Kennedy Floors

Review: We hired [redacted] to finish our new and recently installed hardwood floors (approx. 1100 sq ft). In short, [redacted] work was extremely sloppy. The issues include: 1) Drip, brush and mop marks visible throughout (you can see where he stopped one stroke and started the next); 2) Areas with little to no stain or polyurethane; 3) Improper and inadequate sanding and vacuuming; 4) Bubbles, trapped dirt & debris marks in quite a few large patches; 5) The poly was applied too thick; 6) Stain was spilled and not cleaned off of the front of our new marble fireplace; 7) Just inside our front door entrance is a large area (approx 4 x 27) of ruined floor with a completely different color and finish. 8) It seems that [redacted]e did little to no trim work. He did not finish the edges surrounding our fireplace (approx. 1/4 to of bare wood is visible around most of it) and he did not finish underneath of our baseboard heaters.Shortly after the floors had dried and we realized how bad they looked, we called Kennedy to express our dissatisfaction. [redacted]e came out two additional times in consecutive days (for an hour or two each day) in an attempt to fix his work. We wanted to give him the opportunity to make it right. It only made things worse. [redacted]e buffed and applied another coat of poly to 2 of the 5 rooms. Some of the bubbling and dirt was removed but the colors and finish were now completely ruined and uneven (light and dark areas, dull satin finish mixed with something slightly less dull with no shine). [redacted]e arrived around 3pm in the afternoon one of those days when it was already getting dark and he could not see well (he should have arrived early in the morning when lighting was bright and optimal). [redacted]e had even told my wife that he was frustrated with how our floors looked.Kennedy collected the payments from us in-person very quickly. The final installment was collected before [redacted]e had finished so we had zero chance to evaluate the job before the money was paid.Desired Settlement: We simply request a full refund of the money we paid Kennedy ($2,400). We need to redo this job from scratch and feel that is a very fair proposal. Further, Kennedy agreed to the full refund multiple times and failed to deliver when it came time. In addition to offering to pay another vendor directly on our behalf, Kennedy offered to redo the floors himself another unacceptable proposal as we now no longer trust him to do the job properly. We simply want our floors to look how they should.

Business

Response:

The floors looked good and the customer said the floors looked great. After the floors had been done and weeks had past, we had a message left from the customer about the floors. During the weeks that had past the customer had workers coming in and out of their home and was having construction still going on in the home. We still returned to put another (extra) buff & coat on floor, but the customer wanted it done the way they wanted because his wife did not like the smell of the poly. I expressed to the customer to let me buff & coat all floors (the way it should be done/right way) but they refused and wanted me to do spot touch ups and coat only certain rooms. I expressed I was not comfortable with this but still made the customer happy and did it the way they wanted it done but still expressed it was not the way to do this. The wife was at the house and stayed and watched me do the coats. At the end she thanked me and said she was happy. She even called my wife after I left and asked for some extra stain. Her husband then called few weeks later and expressed he still was not happy, but again he still had workers working in the house. He said he had other floor companies come in and they said the work was poor. I asked for the company name and the customer got very nervous and asked why we needed to know. Finally, the customer gave the company name and I called the company. I was told they said no such thing and they also said they told the customer the floors did not look bad.

With all this we still wanted the customer to be happy and told them we would go back and do a buff and coat. I would just express to the customer again once the floors are done you should not have any workers and/or construction done in their home once the floors are done. I have been doing floors for over 30 years and I have many customers who are returning customers. I also work with many builders who know my work.

Consumer

Response:

Review: [redacted]

I am rejecting this response because:

We had a bad experience with the Kennedys. In one half of the house our "finished" floors have obvious swirl sanding marks, unevenly stained areas and areas around baseboards that weren't stained at all. The work was incredibly sloppy – stain was splattered onto the baseboards and some baseboards were damaged by the sander.
In the other half of the house there is polyurethane that oozed out in between the seams creating hard, little beads. Mike's explanation was that, "it happens" and that they would wear off. Five months later there still are beads in between EVERY board on that side of the house and it is uncomfortable to walk there in bare feet.
The Kennedys promised over and over agin that they would come to do touch ups. Eventually they stopped answering our calls and texts unless we called from unfamiliar numbers. After the fact, we found out that Mike Kennedy isn't even licensed to refinish floors. The Kennedys gave us a relatively low quote compared to others. It turns out that you get what you pay for. Don't go with the Kennedys.