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BUSINESS PRACTICES DECEPTIVE -- TAKES MONEY AND ABANDONS JOB
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COMPLAINT DETAILS
My husband met Richard Fisher of Custom Building Designs at a contractor trade show in Los Angeles in early 2014. He was there with a display, and assumed he was a legitimate drafting business. Seemed like a very nice person.
To our dismay, we have discovered that his business practices are deceptive.
Richard and my husband Vince signed an agreement early 2014, for him to provide us with a professional drawing for a project to remove two bearing walls in my home, and the drawing was to be approved by the city and county for a permit to be issued to begin the work.
Richard required that we pay $720 of $1800 (40%) before he started any work. Being familiar with the State Contractors Board requirements, Vince mentioned to Richard that a contractor should not ask for more than 10% up front, but he stated he is not a contractor…he is a designer. A red flag we should have caught.
Richard didn’t contact us after Vince paid him, so after two months; he had to call him to find out if the drawing was done yet. Richard gave several excuses, and one excuse was health issues with his wife, so Vince was empathetic and was expecting it would be done soon. Richard told Vince he needed to re-measure the walls and stopped by and returned some plans he borrowed from a previous job on my home.
In June, Vince called him again for a status update and Richard stopped by on June 17th because he had to re-measure again.
In August, Vince had to call Richard as we still had not received anything or heard from him, (several excuses for not completing the job), and he said he would come over to the house. He presented to us what he called his preliminary drawing; however, the drawing showed only two lines representing walls, with no measurements and no details. There was no close consideration to the project.
It was then he said to me, “I can’t find your additional checks,” and Vince told him he hadn’t completed any work to justify any additional checks. We could have easily sketched the same thing he had sketched, and he said he spent a lot of time on that unprofessional drawing.
Vince had to continue calling Richard to find out when he would have the final drawings, and Richard continued to make excuses, such as the Engineer lost paperwork, he was ill, his wife was ill, fell off a ladder, friend passed away, there was a religious holiday, using excuse after excuse, still providing nothing.
We realize now that Richard baited us again on October 1, 2014, seven months since our first meeting. Richard agreed to meet at the La Mirada City Hall to show his “Engineer Ready” drawing to the County Engineer. But before doing so, he asked for $900 for the “ready for engineer” drawing and to pay his Engineer…so we paid him. We had now paid 90% as per the “agreement”.
Note: Richard Fisher is using someone else’s license number to legitimize documents. On the Application for Building Permit, Richard did not list any of his business information at all, not even his name…nothing to identify himself. Instead, he listed the Engineer Conway Cook that apparently does his drawings and that person's license number.
However, this was not per our agreement as the drawing he presented to the County Engineer was incomplete. It was lacking detail of footing, and had incomplete details for the site plan, not showing the perimeter of the lot and house structure. It was a plan, but not “Ready for Engineer”. The County Engineer commented that this needed to be done properly before being presented again. We paid the City Hall $147.40 for a filing fee, but since the drawing was not presentable, we have a limited amount of time to present the required professional drawing or repay the fee.
Richard agreed to complete the drawings professionally and have them ready by October 8th. Three weeks went by so Vince called him and asked when this would get done. Richard yelled at him and said, “Sue me, take me to court, turn me in…I don’t care!”…and he hung up on Vince.
Vince again called him on October 30th and he still had not done the final drawing and gave a sick excuse.
Our structural contractor contacted Richard and they agreed to go together to the County Engineer’s office on November 5th, and Richard was to call him back to advise him of the time to meet. He never called him back so he called him again to no avail, and Richard has not called back to this day.
Vince tried calling Conway Cooke, the Engineer that works with Richard on the drawings, and he would not return the call. Our structural contractor was able to contact Conway Cooke and asked if the drawing was completed or at least being worked on, and Conway said he had it, but it was not complete. We offered to pay any outstanding balance owed to him by Richard, but he said he could not do anything with it and that was up to Richard to handle that.
Vince made several calls to Richard and there was no answer, until finally he answered his last call, and intentionally hung up on him. So I called him on November 15, 2014 at 11:52 a.m., and after I introduced myself and asked him nicely how he was doing, he shouted something about my husband and then intentionally hung up on me!. We have not heard from him to this day March 18, 2015, more than one year later.
Richard has received 90% of our money $1767.40, which includes the filing fee, and we have received nothing from him for our payments.
We made several attempts to contact him, to no avail. My husband and I have determined that he abandoned our agreement and stole our money.
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Richard Fisher of Custom Building Design has an “agreement” that is conveniently designed to collect most of the fees without completing services. There is no time limit listed for his service, (our bad for not catching that), and he gives numerous excuses, month after month.
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