Affordable Quality Lighting

This is in addition to our reply below. We, at Affordable Quality Lighting would like to explain our side. As educated adults, we all know that there are two sides to every tale. Mr. ** and his company, Michigan Maintenance Supply is not providing an honest posting. We have been told that Mr. ** has done this to several companies online. Therefore we feel it is time to expose Mr. ** in hopes that he does not continue his pattern of defrauding honest companies. As a reminder, we have had no prior complaints since our grand opening in 1974. Mr. ** and his company filed complaints with the BBB and American Express. These two organizations are a neutral party. And as we all know, they are also long established and very reputable. These two organizations (BBB and AMEX) both denied Mr. **'s claims. They both came to this conclusion after they investigated Mr. **, his company, his history of complaints and more importantly the facts of this particular claim.

We did not sell any product to Mr. ** and his company blindly. We faxed him the details of the order, detailing prices and items. We also faxed him our terms and conditions of sale. Both faxes were reviewed, signed and faxed back to us by Mr.**. Nowhere on any of Mr. **'s documents did we ever note the items are UL listed. We offer many UL Listed and non-UL listed items as many items do not require UL and some jobs do not require UL. However, we offer both thus leaving it up to the customer to choose. Mr. ** chose the non-UL units knowing his project would require them. Mr. ** hoped that he can cut corners, save money and hope the inspector would not catch them. Well, his plan to deceive the inspector failed and now he wants to return used fixtures to us which we do not have to do since they are now used and were not damaged or defective. And Mr. ** signed off on them and their details prior to our shipping them.

However, in order to continue to demonstrate our 35 year old pattern of exceptional customer service we offered to take the loss and provide a refund. Guess what, Mr. ** has not returned them. Wonder why? Well instead he files false claims in hopes the AMEX would have provided a refund and he would keep the installed items, not to mention an additional bonus of trying to extort "labor" money from us in addition to keeping the items for free! And the only way to pull this off would be to file false claims against us in hopes of clouding AMEX and the BBB. Well Mr. **, the BBB and AMEX did not buy it. And we did not as well. We threw you a curve when we offered a refund but wanted the items back. You were also thrown another curve when AMEX and the BBB denied your claims.

Our president has personally spoken to Mr. ** several times to no avail. We will gladly provide all documents from the BBB, from AMEX and from Mr. ** proving our side. Mr. **, what can you provide? It seems all Mr. T. wants is to live his life deceiving companies, city inspectors and now consumer affairs. Lastly and to address Mr. **'s false UL claims: UL has never asked us to remove their name or logo from our site. We continue to work with UL and proudly post their logo on our site (with their permission), where we clearly note to look for the UL logo for UL Listed items.

You have posted a fraudulent claim against our company without even contacting AQL for confirmation. Mark disputed this charge 5 times with American Express. They had a thorough investigation to find in AQL's favor. We have signed documentation. Then Mark sent this fraudulent charge to the BBB. Again, we prevailed and the fraudulent claim was removed. Please call me as soon as possible. We would like these false accusations removed immediately! We can provide invoice signed by Mark ****. The invoice contains the item that your cardholder confirmed he wanted to purchase. We can provide the Terms of Sale as signed by Mark, it clearly states our terms and conditions and the responsibility of the purchaser.

We can provide the website page verifying and clearly states the socket is UL Listed. Mark confirmed he saw this page provide for him but avoided the context in which UL was written. This is an outdoor fixture and we do sell thousands a year, that being said our website is very clear that every city and state has their own codes and the cardholder is responsible to investigate what is approved for their area. We can also provide a letter from Mark's electrician stating that he's a certified master electrician and that he is licensed in the State of Michigan. He claims to be very experienced. We are inclined to believe him. He installed 16 fixtures. He installed all 16! I find it odd such a highly qualified master electrician would install fixtures in his licensed state that does not meet code.

Mark continues to change his claims and states that the fixtures do not meet their city codes. We are absolutely okay with that statement but he could have returned them! Now, his new statement is that they were not installed but he sent us photographs of all of them installed. Your cardholder contacted the President of Affordable Quality Lighting and after your cardholder had all of the fixtures installed he wanted to return them. Your cardholder claimed that he would return the fixtures as new. We can provide the email sent to Mark stating the following verbal agreement the President of AQL and Mark had. In good faith, the President of AQL authorized the return and told him he would receive a credit once the fixtures were returned and inspected.

The President even put this in writing! We never heard from your cardholder again except for this continued harassment! We've already been award victory with American Express for 5 times and the BBB! I am sorry that your Mark does not wish to pay for the merchandise in his possession. We disagree. If you purchase the merchandise, we ship, you accept, you pay. It's a simple concept and it's insulting that you are allowing this fraudulent claim without contacting the firm he's attacking for verification.

I was a victim of a bait and switch scam. On A.Q.L's web site, it said (and I have a print out of this) the lights I purchased are UL Listed and for outdoor use. I received the lights and had a few of them installed. The electric inspector for the City Of Warren Michigan stopped by and said that they must come down as they are unsafe and not UL Listed.

I called Tom at A.Q.L., he told me that they were listed and that he could not understand how the stickers with the UL Listing was not on them. Tom said that he would send them to me in the US mail ASAP. No UL stickers and the letter, he said would also show that they are UL Listed arrived. I called UL they told me that this light are not UL listed. UL had AQL remove UL listings and its Logo from all pages on there web site.

I tried to get my money back from Tom, he said no way. So I am just out of $1,788.43 plus freight back and forth two times (approximately $149.00 ) and the cost of the electrician. The economic cost was $ 3,937.43 as I had a electrician install them only to have them removed and then install real lights.

I filed a complaint with Consumeraffairs.com and Tom himself (the president of AQL) responded promptly and courteously. Tom replaced the transformer. He addressed the problem fairly and I am satisfied with the resolution. I wish to withdraw my complaint and thank you for assisting me with this.

These people sold me a defective product which they refuse to replace unless I pay additional money to ship the product back to them and pay to have the replacement shipped to me. I did not get what I paid for. I have already paid for both the product and the cost to ship it to me. They took my money and failed to send me what I purchased and paid shipping on: a working transformer. I paid an electrician to install this and lost additional money because the part he came to install didn't work.