All a Calgary couple wanted was to renovate the front hall of their southeast Calgary home but instead, they lost thousands after falling victim to contractor fraud earlier this year.
Homeowner Crystal Arnold — who lives in Deer Ridge — says she’s reminded of the $8,000 loss every time she walks up and down her stairs.
“We remember we got ripped off, and we didn’t get everything done that we wanted to get done,” Arnold said.
Arnold and her husband had been in the market for the renovation and after putting it off for the past ten years, and said they finally went all-in after finding a contractor they only knew as “Ralph” from a website that connects homeowners with contractors and renovation experts this past spring.
“He was really nice,” she said. “He came in (and) he seemed super knowledgeable. He gave us a price that worked within our budget,” Arnold said.
They were quoted $16,000 for the project and paid a $3,000 deposit.
Arnold says she started to get a bad feeling when “Ralph” asked for an additional $5,000 to order the supplies for the job.
Everything went south when she confronted him, she said.
“He started pulling out and telling me that I was difficult to deal with, when I was demanding a date,” she said.
“He said he was gonna come, and then he no-showed on that day, and then he didn’t respond to text messages.”
Arnold said when they asked “Ralph” where he was ordering the supplies from, they were given a fake store name before he gave them the name of another store.
They would not only learn that their contractor never put in an order for supplies, but his name wasn’t even Ralph.
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His name is Omar Ghandour, said the Calgary Police Service. Its officers investigated over several months after they determined Arnold “had paid a total of $8,000 upfront to a contractor she hired online.”
The investigation also found that Arnold and the contractor “reportedly agreed to not proceed with the work, and the woman requested her money back but did not receive the full amount of the funds despite repeated efforts to communicate with the contractor.”
Ghandour was arrested by Calgary police on Sept. 30 and charged with fraud over $5,000.
The Consumer Investigations Unit with the Alberta government issued a consumer protection alert in 2021 to warn Albertans about Ghandour.
“No one deserves to get ripped off,” the Service Alberta and Red Tape Reduction ministry said in a statement.
“Albertans should always be vigilant when hiring a contractor, and our Consumer Alerts page is an important resource to help people protect themselves. Consumer alerts are issued for a reason, and Albertans should take them seriously,” the statement said.
The accused is scheduled to appear in court on Oct. 29.
Credit: Government of Canada
The Canadian Anti-Fraud Centre says as of June 30, nearly 10,000 people have fallen victim to fraud in Canada with more than $350 million lost.
Calgary police urges anyone who has suffered a financial loss or has had their personal information compromised because of fraud to report it to CPS or Crime Stoppers.
Anyone who’s received a fraudulent text, email or phone call without a financial loss is asked to report it to the Canadian Anti-Fraud Centre.
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