PARTNER NEWS
Stephanie Forbes
In August 2014, KSA national manager,
Stephanie Forbes, received this letter from
a member of the public who had utilised
the services of a non-KSA member and had
come to the KSA for help when things went
wrong. We asked Stephanie what would
have been different had the client opted to
appoint a KSA member instead…
Dear Stephanie
Part of our planned home renovation in 2013 was a
new kitchen. What should have been one of the more
pleasant experiences of a renovation soon turned into
a bit of a nightmare that dragged on for more than a
year.
inspection’ service. Many of the mistakes and cornercutting that the kitchen company had made were
ones we, as consumers, would never have seen or
known to look for and not only affected the aesthetic
of the kitchen but the structural integrity and
longevity of it too.
I won’t bore you with the details of the poor
workmanship and work ethic of the company, but
we ended having to seek out protection under the
Consumer Protection Act (CPA).
Despite the KSA’s report which stated that the cost to
bring the kitchen up to an acceptable standard would
be over R40 000.00 the Consumer Protectors office
were only able to get the kitchen company to drop the
final payment of around R9000.00.
We thought we had done our homework by having
three suppliers draw up designs, in the same price
range. When we had decided on a preferred supplier
we didn’t just accept their nice showroom and
business record, we also did a Google search for
negative comments before we committed.
The kitchen company in question charged us with
breach of contract when we refused to pay the final
10% payment. This, because of a very long snag list
still existing after eight months of them working on
the kitchen.
It was at this point that we approached the office
of the Consumer Protector. Apart from the obvious
problems there were a few other nasty surprises in
store for us, most of which were only brought to our
attention after we decided to get a second opinion
from the KSA with their new ‘non-member site
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africandesignmagazine.com
It was a shock to us that the Office of the Consumer
Protector could only act as a mediator and did not
have any power to demand financial compensation
from the kitchen company.
We now realise that had we selected a KSA member
we would have had more backup (from the KSA) than
we received from the Office of the Consumer Protector
as their members volunteer to be registered and
agree to abide by any ruling handed down by the KSA
or risk suspension or even expulsion which is listed
on their web site. Had we appointed a KSA member
to do the work their mediation service and assistance
would have been free of charge and I would have
had access to their holding account facilities for my
payments.
I don’t want to make the mistake of saying that there