Haresh

Additional issues were found with the Alex's paint job. In the days that followed the completion of the painting, I noticed what appeared to be gaps between the quarter round and the floor throughout the house, the appearance of the gap is more noticeable in areas where the floor is tiled in white. At first I thought the quarter round were not installed flat against the floor which caused the appearance of the gaps. However upon looking more closely I realized the appearance of the gap is a result of the tape line at the bottom edge of the quarter round throughout the house. Alex attempted to tape the floor at the base of the quarter round, but instead of taping the floor he taped the bottom edge of the quarter round through the house. Since the quarter round is newly installed wood quarter round, you can see the wood line throughout the house giving the appearance of a gap. As a result of Alex improper taping skills it created the illusion of a gap between the quarter round and the floor. During my consultation with Alex, I had also pointed out to Alex a crack in the wall above one of the arches and requested the gap to be filled before painting; however the crack was not filled and was painted as is. I was not advised that the crack will not be filled. Also during the consultation with Alex I had told him that there are small dings on some of the walls which I wanted to fixed and some area needs a bit of sanding, I came to realize that most of the dings and were not filled and some of the rough patches were not sanded. Alex also painted the ceiling bathroom in my home, about three months after painting, the paint has pealed off in several areas. Paint flakes from the old paint apparently chipped off while painting and were picked up on the roller; the flakes were painted onto the ceiling in several areas. Alex did not take the time to remove the flakes. During my initial discussion with Alex about the color and type of paint to be used, I told Alex that I would like the crown moldings to be painted in satin finish. However, the first day when Alex came to paint the house, he said that it is better to paint the crown molding in a flat paint, and convinced us that plat paint for the crown molding was the way to go. Trusting Alex's recommendation over the color consultant recommendation I decided to have the crown moldings painted in flat paint as the sample section he show us looked ok. However, it turned out to be a bad decision to trust Alex recommendation; the crown moldings look unfinished with the flat paint. Since I have popcorn ceiling, the flat paint on the crown moldings does not create finish look, it created a choppy transition from the wall to crown molding to ceiling. I had also told Alex that I wanted all the trims in the house to be paint in satin finish. However Alex bought pearl finish paint and made the excuse that Benjamin Moore does not carry satin finish paint and said that Benjamin Moore pearl paint is the same as satin finish. I subsequently called the store and the sales rep confirmed that Benjamin Moore does have satin finish paint. I would assume that Alex bought the wrong paint finish and made the excuse that Benjamin Moore does not have satin finish paint. As a professional painter Alex should know that trims are not painted in pearl paint, but semi-gloss as recommended or as requested by the customer. Another issue with the paint job is; I had noticed Alex reused the same roller he had used with the cloud white paint to paint the walls with the snowfall white paint in the lower hallway. The cloud white paint is a darker white paint whereas the Snowfall white paint is a light, slightly creamy white paint, the cloud white paint residue from the roller resulted in the snowfall white wall having a tint of cloud white. The walls of the entire lower floors have to be re painted as the shade created by the reused roller does not blend with the color of the tiled floor. A roller cost a few dollars, you would think he would use a new roller for each paint color, but instead he reused the same roller for different paint colors. Review from other clients claims that Alex has done extensive dry wall repairs, sanding and fixing up of walls etc. etc., however in his response to me he states that he does not do dry wall repairs, it therefore makes me wonder if these reviews are fake as noting these reviews claims he does was done in my home. Now that I am ready to resume the upgrading and decorating of my home, I have recently hired an interior designer to complete my home improvement project as well as another painter to redo the paint job done by Alex. Both the interior designer and the new painter advised me that Alex has done a below standard paint job. The new painter advised me that a professional painter would ensure that all wall surfaces are properly prepared before painting, such as filling cracks and holes, sanding rough areas and any other defects, and pointed out many flaws with Alex paint job. The new painter also advised me that since the door trims are detailed molding with groves they should not have been painted with a roller, that the proper way to paint these types of trims is with a paint brush to give a smooth finish. The interior designer and the new painter as well as three other painters who came to give estimates to redo Alex's work commented that Alex has done a below standard job, has poor workmanship and is not detailed oriented. Alex does not do what he says or promises; I had to constantly watch him to ensure that the job was done properly, when I was unable to monitor his work a lot of things were not done properly. He is definitely not a professional painter.

