Venus Designs, It's Better On Michael Padilla Untrustworthy, Unreliable, Unprofessional Denver, Colorado

Micheal Padilla, aka Venus Designs aka Gene Padilla aka Highlandstones... has ripped off quite a few people.  I worked with him and initially thought he was wonderful, come to find out, he wasn't! 
I had contracted with Mr. Padilla to remodel both my baths and kitchen.  It was difficult to get a hold of him, once we contracted out the job.  Before he would start, he demanded payment up front for my cabinets, granite and tile.  I wrote checks out, which were immediately cashed.  He did a little work, then would stop for the day, without completing a project.  I had many projects left undone and could not nail him down to a time frame.  After weeks of frustration, I told him I wanted the projects we had paid for to be complete and once that was done, I wanted him off the project and out of my life.  I did not hear from him.  I went to the granite yard to see if my granite had been picked up yet and was told it had never been paid for, although the check had been cashed by Mr. Padilla.  I then went to the cabinet company to see about my cabinets and was told, again, the cabinets, for which I had paid Mr. Padilla for, had not been paid for.  Only a few had been paid for, the left remained on "hold", waiting for payment.  He left my house, plumbing, walls and fixtures in shambles. 

Upon doing research, which I should have done before, I found out he had an A- rating with the BBB, has several collections against his name and does the majority of his business through bartering.  He is as crooked as crooked gets!  He also tried to get his brother involved... which did not work out in anybody's best interest, either.  He has no assets, is not insured, and has changed his name and phone number several times to avoid being held responsible!  He always has/ had an excuse. 

We never heard from Michael throughout that weekend.  That Sunday evening I called and left him a message saying that we were cancelling our order because we kept having trouble getting responses from him and getting an install date set up.  I followed the phone call up with an email. 

Michael then called on Monday and said that he was going to stop by with a Cashier's check to refund our deposit.  Needless to say, I was skeptical that he really would, but on Tuesday (today) he did drop off a check for a full deposit refund.

So even though I am not real happy with the overall service and the time we lost, I am at least satisfied with the deposit refund.

Michael finally returned our calls - said he had been out of town.  Said he would bring the vanity top & windowsill over the following day.   As I said before, he did great work with our kitchen, so I'm hopeful that this will work out.

I may have spoke too soon.  While Michael did take care of our kitchen in a timely and professional manner 1.5 yrs ago, we cannot get him to follow through on our bathroom vanity & windows sill job.  We've paid the 50% down - in cash because he doesn't take charge cards and I didn't have my checkbook at the time - and we told him we were estimating May 1 as the time we would be ready for the granite install.  Roughly May 1, after numerous emails and phone calls, my husband finally got a response from Michael asking us again for exact measurements for the window sill - so apparently he lost them and hadn't even started on it yet even though we were past the date it should have been done.  We have now been trying for 2 weeks to get a call back from him to schedule the date for him to come install.  All emails are not answered, all calls go to voice mail, and even after numerous messages we still haven't gotten a call back. 

Needless to say, I am sorry to see that this has gone bad after the good things that I've said about him regarding our kitchen.

We had Mike, from Venus Designs, do our kitchen countertops and windowsills last year.  He came to our house a few times to discuss the process & do the work, and also met us at his place for us to pick a small remnant that we needed for a bar top.  At all times, he was professional and courteous.  His crew that helped with the template and installation were all very polite also.  He always showed up exactly when he said he would and was easy to work with.  We liked him so much that we are contacting him again next month to create a custom bathroom vanity top and windowsill for us.

To date I have installed over 3000 kitchens with very limited complaints.  I understand that operating a service company such as mine, complaints are inevitable.  My company deals with all natural stone and on the occasion some synthetic stones, which can cause problems from time to time.  Dealing with this type of stone, cracks and breaks can occur, due to the cut, size an weight of said slab. Everybody that operates a business like mine deals with these same issues daily.  Most of the time these problems are handled at the shop unaware to the home owner that the stone is for.  Anytime that this problem has happened in my business, I have been more than happy to deduct the cost of the stone from the final bill or to simply replace it at my cost.  I strive to make every customer happy, knowing that their kitchen or bathroom is going to be something they have to live with for some time.  My company, Venus Designs, is insured with every job that I am involved with.  If a customer goes behind my back and hires one of my contractors without my knowledge, I am not responsible for anything that happens during their work.  Because the client hired the contractor for extra work without my knowledge, that would evoke a new contract between said client and said contractor.  I have recently run into this issue when I took a job for a local news reporter.  This reporter had me not only install her first kitchen but also her second kitchen.  I have also helped her uncover a story of another granite company that has ripped off his customers completely.  I, with the help of this reporter, have gone in and taken care of these customers by placing new granite in their home for absolutely free.  This reporter has recently hired one of my contractors without my knowledge and is not happy with his work.  This person feels it is my obligation to correct the situation even though I was unaware of it to begin with.  If this customer had asked me for the additional work from my contractor and it wasn't right then I would correct it at my cost.  But because the customer contacted the contractor on their own that means there was a separate contract between the client and the contractor.  I should not be held responsible for contracts that I have no part in creating.