Melvin of Capitol Heights, MD, writes:

This complaint is on behalf of my grandfather, James R.  He is 80 years old, lives alone, has limited education and is on a fixed income. On 9/9/99, Hugh and/or David Reid contacted my grandfather through door to door solicitation about doing home repairs.  One of his neighbors had repairs done also, but only resulting in a small fraction of the cost that was charged to my grandfather.  

My grandfather says he did not want these repairs, but they continued talking until somehow they had him convinced to do the repairs. Just in talking to my grandfather you can tell that he does not fully understand many things. He is easily intimidated. He's not even able to write a check for the outrageous amounts he was charged. 

He says one of the Reids made out the check and had him sign it. I found out on 9/29/99 that this had occurred.  I immediately began to look into the matter.  I tried to contact the company at the telephone number on the "agreement paper" and continuously reached a recording.  I then tried to locate the address given and found no such address. 

I left messages and David Reid finally called back, however, he talks as though this is a normal procedure as if he makes checks out for his clients all the time. 

Also, on both of the "agreement papers" the amounts have been scratched out and another amount put in. This incident has left my grandfather penniless. It cleaned out his entire bank account. I have not been able to even determine if the repairs were actually done at all.

Emotionally he is distraught. Not only is he out of his life savings, but I may have to find a home for him to go into because of this incident.

Please Please advise me on this matter or direct me to someone that maybe able to help us.  At the very least I do not want this company to be able to hurt another elderly person. Thank you, I am anxiously awaiting your response.

This is a terribly unfortunate situation but one that does not have a ready remedy.  It's not likely that recovering the funds will be easy but Melvin should go to Small Claims Court and at least get the process started.