WOW,
Can anybody check this story out ? What's it gonna' Take ?
First of all, were 2000 of the so-called votes tendered from 2000 Union Tribune papers dropped off at the office in ElCajon to be filled out by hired hands. Let's guess, no knowledge ? ?
(How about over 30/40 ballots filled out in RED ink, by the same hand?)
Somebody ask for the sold records and reciepts from SD Union Paper on the date the Ballots went out. (Also 1000 the year before).
You don't have 4 office locations, Thats flat out false , What is the exact address of each of the locations ? Chula Vista is closed (at the last known address-7-15-2007),Poway as well. What are the others ?
the names of the past bus. partners/owners? The only office that we could find is at El Cajon.
BWNDoors has only been in Business for about 4-5 years-according to the Better Busines Bureau and other NOBEL agencies indicate, Do the last several business ventures unrelated count ? None of them were window Companies.
What proof to substantiate the claim as the "First Green Contractor" in our universe ? WORD ?????
I'm sure competitors may have some input on that claim. Was 2000 papers from the Union sold and delivered to BWND office,did people fill out ballots as well as other known parties ?
Talk about Politics and Motives.
Concerned Citizens for a "Better" San Diego

MORE LIKE - SCREWING AND SPEWING
No we are not disgruntled employees (we understand there is over 20 + and Counting) We are not paid for our response from BWand Doors and/or UCAN.
We are just everyday human beings. This company has no end to deceite -denial-unprofessionalism-out of control ownership-egocentric pathalogical liarship as ever seen in a business.
They ( Company and Owner) probably make it harder for other companies to florish, if even, exist. Their service has been so horrific, their salespeople so decietful, their owner Master DoJo Chavez so incredibly misleading,egotistical, and everything a business isn't about.
People have been waiting for almost 5,6 and even 7 months for the NERF paperwork. We are Still waiting. We have heard every excuse. Come to find out it is common knowledge from his employee's Mr. Chavez is $10's of $1,000.00 behind in payment to NERF. NOW WHAT ?
He just CLOSED HIS Chula Vista office, cleaned out !-San Marcos office and Riverside office is too ,operating from someones house in Riverside. Poway office is crammed full of furniture and stuff and closed every-day. The office girl is longer there, as well, has a LAWSUIT on him from the Poway business partner (and others). The Better Business Brueau kicked them out for bad business practices, and UCAN< Howcome you don't sue him for misleading customers for using a very old document he says you made for him?
SHOPPER and Buyer beware, Mr. Chavez is a PROFESSIONAL VICTIM. He has no control of his actions. Everybody is just out to get him. Where is the millions you've made off of us consumers ? Lets guess, someone else stole the money, again! No, some-one did something to you and you were never there and you couldn't control what went on ! You were tricked because your'e so vulnerable, people just take advantage of you.... RIGHT !
Also was told you bought the "Best in San Diego" Award Paid people to sit in your office and fill out over 2000 papers you bought and had delivered to your office from The TRIBUNE.? And had a cheat sheet for the Viejas customers to mark "Best windows and Doors"
What can you say ? What do you say ? Dude, Mr. Shamus, San Diego needs you !
Watch out for Poor business owners who are victimized by US consumers !
Thanx For being there, WATCH OUR BACKS ! SOMEONE HAS TO !
YOU ARE DOING A FANTASTIC JOB !
Mr. and Mrs. Enlightened..............

On May 18th, 2007 Michael Chavez (not verified) says:
Following are responses by Best Windows and Doors to the assertions posted by UCAN about Best Windows and Doors on February 27th and April 17th, 2007:

UCAN ASSERTIONS: “It has come to our attention that Best Windows and Doors (a window installation company based in San Diego) has been suggesting that UCAN rates them very highly. This is a fraudulent representation. In fact, nothing can be further from the truth. UCAN does not endorse Best Windows and Doors. We did a survey almost 5 years ago in which they performed well. We have good reason to believe that they are not offering as good a value as they once did those many years ago. Not only have we received numerous complaints about Best Windows and Doors’ quality of service, but we have requested on multiple occasions that Best Windows and Doors cease using materials that falsely give the impression of a UCAN endorsement. They agreed to stop and yet we continue to receive documented reports from consumers about their false representations about our endorsement.”

