The wheat, the chaff and the Ricks
Recently a neighbor called our roofing office, annoyed and wanting to know when we would be back to clean up a pile of metal from his roof. Said he’d been calling “Rick’s” cell phone, but not getting any results, so he was phoning the office directly. It had been over a week since Rick had collected a check with a blank payee endorsement and the job wasn’t complete.
We don’t employ anyone named Rick.
While there is a local company owned by a Rick, this was positively not That Rick. This was a Random Rick.
I strongly encouraged the neighbor to call our Sheriff’s office and his bank.
Another neighbor carried in a ‘contract’ that an out-of-town contractor had him sign in exchange for a ‘free estimate.’ The free estimate has never materialized and the document actually is for an assignment of the homeowner’s insurance proceeds to the contractor. Not a stitch of work has been done, but the contractor has insisted the homeowner owes the contractor a good chunk of the insurance proceeds.
Speaking as a local roofing contractor, your handshake is all the ‘contract’ we need, and we trust you’re good for the payment after the work has been done. Speaking as an attorney, I’d enjoy seeing an Erath County jury render a verdict on the business practices of the door-knocking, contract-pushing, consumer-confusing, non-locals.
These are far from isolated incidences