Phillips Electric

We used Bart Phillips for a job at our house based on photos on his website. He was a nice enough guy, and seemed to know what he was talking about, at least at first. We told him that we were under a time constraint because this needed to be done within 4 weeks to pass inspection to get plaster and water in our new pool. He said that he could do it, but it would be a temporary fence to pass inspection, and we would do the final stuff right after. His bid for the entire job with wrought iron accents, wood and nice hardware and locks would be $16,500.00, which I thought was expensive, but his website photos looked really good, so we agreed. He finished the temporary fence late the night before inspection, but at least he got it done. At this point, we were one day shy of 8 weeks into a 4 week project, and we were already starting to feel like something wasn't right, especially when he installed one part of our fence right in the middle of a window!
After that, he just kinda disappeared for over a week, so we started calling and trying to get him to nail down a design. After all, he had a price that he quoted, he surely must have known the next steps to finish? Apparently not! We couldn't get a sample of wood, or a sample of the wrought iron or even a freehand sketch of what he planned to do. We even sent him a sketch and some photos from the internet to show him the style that we like and for him to create something similar.
After 3 weeks of him not doing a single minute of work on our project, I told him that if he was not on the jobsite by Monday morning, he was fired and we would find someone else to finish. On Sunday night he texted me saying that we needed to have a meeting on Monday night after work, even though we were home the entire weekend! I canceled our contract with him at this point because he just seemed like he was lost on what to do next and just kept dragging his feet about starting the next step. At this point we had already paid him $10,000.00, so I asked for the balance of my money to be refunded. He responded that we owed him $13,400.00 at that point, FOR A TEMPORARY FENCE!! If the finished product was bid at $16,500.00, how can he justify $13,400.00 for plywood and pipes in the ground? Then he said that he would just keep the $10,000.00 and forgive the rest. Our new fence guy said that he couldn't see us paying even $5000.00 for what was done in our yard. Now we are at week 12 of a 4 week project and have to take him to court to get our money back, if he has any left. Sorry for the long rant, but I wanted to paint the whole picture and not just talk trash on him. I wish I could add pictures because that's where everyone would see that this company does not know what they are doing!! P.S. after almost a year of dealing with the Contractor's Board, we won a judgment in arbitration, which he has yet to pay. You can read the whole story and see pictures on Yelp. https://www.yelp.com/biz/phillips-calimesa-3