BEST WINDOWS AND DOORS’ RESPONSES: In 2002, UCAN did a survey in which a UCAN advocate, disguised as an ordinary person, solicited price quotes from ten unsuspecting vinyl window companies selling in San Diego County. The quotes were for a real home with twenty old windows. The vendors provided price quotes for dual-paned “Low-e” windows. As the result of the survey, UCAN published a rating chart entitled “Vinyl Window Rate Buster,” The rating system used four different ratings from “GOOD” to “AVOID” and stated “UCAN’s OPINION” of each of the ten window companies. In addition to prices quoted by each of the ten companies, the ratings considered whether each company was C-17 certified as a Glazing Contractor. UCAN stated: “To our surprise, many of the companies claiming expertise in windows were not C-17 certified as Glazing Contractors. A C-17 window license is not necessary, but we think it’s worth paying a few extra dollars for a C-17 contractor, since it indicates that they specialize in window retrofits and installations.” Of the ten companies rated, four were C-17 certified, including Best Windows and Doors. The ratings also considered whether each company was LCH-approved. LCH (League of California Homeowners) approval meant that a contractor had a valid contractor’s license for at least two years and was in compliance with the Contractor’s State License Board (CSLB). An LCH-approved contractor also had provided certificates of workers compensation and general liability insurance coverage and was free of any unresolved or outstanding complaints to the CSLB. In addition, an LCH-approved contractor had no outstanding litigation relating to its work. Finally, an LCH-approved contractor had undergone a financial background check and provided references from customers, manufacturers and vendors. Of the ten companies rated, four were LCH-approved, including Best Windows and Doors. Additional rating criteria included the brand of window being sold, whether the brand of window was rated by Energy Star and the year the company was founded. The facts are that of the ten window companies rated by UCAN, Best Windows and Doors was the ONLY company to achieve the highest rating of “GOOD” and, in the final column of the rating chart, UCAN’s OPINION of Best Windows and Doors is “Excellent qualifications and windows make this a UCAN ‘best bet.’”

Best Windows and Doors has included that UCAN Vinyl Window Rate Buster rating chart in its customer presentation book which its sales personnel show to prospective customers. Best Windows and Doors’ sales personnel do not state that UCAN endorses Best Windows and Doors. The rating chart speaks for itself and clearly shows that it was done in 2002. No attempt is made to convince anyone that the rating chart is a current endorsement by UCAN.

Further, Best Windows and Doors paid UCAN for the right to use that rating chart. Note that under UCAN’s online Terms & Conditions, UCAN states, “We take no corporate money, and are beholden only to you, the Consumer.” The fact is that in 2002, pursuant to a written Memorandum of Understanding Cooperative Communications Agreement between Best Windows and Doors and UCAN, Best Windows and Doors paid UCAN $27,403.71 and UCAN paid $5,562.00 of $32,965.71 in total expenses for production and distribution of the UCAN Watchdog report entitled “NEW WINDOWS Can they really cut your high utility bills?” which included the Vinyl Window Rate Buster rating chart. UCAN sent that Watchdog report to its existing members and used it in connection with other materials to solicit new members and expand its membership. Best Windows and Doors used it, with UCAN’s knowledge and approval, to attract new customers.

UCAN now makes the unsupported claim that it continues to receive documented reports from consumers about Best Windows and Doors’ false representations about UCAN’s endorsement. However, UCAN has not produced verifiable evidence that Best Windows and Doors has falsely represented a UCAN endorsement.

