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PostPosted: Mon Jan 12, 2004 1:07 pm 
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Joined: Wed Sep 04, 2002 8:20 pm
Posts: 49
Location: Long Beach West End, NY
I've had the oddest of experiences with this place so far.

When I first when in there, they were very nice, knowledgeable and helpful. I was very impressed.

However, after the first designer/rep, Camille, came out to my house and measured up everything, she never followed up. I called her and just happen to catch her on her way heading out on vacation and got my quote of $750 for a mica countertop. This was a bit more than her original rough estimate of $600 as a ballpark figure, which I questioned. She said that the measurements came out a bit bigger than was originally estimated by me. Okay - fair enough. Unfortunately, the rest of the things I was looking for - floor tile, bath tile, kitchen wall tile - those were now on hold due to lack of follow-up. I never then heard back from Camille or anybody at Centre Cabinet for about two weeks, so I went in there and spoke to the owner.

He said something about her not showing up for work when expected and that she likely won't have a job to come back to. She left no details behind, so the owner (Mike) asked his other employee, Mike, to go measure up the counter-tops in my house from scratch. I was also hoping to deal with my tile needs as well.

Mike measured things up and told me he would have a quote for me either by the end of the day or definitely by the next day. Unfortunately, I never heard back from him. Strike two? I called their office on Saturday looking to talk to the owner and happen to get Mike (the sales rep) on the phone - he told me "oh, i thought that i called you back." Hmmm - nice way to do business, right? :?

I told him that he never got back to me. He seemed a bit confused and then told me that the price was $600. I thought it was pretty nifty how the price dropped a whopping $150 between Camille's quote and Mike's quote FOR THE VERY SAME ITEM! :x

I never did get to talk to the owner that day to express my concerns. And the owner did not return my call. Well, perhaps his employee didn't prefer to pass on that message to him either. So, I left an answering machine message.

Today I spoke with the owner. He told me that his office manager erased all of the messages off of the machine. Interesting coincidence - seems that these people have lots of trouble with basic use of the phone system.

In any event, I expressed my concerns to him about both employees not following-up, yet he stood by his employees. I was pretty confused - I don't believe I was even ever offered an apology. Now he simply pressured me as to whether or not I wanted to proceed. I further expressed my concerns about their lack of follow-up and asked if I should expect that the countertop would actually show up. It's at about that point that he simply hung up on me. I called back and his rep, Mike, answered the phone - and he immediately hung up on me as well. :twisted:

That's just a seriously messed-up way to treat people. Whether I'm even a customer or a non-customer isn't even relevant at this point. They'd already botched everything with me, and instead of apologizing for taking up my valuable time and not following-up, they further offended me by hanging up on me. I was never anything other than courteous. I have a very soft-spoken demeanor on the phone, so I never come across as aggressive or even angry, yet two people in his office found it appropriate to hang up on me, including the owner himself. :evil:

I guess I should have known that these people were not going to be reliable when Camille originally showed up at least a full two hours late for her appointment with me and did not bring the tile samples that she was going to bring, and then never followed-up.

I just don't get it. :roll:

Any recommendations out there for a MICA countertop place that treats people with some courtesy and respect AND knows what they're doing? :?:

Thanks.

Mike


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 Post subject: centre cabinat reply
PostPosted: Wed Jan 14, 2004 6:55 pm 
I did use centre cabintet. I also had a difficult time trying to get things done there. It took Camille several months before she got my design of cabinets complete, but since I wasn't in a rush, I did not see that as a warning sign.
I have a feeling I got ripped off, but I never checked b/c I wanted to support a local business instead of Home Depot. I am afraid to check b/c I will just get angry at myself :evil:
I love my cabinets, and they will be in my kitchen soon, but they run a crazy show over there--very disorganized. Camille and Mike were always nice, but don't seem to be able to keep up with the business.
Also, don't take Camille's recommendation on a contractor. It has been 5 months and my stuff is still in storage....ahhhh!
:cry:
I agree with you, there is no reason why they should hang up on you. That is no way to run a business and if they piss too many people off, word spreads through LB like wildfire!
All in all, I now go to Home Depot..... :D


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 Post subject:
PostPosted: Wed Jan 14, 2004 7:50 pm 
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Joined: Wed Sep 04, 2002 8:20 pm
Posts: 49
Location: Long Beach West End, NY
Hi there Cabbie - Welcome to the forums here and thanks for responding. Your response is really worthwhile.

