Window treatments - Part 2

It's been 6 weeks since I met with the contractor that will be putting up the shades in my home. The point which sold me to hire this contractor was the guaranteed turnaround time of 1.5-2 weeks: from order to installation. Three weeks passed and I haven't heard a peep from him. I started getting nervous. He has our 50% deposit. Yes, the foolish person I was gave him a 50% deposit. First lesson learned: no matter how excited you are about "beautifying" your new home, stick with the rule of giving a deposit of not more than a $1000 or 10% of the contract price (whichever is less). A licensed contractor in California must abide by this law. Check out the website for detailed information on hiring contractors www.cslb.ca.gov.

Anyway, I wanted my window treatments as soon as possible that I was willing to give this person a 50% deposit. So midway through the third week, I left 2 messages on his voicemail inquiring about my order. I got a call back a day later informing me that my order would be arriving to him on the 25th of May. I called at 9 AM on the 26th. He said he would call me back in 2 hours because he needs to call his office to check if the order arrived. Can you believe it? He didn't even know what the status of my order was! In my opinion, he should have been tracking this stuff. 5 hours and 2 voice mail messages later, he finally called me to let me know that my order did not arrive. Turns out Hunter Douglas, the manufacturer, was bombarded by orders in May due to the anticipated rise in prices in June. At this point, I was upset because I felt he had not been keeping track of my order to assure a timely arrival. I calmly explained to him that he should have called me at the end of the 2nd week with an update. Instead, I had to call him to find out what the status was only to be disappointed again because the order did not arrive on the 25th as promised. So I was given another date: June 7th. This time I asked him what guarantee do I have that this is a sure date? He said that this was a confirmed rush date from Hunter Douglas.

June 7th. Nothing. Getting frustrated. June 8th. Frustrated! Just when I'm about to give a piece of my mind to someone, my cell phone rings. Saved by the bell. Half my order arrived. Somewhat frustrated. The other half will be shipped on the 13th. Gad! Another week! I told him I wanted what he received installed on the 10th. No sweat. My downstairs windows and sliding glass door now have Nantucket shades. It looks great! I'm somewhat pacified....for now.

It's the 13th. The second half of my order should be arriving tomorrow. Can't wait to see the upstairs done with the Honeycomb shades. I need these installed before I move in on the 19th. This week will be extremely busy with packing and graduation ceremonies to attend. Life. You gotta love it.