To try to distance itself from the facts surrounding its “best bet” endorsement of Best Windows and Doors in 2002, UCAN now asserts that it has good reason to believe that Best Windows and Doors is not offering as good a value as it did at the time of the survey and that UCAN has received numerous complaints about Best Windows and Doors’ quality of service. In support of those assertions, UCAN has published a four-year-old complaint from Marcel of Lemon Grove. When Marcel sent UCAN a very positive statement about Best Windows and Doors favorably resolving his complaint, UCAN tried to minimize the effect of the positive statement of resolution and stated that it did not know if the Marcel who wrote the favorable comments about Best Windows and Doors was the same Marcel who wrote the original complaint.

UCAN has provided consumers with an online dedicated “Best Windows and Doors Complaint Form” and invited them to fill out that form. If UCAN has received numerous complaints about Best Windows and Doors’ quality of service, rather than just making that assertion, Best Windows and Doors challenges UCAN to publish any of those unresolved complaints with information that allows Best Windows and Doors to verify that the complaints were actually made, that they were made to Best Windows and Doors, and that any of those complaints have not been resolved by Best Windows and Doors.

UCAN ASSERTIONS: “Some of the complaints we have received include Best Windows and Doors falsely claiming they are the only authorized dealer in San Diego for a particular brand of window, falsely claiming they are the only authorized seller to offer a particular National Energy Rebate plan, and refusing to give written quotes.”

BEST WINDOWS AND DOORS’ RESPONSES: Best Windows and Doors challenges UCAN to publish evidence to support those assertions. Best Windows and Doors is, in fact, the exclusive authorized dealer of VPI and Great Lakes windows in San Diego County, and invites UCAN to verify those facts with the respective manufacturers of those windows. Contact information for those manufacturers will be provided to UCAN by Best Windows and Doors upon request. Also, Best Windows and Doors is the exclusive authorized window company in San Diego County to offer the National Energy Rebate Fund rebate plan. UCAN already has the contact information necessary to verify that fact. The assertion that Best Windows and Doors has refused to give written quotes is also unsupported by any verifiable evidence. Best Windows and Doors’ policy is to leave the customer a written quote that is good for a year. If a written quote was not left with a customer, it must have been due to unusual circumstances.

UCAN ASSERTIONS: “We view the company’s participation in the National Energy Rebate promotion as being particularly problematic. From our point of view, it is a scheme that preys upon consumers’ tendency to forget to submit rebate forms. They’ve made the claim process so restricted and so far off in the future, that they are probably banking on consumers forgetfulness. If this kind of scheme isn’t illegal, it should be. But just to be sure, we’ve submitted information about this so-called “promotion” to the Colorado Attorney General’s office. Click here for some correspondence between UCAN and the CEO of National Energy Rebate.”

BEST WINDOWS AND DOORS’ RESPONSES: This is UCAN’s opinion only. UCAN has not produced a single verifiable complaint from any participant in the National Energy Rebate Fund or any evidence of illegality. If UCAN submitted information about the National Energy Rebate Fund to the Colorado Attorney General’s office to determine its legality, where is the evidence that the Colorado Attorney General’s office found anything about the program to be illegal? The fact is that there is no such evidence. If the program was illegal, Best Windows and Doors would not offer it to its customers.

Although the National Energy Rebate Fund provides for a longer waiting period before a rebate is granted than many rebate plans, the rules and stipulations of the National Energy Rebate Fund rebate program are very similar to other rebate programs. All aspects of the program, including its reliance on slippage and the waiting period required, are completely and candidly disclosed to each consumer prior to their election to participate in the rebate plan.

National Energy Rebate Fund participation is only offered with the purchase of products that are comparatively energy efficient. Also, as a result of the longer waiting period required, customers who participate in the program are obviously not relying on their rebates to provide them with the funds necessary to initially purchase those energy efficient products.

The most important fact about the National Energy Rebate Fund rebate program is that it is a FREE INCENTIVE program to consumers. The cost of the program is paid by participating retailers as a part of their budgeted overall marketing expense. For example, instead of allocating a part of their overall marketing budgets to other forms of promotion, such as additional advertising, participating retailers allocate a part of their overall marketing budgets to participation in the National Energy Rebate Fund. Retailers who offer the program are not allowed to pass the cost of the program on to consumer participants. Additionally, the need to remain competitive in their pricing with retailers who do not offer the program insures that the cost is not being passed on to consumers. Best Windows and Doors’ pricing did not increase and the quality of its products or services did not decrease as a result of its customers choosing to participate in the rebate program offered by the National Energy Rebate Fund.

