peel a layer back, sometimes underlying issues arise and need to be addressed. Your cough* “jackhammering” business would obviously make aware of this solid fact.

Sixth, you raised many red flags whilst I was trying to work for you:
• by not paying for the original items on time,
• by trying to find ways to reduce my bills by offering second hand materials such as rusty nails or old taping compound that you had found on other building sites,
• you also told me that you were trying to reduce the electricians bill to save money – despite the fact that you stated he was an old family friend – I hope that he reads this and can see what type of friend you are, my guess is he probably already knows this.

This list can continue with numbered points but instead I will go into some detail so that new customers can get a real idea of what you are talking about, and see why I made the decision that I did. No doubt most will see that it was a sensible decision.

We pride ourselves on our quality of work and compliance with the building code, but when a situation arises such as this where the customer is not willing to comply then we have no choice but to reassess the situation.

Back in the day I sought advice from other contractors (many of whom are on this site), the police & a lawyer in regard to this, all of whom agreed that the stance I took was the professional approach when dealing with the situation that you created.

The reason that I sought the advice of a lawyer and a police officer was down to your harassment after I had clearly stated my terms for finishing the work.
Both have been made aware of this recent situation and if you continue to pursue this petty item then I will get in contact with them once again.

Business is business but you crossed the line by stating in emails that you would be approaching personal members in my life as well as making a threatening scene at the home depot. Rather than keeping it as a business dispute you threatened to get in contact with friends of mine – hence why I sought legal advice.

Going from this most recent resurrection of your complaint and the creepy way that I have seen you riding around my job site, I am serious about moving forward and getting in contact with the police to gain a restraining order on you.

There are of course bad contractors out there – I do not consider myself as one of these based on the jobs that I do and the happy customers that we provide our services too, but as well as them there are bad clients which is the category that I would certainly place you in.

Every now and again a customer like you will emerge not only this industry but across the consumer world, then a business owner needs to make a decision on whether or not to continue with the business.

When you put a worker in a position where their source of income is jeopardised or ability to complete the job properly comes around, then decisions need to be taken in order to protect ones self.

I can confidently say that it was the correct decision to walk away from you and your project both in a professional and sensible situation as you posed nothing more than a risk which became evident quite early into small job that I did for yourself.

As a business owner I do keep records of these items and emails, therefore I and my lawyer have all of the previous correspondences logged.

It is sad that I am not able to warn others about your behaviour apart from this reply here.

Trying to cheap out and not doing things correctly is not the way that contractors are able to complete a project.

I will take what ever efforts I deem necessary to protect myself and my business if you continue your harassment campaign

Thankfully in all of my time working in Canada there has been very few customers which I have not seen eye to eye with, 9 out of 10 are a joy to work for and I would go back to work for them again and again.
Many of my customers have been repeat customers and also recommended us to their friends and family which I am thankful for and take it as a sign of confidence in my work.

To this day I am still satisfied with the decision that I made and would certainly have no choice but to take the same stance again if a similar position arose.

If this situation has taught me anything about business then it is to go with my initial gut reaction to how a customer acts: when a customer harasses me, doesn’t care about quality work and only cares about the bottom line ($), or when they is willing to go to the lengths that you went to try to defame my character and attack my professional integrity, it’s best to walk away.

You claim in your review that it cost you hundreds in order to complete the job – this is exactly what it would have cost you had I done it… further, it would have cost us both the headache that you imposed upon the two of us. In my email, I had offered to do it for free – you chose to go with another contractor… not sure how this becomes my problem.

You are the only one on this website to give me a 0/10 rating. As everyone can clearly see, my average rating at the time I am writing this, is 9.5/10. This was dropped from 9.8 because of your pettiness. The customers will see that I am worth every penny of high quality work. At the end of the day everyone needs to be properly compensated for the job that we do. Like my customers, I have bills to pay, I have a family to support and as a business owner, a boss, and a responsible citizen I have to make these difficult decisions. I stand by my word as I stand by my work.