Werner Kruger Refrigeration doesn't complete work after being paid

I really don't like damaging people's professional reputations by posting public complaints, but I'm at the end of my rope now and don't know how else to deal with this local contractor who has been giving me the runaround for over 7 months after being paid twice for a job that's still not resolved.

Last year I hired Werner Kruger of Werner Refrigeration to repair my fridge/freezer that was giving problems. He was recommended to me in a local community group. I explained the problems to him in advance and again when he was onsite - not getting properly cold, freezing unevenly, switching off randomly and not coming back on unless switched off and on at the plug. When onsite, he assured me it was nothing more than a gas problem and would require a simple refilling of the gas to operate fully and properly again. I was surprised and dubious, so I asked him multiple times if he was absolutely sure that this was the *only* problem. He insisted that it was and my fridge would be in perfect running order after the gas refill. It was done and I paid for the work immediately after he left (EFT).

Within a matter of a day or two my fridge stopped running again. It acted exactly as it had before the work I paid for - not getting cold in the fridge section, unevenly over freezing the freezer section, and turning off randomly and not turning back on until "reset" at the plug. I contacted Werner to let him know his work hadn't worked. He then claimed it must be something else - even though he'd previously expressly insisted it wasn't.

My fridge then had to be taken into his shop to be worked on there. I was somewhat worried about this because while he and his colleague were taking my fridge out to his bakkie, they bashed it into several of my exotic plants, damaging them and upsetting me terribly. I even asked him if he could guarantee that he'd take better care of my fridge while it was in his possession than he had shown towards my home and plants. He promised he would. He told me it would be repaired and then returned on particular day. I asked if he was certain it would be returned that day (there was a public holiday that week), as I was moving house the day afterwards and didn't want to be messed around during moving chaos. He promised he would call me the next day with feedback and then ensure my fridge was returned before I moved. Neither of those things happened. He did not call me on the day he said he would and my fridge was not returned on the day he had promised. I followed up - which shouldn't have been my responsibility - and he used the public holiday as an excuse for not keeping his word. Even though he'd known about the holiday when making his promises and assurances.

He then tried to act like he was doing me a huge favour by delivering my fridge to my new home (same area) on moving day, even though that actually put more stress on me that day by having to communicate and coordinate with him as well as the movers - he also didn't show up on time. But I obviously needed my fridge back. I only have one and was already struggling to keep my food from spoiling in cooler boxes and bags.

Once returned, and paid for a SECOND time because he said it was a different issue (despite his guarantees as a professional that there were no other problems) my fridge worked for a few days and then went back to exactly how it was before it had been "repaired". All the exact same issues. I contacted Werner again to come and resolve the work. He worked onsite and blamed it on a "grain of sand that had caused a small hole in the welding and let the gas escape". I gave him the benefit of the doubt yet again and hoped it was resolved.

It wasn't. Shortly thereafter, it stopped working again. And once more, the exact same problems returned. I contacted Werner again and he and his colleague worked onsite yet again. Once more, I was assured it was now fixed and would give no more troubles. He even repeatedly mentioned over the course of all this that the type of fridge it is, is very hardy and would run for many more years because the older types don't give as many problems as the newer kinds with all their extra digital offerings.

But it wasn't fixed. Same story all over again. This happened so many times that I have genuinely lost count. Especially as it's not the only thing going on in my life, obviously. Each time he gave a different story about what had happened, but his "fixes" never worked. During the welding of the last "repair", he or his colleague also managed to burn several holes across the bottom of the inside of my freezer section, which I didn't know about until well after they'd left. Additionally, the settings no longer seemed to actually work and the fridge appeared to run at one fixed temperature - i.e. turning the temp dial made no difference at all to anything, it just remained on the one setting. I had previously told him that I was going to be extremely busy for some time after that day and really needed it to be properly fixed that time because I'd not be able to attend to it again for some time. He assured me it was fully fixed that time and would give no further trouble.

