Russell in Oakville

Accountability 101: two groups of people: “renters” - Do not take accountability for their actions and “owners” –Do. Accountability, correctly understood and effectively applied, produces results. And with those results comes a level of personal satisfaction that can be achieved in no other way. David and his team, need to make a choice that they will take accountability for being seen as a “renter” and that they would want to become seen as an “owner.” Making the choice to operate Above the Line and take accountability for their actions and overcome the obstacles they face is an essential skill that anyone who manages and leads people must learn to master. When you create that level of personal accountability first, your ability to execute both personally and organizationally becomes all that more effective. When you skip that step and try to execute on a foundation that lacks this personal accountability, then you get problems, not solutions; mistakes not innovation; frustration, not motivation; and excuses instead of results. This is what I experienced as a customer who paid for a professional service to be executed and instead of getting this service, I got denial from the owner, excuses from the staff for their shoddy workmanship which they claim was down to "human error" and therefore should be acceptable and lastly I got blame. I was blamed for been unreasonable and was told that I would never be satisfied. They further told me that structurally the fence was sound, but I was been picky about the aesthetics. When I continued to tell them that they needed to come up with a workable solution to rectify the fence, the workman aka project manager lost it and said that he was leaving. He wanted to take the fence down and leave with it. At this stage I had to ask my wife to call the Oakville police department. Luckily the fence distributor was on site as this was the first time they were installing a fence and he calmed the situation down. I then spent a few hours with them trying to solve the problem (still not sure if I should sent them an invoice for my time). The previous day, the owner blasted me that he had to come to my house on a Friday afternoon and lay a concrete slab for the pool heater (which is in accordance with the gas code) to be installed on because I had refused to use his primary gas technician and the one I was now going to use insisted there had to be a slab. Sorry, Dave, you charged me $250 to do the job, don't you remember!! On the day they came to finish the installation, I took the day off work to make sure my wife was not left to fend for herself. She had also been talked badley to the day before from the owner. On this day, I arrived back from the shops, and the owner was outside talking to his staff. He did not have the professional decency to greet me let alone try to resolve the differences we had the day before. Been courteous and professional does not only apply when things are going your way, but should also apply when the customer is not satisfied or when there is a dispute. This way you would be able to reach a compromise and find an agreed solution to the problem. David and your team, enjoy the $ 5500 I spent with you and let’s hope you all become "owners" one day. I will be looking forward to the response from Terry, who I dealt with from the onset of my relationship with Total Tech Pools. I never had a problem with him and always found him courteous and respectful. As I told him, I never got a second quote on any of the pool equipment I bought and in fact, he had my credit card that he would debit as he needed. All I wanted in return was a professional installation and a courteous discussion on how to solve the problems we encountered. Update to response by TTP: Seen i am such a difficult client, thought i would upload a picture of the professionally installed product that they were going to leave and deemed to be acceptable. 'A picture is worth a thousand words'. By the way, i had already paid them half the amount quoted for the fence as a deposit and they were debiting my credit card at their own discretion. They forgot to mention that when they had under quoted me for the fence by $ 130, i agreed in good faith to split the error 50/50 with them after i had accepted the quote (i must be very unreasonable as they say). As for changing the conditions "unilaterally", i am sure i mentioned that i did phone and inform Terry that there was a change and he did tell me not to worry as they would work around it. Yes it may have been a misunderstanding and we agree on this, but take some responsibility for the advise you gave me on the call. You are supposed to be the professionals that understand the work at hand. You can't lay it all on me. Not sure why i should have to accept below par work and this now labels me in your eyes as been a difficult and unreasonable customer. I guess you had to throw in the 'abusive language' line as you are trying your hardest to discredit me. Pretty lame and predictable. By threaten you, you mean phone the police! The last time i looked, it was a crime to remove goods from someone's property, and yes i had paid for half of it. The remaining half was for the installation which you could not seem to get right.