More Ontario homeowners say they have fallen victim to paving scams where they overpaid for shoddy work and ended up with piles of debris in their front yards.
Carole Simmons of Aurora said someone knocked on her door last month and said they were doing work in the area and wanted to know if she wanted to pave her driveway.
“Our driveway was in desperate need of completion, so we figured why not go with these folks if they’re here in the area paving the driveways,” Simmons said.
While the contractors were friendly at first, once the job was done, they demanded $5,000 in cash right away and said they would come back later to clean up a large pile of asphalt debris in their front yard.
“We asked them if they were going to come back and clean up the mess in our front yard and they said yes, but they never came back,” Simmons said.
Asphalt debris is extremely heavy and Simmons has no way of getting rid of it.
“We don’t have any more money for someone to take it so we have to break it up and I’ll have to take it to the landfill myself. I’m 60 years old, so I’m not happy about that,” Simmons said.
A paving company was also going door to door in Pickering and Huu Nuyen also hired a company to do his driveway.
But when the driveway was completed, Nuyen complained about the quality of the work, and the company immediately left, leaving a huge pile of asphalt debris in his front yard.
Nuygen’s neighbor, Mike Burchell, contacted CTV News concerned about Nuyen’s situation and reached out to others on his street who were also having problems with pavers going door-to-door.
“What I see here is really unfair, it’s not ethical. This is an innocent man who made full payment to them,” Burchell said.
Both Simmons and Nuyen tried to contact the paving companies to come back and remove the asphalt debris, but in both cases the addresses on their contracts were false and their phone calls went unanswered.
The Barrie Police Service said some door-to-door paving companies use names that sound similar to those of reputable, legitimate paving companies, but do not have a fixed place of business and work as Night Operators.
Barrie Police issued a warning about paving scams in the Barrie area after several victims and a local business contacted them to say a contractor was using a business name that sounded too similar to their company name. .
“The public needs to be aware that these paving scams are happening. This is not just in the Greater Toronto Area (GTA), but it is also happening in the North, East and West of the GTA,” said Peter Leon of Barrie Police Communications.
Leon added: “We need to hold these people accountable and if we can, we will charge them with fraud because we are dealing with fraudulent operators.”
Simmons said it’s unfortunate because bad operators are ruining the reputation of paving companies that work hard and do a good job. “I really think they’re hurting the industry,” he said.
Always beware of anyone who comes to your home trying to pave your driveway or for any service. Don’t be pressured, check references, don’t pay up front, and remember you don’t have to talk to salespeople who come to your door.