UCAN ASSERTIONS: On April 17th, 2007, Charles Langley, who works for UCAN, wrote following the heading: “Is Best Windows the Worst? Yes, says San Diego BBB”: “Here is the search form for the San Diego Better Business Bureau. If you search out Best Windows and Doors you will find that the company owned by Mr. Chavez has been barred from membership. Be advised that it is VERY difficult to get kicked out of the Better Business Bureau. UCAN officially urges you to avoid Best and try the rest by visiting the Better Business Bureau. And if you would like to join the ever-growing list of people who have a gripe against Best Windows and Doors, please click here.”

BEST WINDOWS AND DOORS’ RESPONSES: Here are the facts. In 2006, UCAN complained to the BBB that Best Windows and Doors was claiming UCAN endorsement on its Website. The San Diego BBB requested that Best Windows and Doors cease any references to UCAN on its Website. Best Windows and Doors resisted that request because it felt that it had the right to truthfully represent the UCAN rating information for which it had paid UCAN $27, 403.91 in 2002. However, Best Windows and Doors did not disclose to the BBB that it had paid UCAN that money, and you can bet that UCAN did not disclose that fact to the BBB. Finally, when threatened with suspension or revocation of its membership, Best Windows and Doors removed all references to UCAN from its Website. By then, the relationship between Best Windows and Doors and the San Diego BBB had soured. In February, 2007, the BBB threatened to have its Board of Directors consider revocation of the membership of Best Windows and Doors at the Board’s meeting on February 21, 2007, unless Best Windows and Doors ceased offering the National Energy Rebate Fund (“NERF”) rebate program to its customers and deliver to the BBB copies of its television advertisements. Best Windows and Doors complied with the BBB requests by February 16, 2007. It had stopped offering the NERF program before that date and hand delivered copies of its television advertisements to the BBB office on February 16, 2007. Best Windows and Doors then communicated a written confirmation of its compliance with the BBB requests to the BBB on February 20, 2007, the receipt of which was acknowledged by the BBB in writing on February 20, 2007. Despite that compliance, the BBB presented the revocation issue to its Board of Directors on February 21, 2007, and the Board voted for revocation. BBB appeal rules provide for appeals to be made to the same Board of Directors that voted for revocation on February 21, 2007. Best Windows and Doors then timely appealed the revocation to the BBB Board of Directors on April 18, 2007, indicating during the ten minutes it was allotted for verbal presentation of its appeal that it had complied with the BBB’s requests before the revocation hearing on February 21, 2007, and further indicating what it had done to assure self-regulation and compliance with BBB standards in the future. The same Board of Directors that had revoked its membership on February 21, 2007, denied its appeal. There is no expedient or effective way to overcome that denial.

The reader can decide how difficult it is to have BBB membership revoked. Best Windows and Doors does not contend and cannot prove that UCAN caused the revocation of Best Windows and Doors’ BBB membership. However, it is certainly clear that UCAN wants to publicize that revocation.

It is also clear that by its assertions, its creation of a specifically dedicated complaint form and link, and by specifically inviting complaints against Best Windows and Doors, UCAN is using its “public forum” to specifically target Best Windows and Doors. It could be concluded from the facts and circumstances that:

1. Despite UCAN’s representation that “We take no corporate money, and are beholden only to you, the consumer,” UCAN took money from Best Windows and Doors when it suited UCAN’s interest to do so;
2. UCAN then decided that it did not want the public to learn that it had entered into a joint marketing agreement with Best Windows and Doors, a company to which UCAN had given its highest rating and UCAN “best bet“ endorsement and from which it had received money to publicize that rating and endorsement;
3. UCAN tried to distance itself from Best Windows and Doors by trying to prevent Best windows and Doors from continuing to publicize that it had received UCAN’s highest rating and UCAN’s “best bet” endorsement;
4. Best Windows and Doors refused to stop publicizing the fact that, in 2002, it had received UCAN’s highest rating and UCAN’s “best bet” endorsement;
5. UCAN then used its “public forum” for an ulterior motive, and continues to do so.

