Better Living Sunrooms Attempted to price gouge under the premise of having a proprietary product. Plymouth Meeting, Pennsylvania

Mr. Ishikawa,

Have you spoken to Mike Leibowitz? (sp)  My home is on Windy Hill Rd. and he was here less than 3 weeks ago.  I'm sure he'll remember the meeting.  I have responded to your rebuttal below:

1. Verified that our Customer Care Department has not received a complaint similar to what was posted.  I have no desire to do business with BL so I never placed an internal complaint.

2. We have not built a project for a customer with the initials "RTD".  As mentioned in my initial complaint the home I purchased had an existing sunroom.  Therefore there wouldn't be any record of building a sunroom for me.

3. We have not received a Service Request from this area in over 4 years.  I would check your records, I had two appointments in regards to this request.  If you cannot locate any records of this it shows a lack of detailed file keeping.

4. We have not received a Warranty Transfer request in over 2 years.  I never requested a warranty transfer since I do not trust any services offered by Betterliving.  

5. I have personally spoken to my employees and they do not recall a contentious meeting with any customer.  Again, speak with Mike Leibowitz.  

In regards to the use of a general contractor and the decision to use custom windows:  The general contractor did not "force fit" any window.  Custom windows were made to fit the existing opening and secured to the framing.  If there is any additional weight of these windows in comparison to the Betterliving style the difference is minimal.  Therefore, if any sagging does occur it's yet another example of an inadequate structure supplied by Betterliving.  And yet another reason to use conventional building techniques as opposed to your system.  Also, Betterliving was ready to sell me the double pane windows for my own retrofit and confirmed that nothing additional was necessary to convert from single pane to double pane.  So was I misinformed then or am I being misinformed now?

If you truly wish to resolve this issue I'm very certain that you can gather my information from Mike L.  

Dear Consumers,

As we always do when an apparent consumer complaint comes up we immediately
investigate the circumstances.  After an extensive research of our job files we did not find any project that match the initials or description.  And I have not received any
communication regarding a similar complaint to what has been posted.

In order to determine if this is one of our projects we have done the following:

1. Verified that our Customer Care Department has not received a complaint similar to what
     was posted.

2. We have not built a project for a customer with the initials "RTD".

3. We have not received a Service Request from this area in over 4 years.

4. We have not received a Warranty Transfer request in over 2 years.

5. I have personally spoken to my employees and they do not recall a contentious
   meeting with any customer.

We provide a Sunroom based on a Proprietary Construction and Installation system.
When a project is installed we obtained a Building Permit from the local township.  At that time we provide Custom Engineered Architectural Plans completed by a licensed Engineer that meet the load and lateral weight requirements of the International Residential Building Code for proper installation.

Double Pane Glass units are substantially heavier and typically require additional
support members and components.  Only a Certified Company Installer has the knowledge and expertise to make this conversion properly. This is why we do not hire sub-contractors.  Our Installation Personnel are company trained employees.

IMPROPER INSTALLATION MAY RESULT IN A SERIOUS SAFETY HAZARD and will violate the International Residential Building Code.  Only approved Components can be used in a Betterliving Sunroom.  Also, only our Engineer can adjust the existing Architectural Building Plans with the township, as it is his signature on the plans under his license.

A General Contractor would not be aware of this information or have access to our
Proprietary CAD Engineering.  He may unknowingly be creating a much bigger problem for you.  Unfortunately we have had situations in the past where a General Contractor attempted to force fit another brand, style & size window into one of our Sunrooms with disastrous consequences.

Its for these reasons and many others that we are able to provide a 50 Year Warranty on our Sunrooms.

 This is the first time in my 17 years that I have dealt with Rip Off Reports. I dont have much information other than what was posted.  I would contact you directly to resolve the
matter, but there is no contact information other than initials.  I did notice however that Rip Off Reports disclaimer specifically states:

 While we encourage and even require authors to only file truthful reports, Ripoff
Report does not guarantee that all reports are authentic or accurate. Be an
educated consumer. Read what you can and make your decision based upon an
examination of all available information.Consumers, just because a company or
individual is reported on Rip-off Report does not necessarily mean you should
not do business with them. In many cases, its just the opposite. Just because
a company is posted on Rip-off Report does not mean they are "bad".
At some point in time, everyone has felt like they've been ripped off, when
that may not have been the case.

Once again we are requesting that the person that posted this contact us directly to
confirm our involvement and resolve any issue.

 Office Phone: 610.945.1916

 
Sincerely,

Joe Ishikawa
President,
Betterliving Sunrooms Mid Atlantic

This rebuttal to my story is believe was written by Betterliving Sunroom's marketing department or by someone on their behalf.  

I am the happy owner of Betterliving Sunroom and have been for several years. I received a call from a close friend of mine that was researching a sunroom for their home and came across this website and called and asked for my advise. I have referred this company several times and have never heard of this type of experience.



Over my many years of homeownership and the many home improvement projects I have done, including window replacement, new roof, and siding. I have plenty of stories of frustrations with companies not showing up when they say they are going to and not doing what they said they were going to do. I did not have that experience with Betterliving at all. As a matter of fact they were the complete opposite. They showed up when they said they were, they did everything they said they were going to do and the workmanship was outstanding. They cleaned up everyday and made sure that my dog never had a chance of escaping the yard no matter how many times they had to go out to their truck. Not to mention the product looks as good today as it did the day it was installed.



Last year I had a tree branch fall on the roof of my sunroom and damaged an area of my roof, my insurance company did everything they could to not pay for the correct repair of the damage. They even admitted that the product was proprietary but they would only pay for a roofer to patch the roof. Joe and Mike from Betterlving came to my house and met with the insurance adjuster multiple times and fought on my behalf to make sure that my roof was repaired the way that it should be to make sure that my room would never have a problem. They even settled with the insurance company for less money to make sure it was done right.



This company has been nothing but great and I will continue to recommended them over and over again.