Scammers Pounding the Pavement | Video

Jenny Castro | 6/8/2012

Residents who have lived in the Minot area for years would never suspect that someone would actually scam them out of thousands of dollars. This has already happened with online housing listings in Minot, but now many residents are getting cheated on asphalt paving jobs.

Dustin and Heather Deaton have seen how North Dakota has changed over the years. Now they have a strong feel for the negative effects of the booming population.

"Just being born and raised here, you don`t think that people would do this to you and to have someone do this to you it really hurts,” Heather said.

Last summer, the couple was approached by a door to door salesman who had extra paving material from another job. After they asked around on pricing, it seemed legitimate. But from the beginning it didn`t quite match up.

"In this economy, there`s no reason why we should have to go door to door selling our product. My phone rings off the wall for work. We`re booked up for the season, so any legitimate company has no reason to go door to door,” said Jack Sawyer, who owns a local asphalt paving company.

Once the paving is done, it looks like a nice job. Until it starts falling apart, which is usually within a year.

“There are tricks of making the edges look thicker and in the center it`ll be an inch thick. And to the common person they`re going to think, `Oh that`s a beautiful driveway,`" said Sawyer.

"I mean we`re going to have to spend even more money to get this re-done. And we`ve tried calling their company five, six, eight, ten times and we`ve never gotten an answer or return phone call from them; or their number`s been disconnected,” said Heather and Dustin.

The Deatons have been approached several more times this summer at their door with other salesmen asking to re-do the job or put sealant on it. Unfortunately, many of their neighbors had the same job done on their driveways too.

"We`re so used to helping each other out that we don`t think people will take advantage of each other and it`s happening in our own community,” said Heather.

"You figure if they don`t live in North Dakota, you`ve got no recourse if your job goes bad,” said Sawyer.

With so many residents looking for this sort of professional work, it`s easy to just overlook the details.

Another way to spot a scammer is if they ask for cash or a check made out to a person rather than a company. You should also make sure to get a receipt on any work done, find out if they have a local office and visit it yourself.

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