For many years, Best Windows and Doors has specialized in energy efficient upgrades of existing residences and commercial buildings (including the free installation of donated dual-paned windows throughout UCAN offices in 2001). It estimates that it has reduced energy use by approximately 50% in over 17,000 homes in San Diego County. That translates into an estimated savings of over 300,000 barrels of oil per year in today’s market. In fact, Best Windows and Doors has been rated by the San Diego Union Reader Poll as a top-rated company the last two years in a row because of its exceptional customer service and quality of products. This year’s poll results are expected to be no different as Best Windows and Doors constantly strives to improve.

Since my wife and I bought our condo in Rancho Penasquitos in January, 2006, we've wanted to get new windows and a slider. Our unit is in a complex that was built in the 70s and it had those aluminum, single pane windows. We got a quote from a company shortly after we moved in, but couldn't afford them at the time. We ended up using our tax return this year (thanks to having an interest-only loan...oh well!) to buy our four windows and one door from Best Windows and Doors.

Among other things, our salesperson did mention UCAN and showed us a copy of the article that's in question, but he was up front and said that it was five years old. I think he spent more time talking about the League of California Homeowners (dealing with an approved contractor is probably the safest way to check out a company) and their other associations anyway. Also, he mentioned the National Energy Rebate Fund, which I don't know much about--he said it was a 25% rebate after four years, but it was only on the top of the line window, which we didn't buy - so it didn't apply to us anyway. My wife and I decided to use the company primarily because of how long they've been in business. We figured that they had to be doing something right to have lasted since the early 80s.

My wife stayed home to wait for the installers and they showed up when they said they would (and only used a 1/2 hour arrival window, which was nicer than what I'm used to with other services). By the time I came home on my lunch break, they were already cleaning up. Before they left, they showed us the features of the windows again and gave us some suggestions on maintenance (I thought using Pledge to keep the sliding glass door sliding well was real interesting). The windows themselves are beautiful and, since we spent a little more for special sound resistant glass, the noise difference for us next to the 56 freeway really stands out! A female from the office called us to make sure we were happy, and our salesperson came back to do the same and ask for referrals. We gladly obliged, and one of our neighbors in the complex just had their windows installed by Best a couple days ago.

I think that UCAN is a great organization and does the public a good service. I also think Best Windows and Doors is a great organization, and I personally had an outstanding experience. I'm not sure what the big deal is, but my neighbor and I both are happy with our purchase--and that's good enough for me.

Here is the search form for the San Diego Better Business Bureau. If you search out Best Windows and Doors you will find that the company owned by Mr. Chavez has been barred from membership. Be advised that it is VERY difficult to get kicked out of the Better Business Bureau. And if you would like to join the ever-growing list of people who have a gripe against Best Windows and Doors, please click here.

Charles Langley
UCAN Advocate

I'm glad that "Marcel" appears to have finally gotten responsive service from Best. (We can't actually confirm that it is, indeed, the same Marcel who complained to UCAN) We're certainly glad that our posting seemed to spur Best Windows to get it right. Of course, the fact that Marcel volunteers that Best is "not the same company that were a few years ago" is troubling, given that management at the company hasn't changed.

And, as you'll see below from another consumer (Dex), Best is still trying to tout the UCAN survey (in a very misleading way) to support its advertising. And the prices they are offering don't appear to be particularly competitive........Home Depot prices are not particularly low when it comes to window installations. Dex' experience is similar to what we've heard from other consumers. Best's prices aren't so good and they take liberties with their representations. So beware...............and we strongly encourage you to get other bids.