We hired Robert Dow/ RMD Sales & Service in October 2014 to build our new home. We had some reservations about him being able to commit to our job since he was in the process of building his own new home, but he reassured us that our project would be his top priority. We heard he was presently in a legal dispute with a former customer, but his explanation seemed reasonable (blaming the other party) and we decided to give him the benefit of the doubt. However to be safe, we decided to go with paying him an hourly rate rather than getting locked into a contract, he gave us the option of changing the agreement to a contract job at a later date if we chose to. We offered to find him some help on the project via hutterites that we know, he said he'd just as soon source his own help. Things got started quite well, Robert comes across as smooth and professional. He got our permits in place, our home warranty through his company and insurance. He sourced the materials and labor. We had problems from the start with the people he hired to complete various jobs. From the footing, to the blue prints, all on his recommendations and all had issues. After just a couple weeks into the job, he started consistently showing up late, often 11am, and leaving early. When we tried to discuss with him, we were told by his wife that since we decided to go with an hourly rate instead of a contract, that he didn't owe us an explanation, and would work when he could. He had continual trouble finding help to work on the house with him and often showed up for a work day alone. We pressed him to please find a crew/few guys to work with so the job could move along faster, and he asked us if we could also try to source help. Any time we would address our concerns with him we ended up getting irate phone calls, text's and emails from his wife. He had always been paid up to date. She demanded payment the day he invoiced, even though sometimes we hadn't gotten the invoice via email until evening and he had gone home and would often go day's without showing up. He didn't work for over a week at one point and she accused us of having financial problems when we simply hadn't seen him, and his check was ready. He took a week off in December for a family funeral, we were completely understanding about that downtime. One day when Robert didn't show up on the jobsite we text him to find out if we should be expecting him that day, and promptly got an angry phone call from his wife yelling and swearing about how he had been busy at home working on their own water tank. He mentioned that he had 2 guys who could come and work with him, after a few days of him making excuses for them and them not showing up. We reached out to another construction company in Leduc and hired a few guys ourselves to work with him. After that we decided that since we were already into him for over $35,000.00 and the house was still not even halfway to lockup stage, we would like to get a contract price after all. He was really milking the hourly wage. On Friday the 16th, we sent him an email and asked if he could give us a contract price including labor to take the job from its current stage to lock up. We mentioned to him that we had just had a conversation with him on site expressing concern about the costs and he had thrown around the number of $20-$25,000.00 to finish to lock up, so could we get that in contract form. We didn't hear back from him all weekend, and assumed we would sit down and discuss it on Monday. Monday morning he emailed the crew we hired and told them the job was shut down and not to come, he showed up at the jobsite when we were not around, cleared out all of his tools and equipment and left. Meanwhile we were not there and assumed he was working. His wife sent us an email to appease up before we figured out what was going on, told us he wouldn't be on site for a day or 2 while he was out making arrangements for the contract and could they please get paid to date ASAP. She even asked if we could mail the check when we had always given it to him in person. Trusting them, I let them know where they could find the check that we had waiting to give him from the previous Friday, he went inside our home, took the check straight to the bank and certified it. By lunchtime he was gone, had his money, and stopped answering our calls and texts. I text his wife and mentioned we were having trouble reaching him and she said she'd pass the message along. If Robert Dow didn't want to complete the job for whatever reason (he's always got a list of great excuses) He could have sat down with us, let us know and given us the necessary information to move on and find someone else. Since he was clearly too cowardly to face us, he could have emailed us, quit and been on his way. He left us with no warning & no explanation. We do not even have copies of our home warranty or insurance. His actions were shady, cowardly and deceitful. We have since heard more bad reviews about him, heard ours is not the only job he left incomplete, and heard hes had more than one litigation with previous customers, his story was always that people were trying to screw him out of money. But we had not investigated thoroughly before getting started with him. We decided to leave this review and information to hopefully spare another potential customer from these stresses. We also found out that before he left our job site that Monday he had a meeting with another potential customer planning to build a $2million home, and told this man he was available to start immediately. Perhaps he just say more money on the horizon and dropped us for that? We were thankfully able to contact this man and let him know what happened to us. He can decide for himself if he wants to gamble his hard earned $$ and his new home on an unprofessional coward with an angry wife. At any point Robert Dow could have been professional & decent, given us notice, or explained why he was leaving, or even a simple email or text to say he wouldn't be back. Would we have been upset? Worried? Of course, but it would have been better than how he chose to leave things and certainly more professional. I would expect if he replies to this review it will be full of excuses. One thing he does have going for him is charisma, he knows how to sell himself. And he always has a prize wining excuse, never accountable. Proceed with caution.