This is precisely the reason that I started up this Long Beach message board. Long Beach is both a big town and a small town at the same time. Like you point out, word usually gets out pretty easily and quickly on local matters, local businesses, etc. However, with a message board like this, it will hopefully facilitate sharing more info so that the next person might perhaps benefit from us sharing our experience - at least they might be able to make a more informed decision. For example, when I first did not hear back from Camille right away, I figured that it was due to the holiday season, etc. People had other priorities, so I basically allowed quite a lot of time to pass by. I'm a particularly forgiving and understanding person - she had otherwise made a fairly good initial impression on me, although I should have seen the handwriting when she showed up at my house a couple hours late and without any tile samples as she and I had discussed.

The sad part of it is that I think that she appears to be very good at what she does - I believe that it is only the business itself which is run so poorly and is ultimately the owner's responsibility. Nonetheless, they are useless to me regardless of the cause.

I too always try to support local business first when it makes sense. I have so far found them to be surprisingly competitive in pricing, so I do not think you got ripped off :)

I'm not sold on jumping on the Home Depot bandwagon yet for the countertop - I'm not even certain if they offer the same selection of mica tops. I'm also not sure if they offer Mica over plywood, versus over "flakeboard."

In any event, I think it's worth noting that from what I understand, Centre Cabinet has no association with Centre Millwork. In fact, I have ordered several building supply items (doors, durarock, etc.) from Centre Millwork and I've found them to be extremely easy to deal with and very efficient. They will deliver just about any stocked item next-day for free and with custom items (doors) that are being ordered, they get them in the next day and deliver them free the day after that. They've been perfectly reliable and have even accommodated taking back some materials that were special ordered for an alternate version of the product. That's great service.

Unfortunately, people may associate the two companies because they share the same building and have similar business names. I was considering discussing this with the owner of Centre Millwork since I'm certain they would not want to tarnish their name.

Regarding your tile-guy recommendation, my best guess is that she recommended "Marty" - that's who she recommended to me, but I was not impressed with him after he came by and tried to sell me some other jobs I had no interest in - particularly, he wanted to do plumbing work for me, but he did not seem very savvy in plumbing from our brief discussion. I didn't ask him about plumbing work. Ultimately, his quote was not competitive - it was a bit more than the other three quotes I'd gotten.

Of the other three quotes, I have seen the work of one individual and was very impressed with it - so I can perhaps give you a second-hand referral based upon that if you still are looking for somebody.

Incidentally, I hope you will register on the message board so that you can more easily participate. For example, if you register, you would receive an automatic notification of any replies to this topic such as my reply here :wink:

In addition, I have lots of future plans for expanding the website, though I've gotta focus on finishing the work on my house first 8)

Again, thanks for the great input and I hope you'll share all the gory details of how things work out.

In the future, I'll being adding a photo gallery so that you can even post photos of your finished product if you wish. I hope to do that sooner rather than later :)

Mike


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 Post subject: REBUTTLE
PostPosted: Thu Feb 19, 2004 11:00 am 
In order to set the record straight,I am compelled to answer these acusations in a TRUTHFUL manor. In the case of wich you have written you FAILED TO MENTION that YOUR ATTITUDE after your initial dealings with camille were not even close to being cordial and friendly as YOU know! You accused my staff of being incompetent, interupted a meeting with another client(wich was rude enough) and in fact you were quite boisterous. At the time you interupted my client I took the time out to address your situation!.
This is the most rediculous thing I have heard in a long time.
You know the rediculous phone situation was in fact,you called out office 13 times in 1 day!!!!!!!!! Do you have anything else better to do michael?
The people of LONG BEACH SHOULD STAY FAR AWAY FROM YOU MICHAEL!


