My family and I are among the numerous victims of Josip Sep, whose fraudulent actions have caused significant turmoil and financial distress in our lives. We reside in Calgary, where Joe Sep recently targeted us under the pretense of being a reputable contractor. We engaged Joe to undertake a kitchen renovation. He came recommended and appeared professional, so we trusted him with our home. After providing him with half the money upfront payment, he began the demolition of our existing kitchen. However, that was the extent of his work. The promised renovation never materialized, and Joe ceased all communication, leaving us with an unusable space that was once the heart of our home. He would keep saying he would give us the money and then never did, lie after lie. I’ve never had someone lie as excessive as this man did. He will try to gaslight you and say things that don’t even make sense. The emotional and financial strain of this experience has been overwhelming. Without a functional kitchen, our daily family life has been severely disrupted. The cost of undoing the damage and completing the renovation with a new contractor has placed a significant financial burden on us, compounding the initial loss. I hope he gets what he deserves one day. PLEASE WARN EVERYONE YOU KNOW ABOUT HIM

I was helping a friend’s mother to find someone to finish her basement. Jo was referred to me by an ex-colleague. My friend’s mother is very picky and had unrealistic budget and expectations. I sent four different contractors to give her estimates and she was not happy with any of them. I told Jo about the situation and he said he wanted to try anyways. I told my friend’s mother I don’t know anything about this guy, but to my surprise she decided instantly to hire Jo for the job. I warned her again but she said she liked him and wanted to use him. I told her to get his business information and sign a contract. Jo started to work the next day, and was going there everyday to work for 2 weeks with his friend Peter. For some reasons Peter left and Jo started to bring a young man who had no experience in construction work, and that is when he stopped making progress. He called me everyday complaining about my friend’s mother being demanding and he was losing money on the project. He complained about things being expensive, asked me to help him find people to do plumbing and electrical work, asked me to help him find people to do the floors, he said he could do it himself but he lost motivation because she was too annoying. He complained that the new homes were built poor quality, the concrete was not drying, so it wasn’t his fault that he couldn’t make any progress. He eventually stopped going there and started to target me once he heard I just bought a home. I will share my own experience with him in a separate post as it is a long and more horrible story. My friend’s mother already paid him half of the money and he asked for more to purchase kitchen cabinets and doors. When she asked to see a picture of them, he said he had them in a warehouse far from her place, and it would be a waste of his gas to go there to just take pictures. I asked him to speak to the people who work at the warehouse to take pictures, he said it’s stupid nobody would do that. I asked to go there myself and have my friend pick them up. He refused and said he would deliver them himself the next day. We knew he never bought the cabinets, but still waited until the next day, of course he never showed up, never answered our messages and calls. We hired someone else to finish the work he left behind, had to pay extra to fix the mistakes he made, some mistakes were too expensive to fix so we left them. My friend’s mother was the lucky one as she only pay $3000 more than the original budget to have her project finished after he abandoned it. He left his tools there, never went back to pick them up so don’t trust him when he says “my tools are still here, where can I go without them?” He did have the audacity to pop up a few days later, pretended nothing happened, and said he was sick.

Jo was working on my friend’s mother’s house and started calling me everyday to a point it felt like a Harrasment when he found out I bought a house. He told me he could help me make a lot of money if I flip an sell, I told him I didn’t need renovation, I was not interested in making money from the house, I bought it for my mother and we were happy with the way it was. He called me multiple times to ask about my house, I was annoyed but I couldn’t ignore him or block him because he was still working on my friend’s mother’s house. He guilty tripped me and said I was not a good child to let my mother live in an outdated house. He talked about wanting to abandon my friend’s mother’s project, so I eventually agreed to let him do it if he could finish my friend’s mother’s project. I told him I would pay him the deposit he asked for after I actually took possession of the house, he refused and said he needed money to order chemicals and he didn’t want to wait, he wanted to get the chemicals fast so he could start and finish my project fast in time for my mother to move in. He demanded me to let him put the chemicals in the house before I had possession, I refused, so he sat on the driveway, called me every 20 minutes until I said the keys were officially released to me. He said he had to unload the chemicals right away so I gave him the code to the lockbox and he got the keys. I later asked for a copy of the key, it took him two weeks to give it to me, every time I asked he said he forgot. I was locked out of my own house for 2 weeks until I told him I would hire someone to open the door. When I got access to my house I realized he completely destroyed it. Every inch of it was ripped out, he did the complete opposite of what I told him to do. I asked him to work on the main level first, he did framing in the basement, and in the wrong place, and cut open the ceiling which I had to pay someone else to repair later. I said to work on the inside first, he painted the exterior, but only 70% of the surface, and cut my tree. I told him to pick up his tools and leave, he went back and made a new wall. I eventually had to change all the locks so he couldn’t get in my house, and told him to give me the garage remote back. He never returned the remote and I noticed the electric meter outside of the house went missing. I messaged him about it, he called back and yelled at me, said he never touched it, then he blocked me. He scammed me a total of 50K (asked for money for emergency purchases, electrical, plumbing, cabinets that I never got) and left the house destroyed. I hired new contractors to help me fix it, and it will cost me another 100K. He took all my kitchen appliances too. He also abandoned my friend’s mother’s project. He caused serious property damage and mental damage to me. I have been sleeping on the coach for 2 months now waiting for the house to be done as my mother already came but the house is not useable. I am stressed, and constantly worried about my house. Can’t sleep, can’t focus on work. When he came to Calgary I was the first one to take a leap of faith to help him, introduced him to my own connections, and helped him to find people to do work in my friend’s mother’s house after his partner left. This is how he pays me back.

