| Address: | Kanpur, Uttar Pradesh |
A contract was set up with SUBHASH PAINT AGENCY PRIVATE LIMITED, KANPUR, U.P. (referred to as paint agency or agency in further statements) through their Asian Paint associate Karan Vidhyarthi in Jan 2023 to putty and paint my house at a cost of INR 2, 70, 000. Contract attached.
The paint agency then handed this contract over to one of their painters (Rajveer) who wasn't skilled and didn't know the basics of the job. He worked on the site for a few months and couldn't even putty the walls properly. This issue was raised several times with Karan who didn't pay any attention to this and kept assuring that the walls will come out fine at the end of the putty job. While this was happening, Karan had already taken INR 2, 00, 000 from the total contract amount with assurance that this money is being utilized in labour and material, so they needed funds to continue the job. Trusting the reputation of Asian Paints, we paid the amount. The only service received for this 2 lakh was putty & primer on about 60% part of the house.
We waited patiently, as requested by Karan thinking the walls would eventually be done properly but this didn't happen and then we had no choice but to finally raise the issue with the agency. We requested them to change the painter as the one working onsite wasn't skilled and had no communication etiquettes. Discussions with Karan also often went out of hand as he's also quite ill-mannered and wasn't doing any supervision whatsoever. The agency told us that since they had already overpaid Rajveer, it wasn't possible for them to change the painter. This was quite frustrating for us as Rajveer wasn't even skilled to do the job and there was no point in allowing him to continue spoiling the walls even further. Both Karan and Rajveer kept blaming either the plaster or putty being left for long to justify their poor work quality. There was a proper site inspection done before taking the contract and none of this was raised at the time. We kept requesting the agency to get the painter changed but instead the site was put on hold. We had the job held for a few months due to this dispute. We even questioned Karan and the agency about the 2 lakh paid for the little service received, but never got any answers.
In the meantime, when we were not getting any support and the job was on hold, we paid a private painter INR 20, 000 to putty the walls that were not coming out smooth. This was also priorly informed to the agency and Karan so that they realise that the customer has been suffering but there was no support still received from them in commencing the held paint job. We had no choice but to continue discussions with the agency who kept postponing the job and assuring that they will do something about our complaints. An Asian Paint area head, Sumit Bajpai was also involved who was trying to assess the situation and assist but there was no cooperation from the agent as he was adamant that they had no option but to continue with the same unskilled painter. By that time we had also made up our mind that Rajveer cannot continue and either the agency gets a new painter onboard or get someone new who we can trust or refund our money. It was a tough time going through these discussions with the agency and Karan who were not coperating at all. Sumit was the only one trying to make things work.
After spending a few months in this discussion process, eventually it was agreed with all parties that the job will commence and be serviced by our private painter whom we agreed to pay INR 70, 000 and another 20, 000 to the paint agency for supplying the material. Even though the total contract amount was 2, 70, 000 we still agreed to pay 20, 000 over that to get the job completed. Kindly note that this was over and above the INR 20, 000 that was paid privately for wall putty.
The private painter provided a list upfront of all material required for the job to the agency which they reviewed and agreed to supply that material in order to get the job done. We onboarded the private painter, paid him an advance and finally the job commenced from Apr 10, 2024. The agreed process was that our private painter would submit a piecemeal list of the material which will be provided by the agency within a couple of days.
This went on smoothly for a few days until the painter requested material for paint of the house on Apr 20. Suddenly, the agency and Karan both realised that they have to measure the site again as they felt that the request for paint was in excess quantity. This was after they had reviewed this painter's list upfront and had agreed to supply the material. This again delayed the process by a few days and after the site evaluation they decided that the paint quantity requested must be slashed by 30%.
This is absolutely ridiculous. The agreement to pay the agency another 20, 000 for the material (over and above the INR 2, 00, 000 paid to them for which the only service received was putty on some parts of the house) was based on the initial list provided upfront by the painter which was reviewed and agreed by the agency. There's no professionalism being shown by the agency or Karan, and they keep going back on their words & agreement. Sumit is the only Asian Paints representative that has been showing some cooperation and trying to get this to work but the Subhash Paint agency owner and Karan both have been terrible. Karan has no manners and argues & fights with us. He is unprofessional and rude and isn’t even fit to interact with the customer. He doesn’t answer phone calls or replies to messages, neither does he respond back. He refuses to answer queries and instead asks us to contact Sumit who’s his boss. This is utterly disrespectful and irresponsible if he’s in a customer interaction role.
All of this has just demeaned the reputation of Asian Paints in our eyes, and I don't think that I would ever think about Asian Paints in future for any service and would neither recommend anyone to use Asian Paints. It has been a miserable experience, just imagine getting a house painting job done that started in Jan 2023 and after 15 months, still not completed.
A total disaster, unfortunately!!!
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