After the tumultuous pre-renovation discussions that happened with them, right after I came back from my New York Trip, the renovation itself did proceed without much of an issue, things went as smoothly as they could and even though I found out I was undercharging them for certain items, I was still making a bit of a profit from the overall renovation.
The biggest issue with this renovation, aside from my disdain towards Jenny as a client, is the Brick Wall that they requested. I had undercharged them previously and told them I had to charge them a little higher to recoup my losses, Jonny was all for it, he was very understanding of my predicament, but then Jenny came in and stared a huge fuss about how I was trying to earn more to make up for the huge discount I had given them earlier, essentially guilt tripping me about the additional charges and the whole fiasco ended to her benefit.
So the renovation starts and things went well, then the brick walls came in and Jenny started to nitpick about it when she saw the wall half completed, her main complaint was that the colour wasn't what she wanted, so I tried to convince her that it would look different once it was completely done up, sending her sample photos of how the end result of the wall would look like and that was able to placate her for a while.
The kicker here is I have showed her the brick samples before and I have told her that the bricks won't be pure white, that there will be a bit of brown and cream speckled throughout, she was initially a bit concerned then but she accepted it because that was the lightest shade available for the brick wall she had requested. This was before we started the renovation, I have told her about it before and suddenly she somehow conveniently forgot about it.
Anyway, now that the wall is done, I was fully anticipating for Jenny to complain about it, I mean it is inevitable that she will have issues with it, it is Jenny after all, can't expect any positive outcome when dealing with her. Well, today is the day because Jonny called me about an hour ago, sharing his concerns with the brick wall, and I am 100% certain that he is just the mouthpiece, the one who has the real issue is without a doubt Jenny.
Reason for the complaint? The colour wasn't what they were expecting.
I have showed them the actual pieces in my showroom weeks before we started the renovation, I have explained to them the colour would not be the same as the one I have done up in my 3D and they never listen. My tiler has actually done a pretty good job spreading out the darker bricks out evenly so it doesn't look too patchy but because it's not a consistent light colour throughout, Jenny isn't happy with it.
Every time I try to do a disclaimer to them, it's like I am talking to a fucking wall, because they don't listen. I don't have it on paper, on video or text message, it's my word against theirs and they can just simply say...
"I don't remember you telling me that."
... they haven't and I am hoping they don't use that. I haven't met any customer of mine who have said that before and I really hope I don't because you really have to be a literal scumbag to be able to abuse your rights as a customer and lie through your rotten teeth.
We are going to meet this week to see if there are any solutions and I honestly don't know how it will end. I mean the wall is done, the bricks have been installed, the only way this ends well for everyone is for them to accept the wall the way it is. Worst case scenario is we tear everything down and redo, but I really don't see the point in that because their issue is with the colour and the supplier themselves don't even have control on how the colour will turn out.
I knew from the start that J&J's project will have problems and I was absolutely right, I honestly can't picture their project beyond this brick wall issue right now, but I will definitely be facing even more problems when the carpentry goes up because that is when a lot of my homeowners start finding problems, I am not looking forward to the dozens of "dings" my phone will be getting from their text messages.
This is the part of the renovation process that I hate, my last 3 projects that I was doing before I flew to New York were so smooth sailing, I guess having this project go to shit is the universe's way of balancing all that out.
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