Early on we were handed off to Jessie Montrallo by Graves Brothers’ Project Estimator/Roof Salesman Tyler Warshaw during the scheduling process.
At the time of the transfer, Ms. Montrallo made initial contact with us a mere seven minutes after Mr. Warshaw informed us that he would have her reach out to us regarding specific details about scheduling. Graves Brothers’ employee Mr. Warshaw referred to her as “our scheduler” but we would later come to realize that her email address originated at OaksBrands.com rather than GravesBros.com like Mr. Warshaw’s email address. It turned out that Ms. Montrallo’s actual title at Oaks Brands was Multi-Trade Coordinator.
A Multi-Trade Coordinator generally assigns work to employees of varying skill sets to complete a project- like carpenters, electricians and plumbers working together on a kitchen remodel. In the case of Ms. Montrallo and Oaks Brands, that role seems to include assigning teams from either of Kristopher Oaks’ differently qualified home improvement companies Graves Bros. or Oaks Roofing & Siding to complete work. Kristopher Oaks is a serial entrepreneur and real estate investor from the Rochester, New York region.
Two days after our first contact from Jessie Montrallo, we sent an email requesting clarification on when the payments would be due. Nineteen minutes later, Ms. Montrallo stated that the first payment would be due at the start of the project and the second payment would be due when the work was completed.
Our next email to Jessie Montrallo would not come until the day after the incomplete installation of the roof and gutters. Ms. Montrallo was informed about the strange situation that occurred when the new gutters were not installed with the new roof. She apologized and said that the gutter installation would be scheduled “within the next 1-2 weeks.” This time her reply would take 104 minutes, still reasonable considering that she likely had to consult with one or more other employees regarding this matter.
Just two days later on August 4th, Jessie Montrallo informed us that the gutter installation could take place as soon as August 7th. What at first sounded like a potential two-week wait was now just a matter of days. We looked forward to the project soon being completed.
Unfortunately, the Oaks Roofing and Siding gutter crew would go on to do absolutely horrendous work. The two-man crew were onsite for what seemed to be less than ninety minutes. One of the workers was observed carrying the completed length of gutter bent over his shoulder and then throwing it to the ground, resulting in grass and mud being embedded into the end-seam of the gutter. Material like that can cause the sealant to fail and the gutters to leak at the seam. The newly installed roof’s drip edge was snipped dozens of times around the house to accomodate the gutter spikes that attached the gutters to the house. There were also inexplicable bends in the drip edge, where no gutter spikes ever existed. All of these snips and bends exposed the wood underneath to the elements- precisely the opposite of what the roof and gutters were meant to do.
We sent an email to Jessie Montrallo that night- after we had spent the afternoon wandering around the house with a ladder and taking pictures of all the terrible work. Early the next morning we received a short reply from Ms. Montrallo, at around 7:30 AM. She said that she was going to contact the Gutter Production Manager and let them know about our concerns.
The next twenty-four hours we received no messages from anyone at Graves Brothers Home Improvement, Oaks Brands, or Oaks Roofing and Siding. This was surprising to us, considering there was a large hole in the roof and several smaller holes all around the roof in the drip edges, as well as several other issues. At this point we decided to look for someone other than Ms. Montrallo to contact- ideally some sort of a customer service representative.
Several web searches were conducted and no specific customer service representative from either Graves Brothers’ or Oaks Roofing and Siding was found. However, there was a business information website that listed dozens of employees and their respective titles at the two companies. The website claimed that Graves Brothers Home Improvement was actually “Charles Graves, Incorporated” and that Oaks Roofing and Siding was actually “Kris Oaks Construction, Incorporated” This was an interesting discovery at the time but the list did not include a single employee with a title that resembled a customer service representative. Then a unique idea came to mind.
At this point we made the decision to just email every employee for which we had information. Since we had Tyler Warshaw’s business card we knew how the company email addresses were formatted at Graves Brothers Home Improvement and since one of the Google searches provided us with a list of employees at both Graves’ and Oaks’, we would be able to combine this information and email all of them, including Kris Oaks and Charlie Graves. They were pretending to be one company, after all. At around 7:30 AM we sent out an email describing the events along with seventeen photographs covering sixteen completely different problematic areas around the roof. More problems would later be discovered after we were compelled to hire a house inspector in order to get a thorough assessment and a professional opinion- we had wondered if we were overreacting. For now, we awaited the response to the mass email.
Twenty-eight minutes later, Johnathon Lauricella- Roofing Production Manager for Graves Brothers Home Improvement responded. He said that he had spoken with the Gutter Production Manager the previous day and had not yet gotten his chance to contact us. He said he wanted to visit with us at our convenience some time in the next two weeks. Considering that the wood was exposed to the elements, we made it clear that we were available any day or time for this meeting. That wednesday morning Mr. Lauricella said he would be able to visit on Friday in the afternoon. There was no reply from Ms. Montrallo.
Jessie Montrallo would not contact us again until over four-months later when she threatened to send the project’s invoice to “our collection agency” even though home improvement customers in New York are encouraged by the state government to withhold final payment until the project is completed satisfactorily. This seemed like a strange message for the Multi-Trade Coordinator to send out of the blue, so we did not bother dignifying her threatening email with a response. It is worth noting that this time she emailed from JMontrallo@OaksInc.com rather than her JMontrallo@OaksBrands.com that she had previously used and she had made sure to carbon copy the email to the Graves Brothers’ assistant sales manager Allison Kesselring; AKesselring@GravesBros.com. The interaction we had with Ms. Kesselring was as strange as her actual position within the organization and this will be covered more thoroughly in a later Employee Profile.
