Culinary Mastery 101

Apparently my original review is too long. Shortened version:
I found JP (of Culinary Mastery 101) on Thumbtack. Due to the Thumbtack form, it looked like I needed full catering, which I did not. I simply needed someone to set up and break down my buffet. The food I was serving was provided by a family friend.
JP was incredibly responsive on Thumbtack. We exchanged 12 messages in a day. He said, «No job is too small!» as he and his wife were expecting their first child and he offered to set up my buffet. I offered a generous amount of money for the small task of setting up the buffet, breaking it down, and doing one trash run. He provided a contract and invoice. He said he would do the job himself.
I checked in with him a few weeks before to ensure everything was good to go: he said it was. At that time, we also confirmed the venue location, date, and time.
I had asked that he arrive at the venue at 5pm. At 5:15, he’s still not there, so I call him. No answer. He texts back at 5:30 that he thought the event started at 6 and asks for the address; «his worker» is on the way from Lewisville and is 20 minutes out. That’s less than ideal and not what we discussed, but okay. If the worker really is 20 minutes away, we can still make it work. By 6:30, it’s clear no one is coming, so my friends, family, and I set the buffet up. And I spill pasta sauce on my wedding dress. Around 6:50, his employee arrives. She was very sweet and said he sent her a Facebook message asking her to drive from McKinney to Grapevine to work the event with no prior notice. We thank her for driving all the way down, but send her home. JP and his business were in breach of the agreed upon contract, and we did not feel comfortable accepting any services from his company at that point.
After the event (which we bussed and did trash runs ourselves, by the way), I text JP with a screenshot of our Thumbtack conversation and ask for a full refund since he didn’t fulfill his contract. JP blames his employee and says, «her tardiness cost her her job and for that I apologize.» He did promise full reimbursement.
He never reimbursed me, so I had to file a dispute with my credit card company. He hasn’t fought the dispute, yet.
He did, however, threaten legal action for posting an honest review of my experience with his business. Needless to say, as there were multiple conversations, emails, and text messages, everything is documented and 100% verifiable. If you’ve ever planned any event, you know to save every piece of communication, just in case. And a pro-​tip if you haven’t planned an event: seriously, save every piece of communication, just in case!