Albert

Have my Punggol house renovated by Inside Living 9 months ago and have a pretty bad experience. From design, 3D drawing to carpentry and after sales service has been a total disaster to me. My ID is not only unfamiliar with BTO flats, he's forgetful and shows a total lack of planning. I took 3 months off from work (yes that's right) and attend to my renovation on site more frequently than my ID. I even have to deal with the carpenters,electrician, plumbers etc on site to the point that my ID will at times just tell me to instruct them what to do myself as he was not "free". I found out alot of defects/wrong stuffs along the way and have to correct them, even though I have informed my ID what I wanted several times. I still have quite a number of left over defects which my ID promised to fix but after paying my last payment he did not bother to contact me unlike before payment. I just found out he had left the company and I have called Inside Living twice and waited more than a week, didn’t even get an acknowledgement from them. That's very disappointing considering that my ID kept emphasizing Inside Living is very particular about after sales service. My BTO come with floor tiles and door and I did not do tiling overlays/hacking for both toilets. For that I have paid more than 45K to inside living for renovation alone (not including furniture, lightings, appliances and toilet fixtures etc, I spent about 85K in total if including everything). I expect more than this kind of service for the amount I paid. Its sad when your friends came over during open house and comment "Why you spent so much but the house looks like this?" When completing my ID ask me how i felt about the renovation I told him I'm not satisfied. He still have the cheek to tell me he agreed that there are a lot of mistakes, screw ups, workmanship and design problems and he will not use the carpenters and 3D designers again. If have a chance to renovate my house again next time he will do it much more better. Really is WTF. I only have 1 house and I’m not renovating every year like I change clothes. If as a ID you know you cannot put in 100% and you have problems with your carpenters/design team etc then let me know and I will engage somebody else from the start. Don't come and screw with my house and make me live with something that you as an ID is not satisfied too. Here's a list of my problems: 3D Drawing: Very lousy 3D drawing. The design, colours are all wrong and I think any amateur students can draw better. Keep delaying the 3D Drawing and cannot produce them on the time agreed. They started carpentry without completing my 3D drawing. In the end when I demand my 3D drawing my ID still ask me "Are you sure you still want the 3D drawing? Its no good..." Seriously??? After I complaint that if I don’t require a 3D drawing I would have engage a contractor instead of an ID then I got my 3D drawing. I still kept the drawings with me and show to guest visiting my house. They cannot believe that the drawing is produced by a professional ID company. My ID told me later that the 3D designer was sacked as the other ID/customers were not satisfied with the 3D Drawing, but once again it does not benefit me at all since my house design is already screwed up. I have my living room ended up in a laminate i hated, but due to the lack of proper 3D drawing before carpentry, I could not see my design until they install it. I keep thinking of the net renovation because of this, and seriously it don't feel good at all. Planning: My ID seems to be overloaded with other projects on hand. Have to kept calling him to get things going. Not only that he is very forgetful too. Alot of things I told him not to do and it will end up exactly the way I reminded him not to do, despite reminding him many times. He will give excuse like "I told the contractors but they forget." He told me some of the common mistakes he said some novice ID will make which he won’t; in the end he does the exactly same thing. Again lots of excuses. Keep asking me to get the LED lights ready but whenever i ask him what is the quantity to get he will say he will check and get back to me. After asking more than 3 times what are the quantity he still gave me a wrong quantity (even though the ceiling have already been done and power points laid, really shows a lack of planning/overloaded) Carpentry: Materials are of good quality and solid. But carpentry workmanship are bad and even my ID agreed. My guests keep telling me why the workmanship is so rough. Blum cabinet not smooth still can tell me cannot do anything. Cabinet not flushed/aligned said cannot do anything. A lot of mistakes on the design part, but I guess this is the ID fault for not informing the carpenters properly. Ex: Told ID specifically to put clear silicon on an area, in the end it end up with white silicon. I have even paid extra to redo works that are not thought out properly by my ID initially even though my friends and family told me that the ID should borne the charges since its their mistakes. My toilet cabinet the carpenters and ID keep telling me cannot cover the pipes and give reasons like "Not possible, cannot do" etc. In the end I have to tell them what design to do to cover the pipes. Electrical: During planning I emphasis I want whole house to be LAN ready and cables to be conceal within carpentry as I don't like to see wires cluttering around. My ID assured me their electrician are professional and I do not need to engage a outside party for the job. In the end after I finished my carpentry then I found out from an outsider that my house is already LAN ready and I just need to change the socket cover. When confronted, the electrician give me the answer that the conceal Cat6 point is done by HDB hence not reliable that’s why he don't want to inform me and I should not use. Hey my electrical power and water points are also conceal and done by HDB, so should I not use them too? In the end he agreed to waive off 1 LAN cable laying charge, but I’m more concerned about the rest of the points which cannot change position anymore since my carpentry are done (I’m still being charge for shifting the rest of the LAN points due to carpentry). Now I’m left with unsightly LAN wires exposed around my house, thanks to them. (My ID don't even know my house is LAN ready even though the third party told me that existed for about 1.5- 2 years for BTO flats) Misc: Never clean properly despite paying for 2 cleaning. I have to clean and buy the group filler to fill up whatever grout damaged/soiled by the contractors. My laminate flooring also haven dents damaged by carpenters (My ID rectified them by filling up but don't look nice). Some tiles are chipped away, showed ID and ID was surprised too. Metal bar strip between kitchen rusted as when cleaning they did not remove the tape on it and water accumulated on it. ID bring acid clean, in the end become even worse. ID promised to rectified after CNY, till now no news. Laminate flooring damaged, silicon on carpentry came out. ID promised to rectify after CNY, still no news. I seriously learned my lesson. Never pay the last payment until everything is rectified no matter what the ID promised. Once you paid up they will just disappear and forget everything they have promised. I’m an easy going person who doesn’t pick on small things, but I guess Inside Living really test my limits. Enough of my ranting, those who want to know the details of my problems can PM me and I can show the photos etc to you to prove what I have said are true.