Jo offered to help my friend paint her wall for free as it was just a small area. When he was there working on the wall, he somehow convinced her to do her basement and collected $2000 from her to buy materials. She later on regretted that decision and asked for the money back. He said he couldn’t return the materials anymore as it was final sale, but he would send the money back. He never did. I asked him to give us the materials he bought, he never gave anything to us, never gave us the receipt that he said he would provide.

My company was referred to Joe by another contractor (who we know and trust) that had been working with Joe for a few months. The contractor had no issues with payment from Joe to date so we had no reason to foresee any of this coming. Our first job with Joe went quick and easy, although payment was late it was received (Small $1200 job). Following that, we priced a larger renovation for Joe and our quote got approved. This project accumulated extras which were approved by Joe and documented. Following the completion of our work, Joe received the invoice and reacted as if we pulled these numbers out of thin air, shy of $10,000 ($8xxx originally quoted + approved extras). Time went on and we did not receive anything from Joe. After going back and forth, we eventually agreed to settle on $6000 + tax to at least cover our labour costs – which he said he will pay right away. Time went on and we did not receive payment. We also dealt with Joe for a couple other projects which we eventually pulled off from and stopped working with him all together. It has been almost half a year and Joe has gone off the radar with no payment. Once we started seeing things go south, we caught Joe on several lies and anytime he didn’t hear what he wanted to from me, he would call one of my partners to get them to do something that I said I wouldn’t – obviously this didn’t work. Joe also tries to pawn off liability by getting sub-contractors to pull permits for him. His work is also beyond sub-par – we have photos of a project we walked away from which he supposedly had building permits pulled (but didn’t) but not one bit of his framing work was to code – honestly some of the worst work we have come across in our years. Joe is a manipulative, lying, and very shady individual and I advise all contractors and clients to stay far clear of Joe & SETP-TJE construction. This man is a painter at best, and knows nothing about honestly, transparency, communication, and really anything about construction. He currently is playing a song and dance with people stating he is sick in the hospital – I don’t think anyone can confirm the validity of it but when he sends us a picture from a hospital that’s 2 years old it makes you think… typical Joe. I am deeply embarrassed that my company had any association with him, and apologetic for any clients who had to deal with him. STAY FAR AND CLEAR FROM THIS GUY

I did jobs for Josip for a little while. He currently owes me $5000 also has my $2200 paint sprayer so I am out a total of $7200. Nothing but lies in empty promises. Hopefully he will never work in the trades again to rip off another customer or tradesperson

I met Joe through a friend who recommended me as a tile installer. I went to look at a job that Joe was General contracting. The signs of a project run by someone who doesn’t know how to run things efficiently were definitely present (something I pointed out to my friend right away). Normally, I wouldn’t have accepted the job, knowing that the chances of something going badly were high, but against my better judgement, I went ahead and gave Joe a price. When he spoke over the phone, he gave me the quick talking, know-it-all responses that would make any seasoned professional cringe. Details were sparse, I was expected to do tasks that subcontractors typically wouldn’t do, and low and behold, the tile patterns (which I didn’t price for), were far more time consuming than expected. Regardless, I completed the work, the client was happy, but I was not payed for the balance of what was owing to me by Joe. Every time I called for payment, there was an excuse until he just stopped answering.

