FCA Floor Covering Associates of Kankakee — Local services in Bourbonnais

We had a double bad experience with FCA Tile in Bradley. Their policies are very unfriendly to customers. We originally ordered some floor tile for our bathroom from them. It was a high end tile with each piece having a unique stone pattern. But when it showed up the color did not even come close to any of the pictures we had seen. FCA refused to take it back because it was a "special order". Turns out, they only accept returns on things they stock. So I asked them what they stock, and I was told "very little". The tile is uncut, unused, and in the box, and yet they refuse to just send it back where they got it. So buyer beware on this one. ​We ordered a second type of tile for the bathroom, even though we were having to just eat the cost of the fist one. This was also a high end tile with a random stone pattern (from the mfr website: "Shade Variation: Random (V4) – Considerable variation from tile to tile"). This time, the tile was the right color, but it was not random. There were only two different tiles, with very minor color variations. Definitely not what I was expecting. This tile was basically a mass produced, non-random tile priced ABOVE the high end tile we bought the first time. I contacted FCA about this, and they just brushed me off, passing the buck. Their advice was to contact the manufacturer for relief. I did that, and DAL Tile also refused to support their product. Their advice was to go back to FCA. How helpful.

Finally, I spoke to the owner and manager of FCA. He was very rude, condescending, and angry with me. He was all but shouting at me on the phone. He had heard about my previous phone calls, and it was clear he had decided even before I finally got in touch with him that he was not going to help me in any way. He offered no support, no service, no solutions, no courtesy, and no indication whatsoever that he cared at all about keeping me as a customer. The main message I got from him was: take your problem and shove it, we don't need your business any more. He did, however, take the time to remind me that FCA had "generously" given me a slight discount off the retail price of the second tile because of my troubles with the first one. He also tried to backpedal their policy and say that if the tile had not been installed, I could have returned it. How convenient. That's funny, because his employees specifically told me the opposite, since it was also a special order. The owner said he "wouldn't expect me to understand the difference".

And it turns out, my installer on this job told me that FCA has been like this for years, with this reputation. I wish I had known that...

In rebuilding and upgrading our home following a minor house fire, we sought to replace damaged carpet and tile with carpet and tile that was most fit our needs. We searched the Internet and then went out to a variety of stores to see the products. None of the others had what was finally shown to us at FCA of Bradley, IL, 100% SmartStrand carpet by Karastan as well as Paramount's Central Park tile. Our salesman, Kyle Soucie, listened to what we said wanted and needed in a carpet and then showed us the carpets of a variety of manufacturers and explained how each would meet our needs (Kyle, owner of a large and powerful dog himself, gladly met our high drive dog, RRJ, to get a better idea of the specific challenge our carpet would face). In addition, Kyle showed us the choices of padding and explained their strengths and weaknesses. Finally, before placing our order, Kyle measured the stairs where our new carpet would go. At another visit to FCA, Kyle showed us a selection of tile appropriate for our home and had us take samples home to see what tiles we would like best to replace those which had been damaged. In addition, Kyle was very helpful in amending our orders as necessary. Both the carpet and tile have been installed, and visitors have been very positive about them. Besides helping us find our carpet and tile, Kyle also worked closely with us to make sure both arrived on time for the rebuild. Furthermore, Kyle went beyond helping us with the products we bought directly from FCA by ordering stair nose necessary for wood flooring that was also being replaced but flooring that we had bought from an FCA affiliate and not FCA and Kyle directly. Without hesitation I say that you''ll find Kyle to be friendly, intelligent, informative, helpful, and a true professional. P.S. Just before we signed to buy the carpet, FCA ran a coupon on its home website, and Kyle applied this coupon to make the sale...

Great selection of tile (we love the design aspect of our finished bathroom). Attentive sales people before the sale.

Cautions/Reasons for not providing 5 stars:

1. Be sure you work closely with your installer to verify tile/grout quantities rather than relying on store estimates. It was not made clear/pointed out during purchase that returns of unused tile are generally unaccepted and we ended up with enough left over to remodal another small bathroom.

2. Additional gotcha for us was that tile selected for our accent border in the shower was significantly thicker than the rest of the tile so install cost was significantly more. Not knowing enough to ask about this, I would have hoped the sales people would have advised us of this. We again tried to return the tile when we found out the problem but were denied.

3. While I know no one enjoys responding to deny a request radio silence gives the appearance that a request is being ignored and makes a person wonder if the manufacturer was contacted or the store front just doesn't want to deal with a return. A response without hounding would be nice and...