Fooled by Flooring Contractor

You have seen the ads on social media. You have seen the ads on TV.  Express Flooring will beat any offer by 15% or your flooring is free!

We called a couple flooring contractors to come out to give us an estimate but they could not give us a definite date to meet because they were so busy. I saw the Express Flooring ads, I called and they came out the next day to give us an estimate. The sales representative had a “polished” presentation and after she did some measurements, she gave us an estimate. It was way higher than we expected. She went on about a “lifetime guarantee’ and started negotiating the price. She lowered the estimate, some for this and some for that and shaved a couple thousand from the estimate. She had several vinyl planks and talked about how “Express Flooring” only used the very best quality products on the market. My wife did ask “how the planks fit together” but the sales rep only had short partial planks that could not fit together. After a few hours we wore down and signed the intent contract and paid a $5,000 deposit. That should have made us hesitate but it was late and we were tired and we have been waiting several years to replace our worn carpet.

A couple weeks later a large truck pulled up into our driveway full of new flooring. The contractors came into our house and notified us they needed to pull up carpet in every room (4 bedrooms, 4 closets, the hallway, hallway closet, the formal dining area and the large living room. We were caught off guard. We did have all the 4 bedrooms empty but not the formal dining room not the large living room. The contractors explained that before they can start, they need to check the foundation in every room with a “level” to make sure the foundation is level. They pointed out that they have never seen a “level” foundation ever. They explained that if the foundation is not level it would require them to pour cement over the low areas, because every room must have a level foundation before flooring can be installed.

The Express Flooring sales rep failed to tell us about the foundation needed to be leveled before installation. The sales rep failed to tell us that foundations are never level and all rooms will need cement added. The contractors pulled up the carpet in every room and explained that every room would require cement to be added to level the foundation before installation can start. Then they told us the “cement leveling” is not included in our negotiated price with Express Flooring and the final cost will be “two to ten thousand dollars” more that the contract price. Our carpet was already pulled up in every room and we asked the contractors to leave. We decided to cancel because we were not prepared to pay more than the contract price especially because the “Express Flooring sales rep” never mentioned the price would be substantially higher than the contract price. The contractor never did unload any flooring from the truck. The contractor left to return the flooring.

We called Express Flooring. We explained that we were never told about a “leveling fee” of $2.000 to $10,000 more than the contract price. We told them we wanted to cancel. The Express Flooring agent then told us, since 3 days had expired from the original contract day, that we would forfeit our $5,000 deposit for their “restocking fee.”

We explained that the sales rep never told us about any 3-day cancellation policy or deposit forfeiture. That agent told us he would have the “manager-in-charge-of San Antonio operations come to our home the next day. We learned that day that Express Flooring is based in Arizona. The agent we were talking to was in Arizona.

The following day a different sales rep showed up. Apparently the San Antonio manager-in-charge was too busy.

This sales rep tried to convince us to continue, that they would pay “some” of the leveling costs (that we did not expect to pay). We did not want to continue working with Express Flooring. She told us that we would not get our $5,000 deposit back. Then she left. Express Flooring did not communicate with us for several days.

We talked to a friend, he is a long time lawyer and retired judge, about our situation. He explained to us by Texas law, the Express Flooring sales rep must “orally explain” their (3-day) cancellation policy, during the initial meeting and that on the contract we had to “acknowledge” that we read and understood the cancellation policy. In fact, he sent us a section of Texas law stating that the cancellation policy must be given orally and there must be an acknowledgment on the contract. The “Arizona written” Express Flooring contract does not have an acknowledgement space for the customer to initial or sign “regarding their cancellation policy”. We left phone messages for their San Antonio manager, “that we deserved our deposit back”, but we were ignored.