!! Homeowners beware !! If you ever run into a guy named Josip Sep (Joe Sep) and his company name is called Sep-tje Construction (for now until he changes it) run for the hills! We have done work for him and have not yet been paid and won’t. The homeowner is also out $30,000 and no garage. Beware he is a con artist , he takes on jobs , gets 50% down deposit for the work and get smaller contracting companies to do the work, then he disappears and dodges calls and won’t pay the contractors who did the work. This guy never gets permits for anything. He promises big things for next to nothing $$$ because he never plans on paying for the contractors he hired to do the work. He already has 5 court cases against him as of today. He WILL keep continuing to do this to other homeowners and contractors until he is stopped. We have heard that he bought a house in Alberta (south Calgary / Airdrie, Alberta). He started in Saskatchewan, came to Winnipeg and now is running to Alberta (south calgary / airdrie) as his gig is up here. Please share this wide and far so no else get taken by this awful human.

I started taking jobs from Joe in 2021 and at first everything was smooth. I did a few projects with him and was paid for my work. Joe landed a big house reno job in 2022 and brought me in for the job. He used the good reputation he had built with me so far to get me to bring in an electrician for the job knowing I would vouch for him. Once the work was done Joe kept making excuses for payment. When we would speak on the phone Joe would lie about how much the homeowner had paid him and also claimed he had given the homeowner a “huge discount” because of delays which he was blaming on me. The homeowner confirmed no such discounts were ever offered and that Joe was to blame for the project timeline being horribly inaccurate. Joe has still not paid anything to me or to the electrician and has stopped communicating with us.

Joe is a yes man. He accepted all of my requests and sold me on this incredible vision of what he could achieve for my clients. Although he accepted the price, he was apprehensive about getting anything in writing. As the project progressed, he gradually began blaming everyone but himself for his inability to finish tasks and creating more and more excuses. The most common grievance was that he needed more money, which was a recurring theme for Joe. As an interior designer, I send my contractors to pick up materials and/or pay final invoices. As he was completing this task, he began to yell at the supplier, complaining that they had overcharged him and that he could find a better deal (obviously wrong). He gave my suppliers that I work with a bad experience, making me look bad in return, and I was embarrassed to have hired him to represent myself and my clients. By the conclusion of the project, we had discovered that he had simply pocketed up to $30,000 in bills instead of paying them. DO NOT WORK WITH HIM. He is a lousy contractor and an even worse person.

This guy took half the money up front and then never came back to do the work, after some investigation, it turns out I’m not the only person he has done this to. Theres a few lawsuits with others he has done this too along with employees who haven’t been paid for work they have completed. I would hire anyone but Joe. (This review was posted on the SEP-TJE Construction Google Listing on February 23, 2023)

While providing a quote for a renovation on an old house, Mr. Sep assured me he would not report the asbestos in my house to the Manitoba Department of Workplace Safety and Health, despite openly admitting that he knows this is required by law. “If there’s asbestos, that’s our problem, OK?” he began, going on to describe the expense involved. “Don’t talk about it. Because, by the law, we need to report, and if we report, just one wall, asbestos is like $15-$16 thousand. You don’t want that.” He went on to explain both the costs and hassle I would experience if the government knew that renovation involving asbestos was about to be done to a house. “55 bucks by square foot. Then you need to have yellow bag. You need to have everything.” Mr. Sep pointed out that, on the one hand, hiring his workers to replace insulation that contains asbestos would save money. “Again, we will do containment. You will be safe.” But if I hired a different company that abides by the law, “You need to spray, then you need to isolate it, then new insulation… They will check bag year and the date. It’s stupid. It’s hazard number three in insulation. The worst one.” Manitoba’s Workplace Safety and Health Regulation has requirements for asbestos management and abatement. The regulation describes what’s required prior to, during, and after the demolition or alteration of Asbestos Containing Material. That includes Workplace Safety and Health being notified at least 5 days before starting work that may release ACM into the air (Part 37.8(2)). The Manitoba government has the authority to issue penalties of up to $5,000 in cases where contractors are breaking the rules related to Workplace Safety and Health. They can also prosecute and issue stop-work orders.

Jo was aggressive in sales and pricing and talked himself up to be a very affluent man and a big player in the industry.  He exuded confidence and offered me the moon for a very good price.  His timelines were exceptional for a complete upstairs renovation was said to only take 2-3 weeks.  It took 3-4 months to finally be 100% complete.  The renovation turned out great but the big mess was all behind the scenes.  Jo was playing fast and loose with the cash.  He was paid just shy of $70,000 in total but the plumber, electrician and drywall team saw no money.  The cabinet makers never received their final payment, the tile installer only got paid about 60% of what was agreed to and the countertop installers were left hanging on a small balance as well.  At the end of the day Jo made off with about $35,000 in his pocket and refuses to pay all the men who did most of the work.