Love Your Stairs

We met Rizwan and really liked him. He put together a quote that was about $1,200 more than other quotes we had but we felt like he would do a better job than the others. He was organized and had a wool carpet option we really liked. He ordered the carpet and kept us updated on timing. He set up installation on a Monday morning with his installer Mike, just under one month from when we placed our order. Mike showed up on time and started the project, and was very pleasant throughout the time he was working. Mike completed the project quickly, got on the phone about another carpet install and then announced that he was done and left very quickly. I was surprised that our living room carpet was full of loose threads from him cutting the pieces on it, and that our new stair runner was also covered in loose threads and fluff (many large enough to pick up by hand). As he was leaving, I took a quick look up and down the stairs to make sure things looked ok. It seemed fine, and overall the carpet looked great, except for the threads/fluff all over each step. Frustratingly, I got our vacuum out and had to clean up the living room (cutting area) and the entire set of stairs. While vacuuming I noted that there were two areas with thread pulls on the new carpet (where the threads were still attached) and two corner joints that were not done very well (carpet threads were missing and the beige carpet backing was exposed in plain view). Paying the premium we did, we expected this to be professional, clean and not require much of our involvement to ensure a quality outcome. I contacted Rizwan and sent photos to him. He was apologetic and surprised that his installer left without cleaning up. The installer returned an hour later (which is an uncomfortable situation, even though we are the ones paying), looked and agreed that he should have caught those problem areas. He repaired both with glue and everything looked great after he was done. I contacted Rizwan to let him know that the installer came back and resolved everything. I then proceeded to pay the remaining amount from the invoice (50%) via e-transfer. I did not hear back from Rizwan with either a follow-up customer service call on our inconvenience, or confirmation that he got the payment. He did contact me once he saw this review on Homestars. In all, the carpet runner looks fantastic and feels great under our feet walking on the stairs. We are very happy with the end product, but not necessarily the process. We relied heavily on Homestar ratings in making our decision to pay a premium to have this done with minimal interruption or inconvenience to us. Unfortunately this company did not live up to its super high ratings on this particular day, but they were still pleasant and we did get a final product we are happy with (both carpet and the overall installation except for the problem areas). Everyone can have an "off" day, especially when relying on a sub-contractor (I assume) to do the installation work. I think this was their "off" day, which was unfortunate for us. Other quotes for our 3 section stairs (high quality wool carpet in contemporary design) ranged from $2,200-$2,800, and this company was $3,960. It was likely not worth the premium on this particular day unfortunately.

One final issue is that when Rizwan first looked at our stairs, we talked about one of the wood steps being cracked near the edge and how it moved when you walked on it. I knew it needed to be fixed before installing the carpet to ensure safety of it not breaking at some point. Rizwan mentioned that his company fixed such issues, as he noted that they also build new stairs for people. I understood (possibly misunderstood) this to mean that his installer would fix this crack when he showed up for the carpet runner install. When Mike showed up, he had no idea how to fix that crack. I then proceeded to glue and nail the step to fix it myself, and then Mike carpeted over it. Luckily I own a contracting business and know how to fix a step myself, but most would not and may have also been confused by remedying this situation. It would not have made sense to install a carpet runner until this step was fixed. The communication on this could have been clearer on both sides prior to the installation day, which is equally my fault.

Follow-up: Rizwan has since dropped off a gift card and a small carpet out of some extra carpet for us. He has apologized and continued to follow-up with us, which increased my confidence in recommending him to friends, so I increased our rating of him from 7 to 8. The stair runner looks great and our dog Sawyer is much happier getting up and down the stairs with the added traction!