Soon afterwards, just a day or two, my fridge started acting up again. It was very heavily icing up all over the inside of both the freezer and fridge sections and seemed to be running constantly instead of cycling on and off. I didn't know if I was being overly worried, but it sounded like it was straining from the constant running. I messaged Werner yet again to tell him it wasn't cycling on and off, but running constantly (the motor was very loud with the straining sound) and that, as already told to him, I wasn't able to monitor it at that time. I received no response from him at all. He simply left me on read.

Very shortly thereafter, I suffered a deeply sad death in my family and was in no state to follow up and beg Werner to do the work he'd already been paid for TWICE. As soon as I felt moderately able to keep my patience and talk to him again, I tried to phone him because I was having WhatsApp issues. None of my calls were answered or returned. I tried several more times over the next few months and all my calls were ignored. I didn't bother trying to email him because it felt like a waste of time if he was ignoring my calls. I then had to attend to some urgent family matters and wasn't able to keep hounding him to do the work he'd been paid for. However, when the hot weather hit, my fridge was straining more and turning off more often, so I tried again to reach him by phone. Again, ignored. I wondered if his number had changed and searched for it on local group posts, but it was unchanged. I didn't really know what more to do at that point because I can't force him to answer my calls. Another tragic death then struck my family late in the year, and once again I wasn't capable of chasing after someone I shouldn't have to chase.

I'm still not ok but have been forced by urgency to try and attend to this again since my fridge is now running for no more than 3 or 4 minutes at a time and then taking many hours to come back on - and only if repeatedly switched on and off at the plug, because it doesn't come back on by itself at all now (since Saturday night). And with the heat we've had over the past weekend, all my food is going off and I can't afford to pay someone else to do the job that he was paid to do - nor should I be expected to.

My WhatsApp is now mostly working again, so I sent Werner a message this morning to tell him that his work has still not fixed the issue he was paid to resolve, and that I expect it to either be done today as it's extremely urgent now, or he needs to immediately refund the monies paid so I can hire someone else to urgently do the work he was paid to do but didn't complete. Not surprisingly, he's refusing to do either and trying to make it seem like I'm being unreasonable. I don't think it's at all unreasonable to be very upset after 7/8 months and paying him twice, only to be left with a fridge that's even worse off than before he worked on it!

I've tried so hard to be patient for all these months and to give him the benefit of the doubt throughout his poor service, but now I've got no patience left for him. I did give him one final chance earlier today, after he refused to fix it or refund me, to resolve this amicably before I lay a public complaints and thereafter, if still not resolved, file charges against him with the SAPS, but he's just ignoring me again.

I always try my best to support local, and wherever possible, small businesses, because I know it's hard to make a living in my area. I also detest having to complain publicly because it is very detrimental to one's reputation and small businesses can't afford that knock. But I firmly believe I've done everything I can to resolve the problem without taking the public and legal route, yet he's simply refusing to actually repair the item he was paid to repair, and furthermore, caused additional damage to it. I feel I've shown more patience and lenience than many would have, but it's enough now. I'm furious to have been essentially ******** into paying for work that didn't resolve the problem and has wasted so much of my time, money, and energy - of which I have none to waste. I have no interest in trying to discuss this with Werner any further as that'll just waste more of my time - it's now a simple matter of him needing to either PROPERLY repair my fridge as he was paid twice to do (at no additional cost because I'm not his cash ***), or refund all monies paid to him by me so that I can hire someone else to do the job he's atrociously failed at. Otherwise, I'll be forced to go to the police and take legal action against him and his business. I've had other bad experiences with local contractors over the years, but I've never been this angry, upset, disappointed, and disrespected by one before. Especially one proclaiming so loudly about being a Christian. His behaviour and lack of ethics has been shocking and I definitely would not only never recommend him, but have to go so far as to warn people against him and his business. I have now, within the past hour, seen multiple other local complaints about Werner Kruger that are so similar to mine that it's incredibly suspicious and is leading me to believe he's a ****mer who takes money for work he can't do and then just ignores the customer when they try to get him to fix the item he was paid to fix! I wish so desperately that I'd chosen someone else from the recommendations and never hired Werner Kruger of Werner Refrigeration. He's essentially ****** my money while damaging my fridge further.