I hope this doesn't sound unsympathetic to the homeowners but how did they find this contractor and how well did they screen him? Did they check references?
A simple Google search of the company name told me that they made about $100K last year and have one owner, one employee. (
www.manta.com) I couldn't find a license or anything else. Seems a little shady to me to start with. A reverse lookup of the company's phone number leads me to an unpublished landline.
Just because someone can drive a nail it doesn't mean they can put an addition on a historic home!
That being said...
And not wanting to sound unsympathetic (honest!)...
But is this forum really the best place for rants/raves about businesses? Perhaps our mod can consider such a forum? Or perhaps there's another website that might work better for this... like Angie's List:
http://www.angieslist.com/Angieslist/