RMD Sales & Service Inc Reviews
We hired Robert Dow/ RMD Sales & Service in October 2014 to build our new home. We had some reservations about him being able to commit to our job since he was in the process of building his own new home, but he reassured us that our project would be his top priority. We heard he was presently in a legal dispute with a former customer, but his explanation seemed reasonable (blaming the other party) and we decided to give him the benefit of the doubt. However to be safe, we decided to go with paying him an hourly rate rather than getting locked into a contract, he gave us the option of changing the agreement to a contract job at a later date if we chose to. We offered to find him some help on the project via hutterites that we know, he said he'd just as soon source his own help. Things got started quite well, Robert comes across as smooth and professional. He got our permits in place, our home warranty through his company and insurance. He sourced the materials and labor. We had problems from the start with the people he hired to complete various jobs. From the footing, to the blue prints, all on his recommendations and all had issues. After just a couple weeks into the job, he started consistently showing up late, often 11am, and leaving early. When we tried to discuss with him, we were told by his wife that since we decided to go with an hourly rate instead of a contract, that he didn't owe us an explanation, and would work when he could. He had continual trouble finding help to work on the house with him and often showed up for a work day alone. We pressed him to please find a crew/few guys to work with so the job could move along faster, and he asked us if we could also try to source help. Any time we would address our concerns with him we ended up getting irate phone calls, text's and emails from his wife. He had always been paid up to date. She demanded payment the day he invoiced, even though sometimes we hadn't gotten the invoice via email until evening and he had gone home and would often go day's without showing up. He didn't work for over a week at one point and she accused us of having financial problems when we simply hadn't seen him, and his check was ready. He took a week off in December for a family funeral, we were completely understanding about that downtime. One day when Robert didn't show up on the jobsite we text him to find out if we should be expecting him that day, and promptly got an angry phone call from his wife yelling and swearing about how he had been busy at home working on their own water tank. He mentioned that he had 2 guys who could come and work with him, after a few days of him making excuses for them and them not showing up. We reached out to another construction company in Leduc and hired a few guys ourselves to work with him. After that we decided that since we were already into him for over $35,000.00 and the house was still not even halfway to lockup stage, we would like to get a contract price after all. He was really milking the hourly wage. On Friday the 16th, we sent him an email and asked if he could give us a contract price including labor to take the job from its current stage to lock up. We mentioned to him that we had just had a conversation with him on site expressing concern about the costs and he had thrown around the number of $20-$25,000.00 to finish to lock up, so could we get that in contract form. We didn't hear back from him all weekend, and assumed we would sit down and discuss it on Monday. Monday morning he emailed the crew we hired and told them the job was shut down and not to come, he showed up at the jobsite when we were not around, cleared out all of his tools and equipment and left. Meanwhile we were not there and assumed he was working. His wife sent us an email to appease up before we figured out what was going on, told us he wouldn't be on site for a day or 2 while he was out making arrangements for the contract and could they please get paid to date ASAP. She even asked if we could mail the check when we had always given it to him in person. Trusting them, I let them know where they could find the check that we had waiting to give him from the previous Friday, he went inside our home, took the check straight to the bank and certified it. By lunchtime he was gone, had his money, and stopped answering our calls and texts. I text his wife and mentioned we were having trouble reaching him and she said she'd pass the message along. If Robert Dow didn't want to complete the job for whatever reason (he's always got a list of great excuses) He could have sat down with us, let us know and given us the necessary information to move on and find someone else. Since he was clearly too cowardly to face us, he could have emailed us, quit and been on his way. He left us with no warning & no explanation. We do not even have copies of our home warranty or insurance. His actions were shady, cowardly and deceitful. We have since heard more bad reviews about him, heard ours is not the only job he left incomplete, and heard hes had more than one litigation with previous customers, his story was always that people were trying to screw him out of money. But we had not investigated thoroughly before getting started with him. We decided to leave this review and information to hopefully spare another potential customer from these stresses. We also found out that before he left our job site that Monday he had a meeting with another potential customer planning to build a $2million home, and told this man he was available to start immediately. Perhaps he just say more money on the horizon and dropped us for that? We were thankfully able to contact this man and let him know what happened to us. He can decide for himself if he wants to gamble his hard earned $$ and his new home on an unprofessional coward with an angry wife. At any point Robert Dow could have been professional & decent, given us notice, or explained why he was leaving, or even a simple email or text to say he wouldn't be back. Would we have been upset? Worried? Of course, but it would have been better than how he chose to leave things and certainly more professional. I would expect if he replies to this review it will be full of excuses. One thing he does have going for him is charisma, he knows how to sell himself. And he always has a prize wining excuse, never accountable. Proceed with caution.