I have come to regret hiring Alex from Emerald Painting Service to paint the interior of my home. I hired Alex to paint my home after reading many good reviews on Homestars. However, it appears that these reviews are based on appearance of the work that were done and not the quality of the work and workmanship. At first, after the painting was completed, with a fresh coat of paint on the walls the house had a clean and almost new look. Visually it appeared that the job was done properly and was pleasing. However, as the days progressed, I started noticing imperfections in some areas, after inspecting more closely the work that was done, issues became evident of a bad paint job. During the consultation with Alex, I told him that there are many small dents and dings on the walls which I wanted to be fixed and one area of one of the of the walls needed to be repaired and assumed that these fixes and repairs would be done and done properly. I also told him that I wanted a high-quality paint job. However, this was not the case, there are many areas where the dents and dings in the walls were not filled in before painting. A couple areas of the walls that were repaired were done very badly; the areas were not properly filled with dry wall compound and sanded smoothly before painting. There is a crack over one of the archway, the crack was not filled, but painted over leaving the crack visible. The door facings were painted with a roller brush instead of using a paint brush ruining the details of the moldings by leaving a textured finish instead of a smooth finish. After noticing the textured surface of the molding, I said to Alex that I thought that the facings and trims are supposed to be painted with a brush for a high-quality smooth finish, I was told by Alex that no one uses paint brush to paint trims as it would take a long time and that all the painters in Canada uses rollers to paint trims. This I know is not true as the painters from two different companies who recently painted one of my friends and one of cousin houses used paint brushes for all trim work for a high-quality smooth finish and did a far better job than Alex. Alex also wanted to paint the some of the crown molding with a roller, however after seeing the way it looked with the roller, I had to tell him to leave the crown molding not to paint them, however he ended up painting them with a brush at my request. A roller is used to paint trims for a quick and easy application process to finish the job quickly; however, a brush is used to achieve a smoother high-quality finish as explained by painting professionals. I have spent thousands of hard-earned dollars to have most of the door facing and baseboards in my home replaced twice before having them painted only to have them ruined by a sloppy paint job done by Alex. Brand new painted trims and moldings are supposed to be have a smooth finish and the details of the trims and molding are supposed to be enhanced by the paint, the paint job that was done on the trim in my house is very sloppy with runny paint on the baseboards that and makes the baseboards appears to be old and appears as if they were painted with several layers of paint ruining the details of the baseboards. The trim contractor took his time to ensure that all the wall moldings, trims and baseboards were properly installed with precision and all angels aligned perfectly and did a quality job, all of the contractor’s workmanship were ruined by a bad and sloppy paint job. Too much paint was applied on some parts of the moldings creating thick paint blob spots and paint runs on the wall moldings and the baseboards in many areas. There are many sloppy areas where the paint from painting the crown moldings were smeared on the ceiling creating uneven, sloppy lines between the ceiling and crown molding. Again, the contractor took his time to create clean caulk lines when the crown moldings were installed, this was ruined by sloppy paint lines. Paint was also smeared onto wall papered walls from painting the baseboards. When the baseboards were replaced on the wall papered wall, the contractor tried very hard to protect the wallpaper from damage only to have then get ruined by paint. Gaps between the door facings and walls were not filled leaving choppy paint lines between the walls and door facings. Drop cloth were not spread in many areas resulting in tiny specks of paint on the hardwood floor. These tiny, scattered specks of paint took a lot of time to remove. Alex does not pay attention to details, unless and I pointed out something to him as he was painting it would not get fixed. He had also mentioned to me that he will be going to the store to get some paint and I asked him to buy a different color paint for the laundry room as I had changed my mind on the color. He ended up not going to the paint store; did not inform me he was no longer going to the store and painted the laundry room in the original color. Had I known he was not going to go to the paint store, I would have gone to get the paint myself. I though a professional painter would pay attention to details, inform customers of any issues, and let the customer now if what the customer requested will not get done. I had also requested for the trim to be painted with satin paint; the trims were painted with pearl finish paint which I am not happy about. The bathroom ceiling was not properly prepared before painting, resulting in the paint starting to peel in the corners. The first set of guests who come to my home commented that some of the walls appears as if only one coat of paint were applied as there are some shadowy areas. Also, in some area, dust was picked up by the roller and paint brush and were painted on to the surface instead of having them removed. When I pointed out some of the thing that which I though a professional painter is supposed to do, I was told by Alex that I have special request. When you hire someone to do a job, it is expected that they would take their time to do the job properly especially if they are a professional. It is disappointing and upsetting to see that some of the basic things that should have been done were not done properly, especially after spending my hard-earned money to upgrade my home. I feel disgusted that someone will come into my home, do such a sloppy job, and take my hard-earned money. Alex’s bad paint job has let me with a dilemma will put me into additional expenses to have all the molding stripped and repainted or replaced complete. Painting of a home should help to add value and to beautify the home, not cause stress and additional expenses to the homeowner to redo a job that should have been done right the first time. I will not hire Alex nor recommend him to anyone looking for a high quality and detailed paint job.

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