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My husband and I are about to move into our new apartment at 505 Greenwich St in Manhattan. On our first day there, we met Ozzie who introduced himself as the handyman of the building and offered to paint our entire apartment just $3000. He said he's been building houses his entire life and we were lucky to meet him, because had we met the super, he would charge us more for inferior workmanship. We hadn't met any of the other building employees, but we trusted Ozzie based on the fact that he is an employee of the building and of course AKAM wouldn't allow dishonest individuals to have free access to people's homes, right? After hiring Ozzie, we returned to San Francisco, telling him that he had two months to complete the job before our return. He asked for an initial payment of $1000, which was mailed right away to his home address. Two months later we went to New York to check the status of the apartment and found that the work was not completed. Worse still, what had been done was appalling workmanship, mainly involving a gigantic roller that left an orange peel effect all over the walls. Furthermore, paint was spilled all over the carpet and curtains, and gaps appeared in places where Ozzie had simply not bothered to paint at all. That's when we realized we had been duped. The super recommended an excellent painter who completed the job in one week for $7000. Ozzie's work was so bad that the new painter had to undo everything and start afresh. Shortly after that I emailed Ozzie to try to get her $1000 back, but of course, I haven't heard from him. So with $1000 down the tube, a baby on the way and a *** artist working in our building, I turned to my building managers, AKAM Associates for help. But AKAM dismissed us, saying that there was nothing they could do, and that it was our fault for hiring Ozzie. We pleaded with AKAM, trying to get someone to understand that the reason we chose to trust Ozzie was because he was an employee of the building. Had he come off the street, we would have done our research, but as an employee of a building of this caliber, we expected that he was trustworthy. This too fell on deaf ears. To quote AKAM: We were not involved in hiring Ozzie as this was done prior to our management of the property. I have never experienced an issue such as this with Oliver or any other staff member. The reason why I state that I cannot get involved is because when a unit owner contracts an employee to do work outside of what the building is responsible for it becomes an agreement between the unit owner and that person, and at that point he is working for you directly and therefore that is why we cannot get involved. I pleaded again, saying did it not matter to AKAM that one of their employees had been found to be fraudulent, scamming a new resident out of money? My husband and I are two weeks away from moving into our new home. I am heavily pregnant and don't feel safe, knowing that this deceitful individual not only knows where we live, and will have to see us in the building every day, but will possibly also have access to our keys. Additionally we have no idea how much of our complaining has reached this man's ears, and who knows how a person will react when they discover that you may be a threat to their job? Ozzie conned us, and the building managers are siding with him, which hurts almost more than the deception itself. My husband and I paid good money for our home, and we have a basic right to feel safe and comfortable in our home.