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 Post subject: REBUTTLE
PostPosted: Thu Feb 19, 2004 11:51 am 
CONTINUED :roll:
AT THE TIME YOU INTERUPTED THE OTHER CLIENT, I LEFT MY DESK AND THE CLIENT, TO ADDRESS YOUR NEEDS. I IMMIEDIATLY ASSIGNED MIKE TO YOU. BOTH YOU AND HIM LEFT OUR FACILITYTO GO TO YOUR HOUSE WITH TILE SAMPLES AND COUNTERTOP CHIPS FOR YOU TO MAKE A DECISION. AT THIS TIME YOU CALLED ME AND ASKED FOR A BETTER PRICE BECAUSE YOU WERE DOING SEVERAL KITCHENS IN APTS. YOU HAVE AND WANTED TO ORDER TILES AND COUNTERTOPS FOR EACH.
I DID AUTHORIZE THE LOWER PRICE--YOU FAILED TO ORDER AND CONTINUED TO HARASS US ALL. I HUNG UP ON YOU BECAUSE YOU WERE NOT WILLING TO PAY THE DISCOUNTED PRICE FOR THE SERVICE AND MATERIALS YOU WANTED!
I AM SUPRISED THAT THE GOOD PEOPLE OF LONG BEACH AND THE SURROUNDING COMMUNITIES WOULD LOOK AT A WEBSITE THAT IS FOR
C H R O N I C C O M P L A I N E R S WITH NO REAL SUBSTANCE TO THERE COMPLAINTS EXCEPT TO DEFAME AND HURT THE REPUTATION OF A BUSINESS THAT HAS OPERATED OPENLY AND HONESTLY IN THIS COMMUNITY FOR THE PAST 23 YEARS! IF THIS WAS NOT TRUE WHY DO THE BULK OF LOCAL CONTRACTORS AND HOMEOWNERS CONTINUE TO COME HERE TO CENTRE CABINET?
PLEASE GO AWAY YOU ARE NOT WORTHY OF ANY FURTHER CONSIDERATION BY US OR THE GOOD PEOPLE OF LONG BEACH!


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 Post subject: NOTICE
PostPosted: Thu Feb 19, 2004 3:58 pm 
:roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll:


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 Post subject:
PostPosted: Thu Feb 19, 2004 4:26 pm 
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Joined: Thu Feb 19, 2004 4:06 pm
Posts: 1
I'm hard pressed to believe you had such a difficult time with Center Cabinet. I had my kitchen and 2 bathrooms done by them, and I could not be any happier. They seemed to be friendly enough and my kitchen is beautiful. I had 1 damaged cabinet door and it was replaced within a week with no questions asked!! I should tell you that I also had a countertop done and it looks great as well. Why dont you go some place else and stop whinning like a girl, nobody cares about your miniscule little problems. I mean there are people starving and sleeping in the street for Christ sake.


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PostPosted: Fri Feb 20, 2004 2:25 pm 
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Joined: Wed Apr 03, 2002 11:33 pm
Posts: 140
Location: Long Beach, NY
In founding this open forum, I intend to stick with a no-censorship policy. However, while there are not yet a formal set of Terms of Service in place, forum abuse is an issue that will need to be addressed.

The logs show that the last two user posts are from the same IP address (ie. they came from the same computer.) Using dual identities is contradictory to the purpose of these forums and thus will be disallowed in our Terms of Service.

This also begins to force my hand for requiring user registration before posting on more of our forum areas.

For full disclosure to our users, I am posting this notice while leaving the above posts in place as-is. Users can draw their own inferences and conclusions.

Here is a copy from the IP logs:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
IP address for this post
66.114.68.162 [ 1 Post ] [ Look up IP address ]

Users posting from this IP address
Guest [ 3 Posts ] ("JMitch9398" posted as a Guest.)

JOESHMO [ 1 Post ]

Other IP addresses this user has posted from
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Hopefully this information is useful to forum users.

Thanks.

Mike


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