"miamicuse" wrote in message
...
Have a exterior metal double door and this morning the dead bolt jammed
and
won't fully retract. The deadbolt is the lower part of a mortise lock.
Tried for an hour and no luck. Call a local locksmith a had a good
experience with two years ago and he said he will send someone over in an
hour or two. Someone came an hour later from "A+ Locks" so he contacted
another locksmith. OK let's try. This guy is a joke. Tried using his
allen wrench to loosen the screws and one screw fell down to the "inside"
of
the door. The he tried to open it brute force buy pushing and pulling and
banging the door from the inside, still no luck. I suggested we take the
door pins out from the inside and see if we can loosen the entire door and
he ignored me. Next he sprayed a bunch of WB40 and nothing worked.

(tale of woe snipped)
If I have to replace the entire exterior door and lock, am I just out of
luck or the locksmith should bear some responsibility?

Sounds like you have already expended entirely too much time and effort on
this project. If you can't buy a drop-in replacement for the locksets,
rather than replace the doors, I would Bondo the old holes, and buy new
locksets to fit holes you drill. They sell decorative wrap-around plates for
situations like this, so you don't even have to repaint the door.

As to going after the locksmith or the guy he subbed it out to- forget it-
it will cost more money, time and effort than replacing the whole door
would. If you must vent, write him a nasty letter about the experience, and
tell him you will be telling everyone you know to avoid him, and then do
that.

aem sends....