Dealing with Contractors

We are in the process of having a backyard patio, retaining wall, deck and gazebo put in. So far I have had to deal with 4 different contractors (Sprinkler guy, retaining wall guy, cement guy and deck & gazebo guy) and out of the 4 we have had an a great dealings with the sprinkler,patio and wall guy (all mind you do this on the side) but my deck and gazebo guy who is backed by a national company has been nothing but a total headache and has screwed the job up completly. When we met with him he had mentioned that they had 20 years + in the business (a good reason to go with them so we thought). After screw up upon screw up we find out that they just bought into the frachise this Feb. I have attached some pictures of the screw ups. I have called the headquarters to this company and requested all work be stopped by the incompentant crew and to get another more seasoned crew out to fix the problems and get this done. What else can I do to get this done right?

Pic #1 footing shimmed up (I thought shimms were used for door frames and not for load bearing surfaces)
Pic #2 Gazebo floor support (or misaligned. Entire section of Gazebo drops down when stepped on)
Pic#3 Gazebo floor sitting crooked on frame
pic#4Gazebo floor crooked again
Pic#5Gazebo frame resting on support (barely)
Pic#6 North railing (notice difference in height between two railing)
Pic#7 south railing
Pic#8 Steps (notice shotty work)
Pic #9 Patio and wall done and looking good
Pic#10 closeup of patio
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That's really F'd up. I would imagine just emailing those pics to the company HQ would get some a$$'s chewed and the problems corrected.

Good luck.

 

PAT

HAVE YOU GIVEN THE DECK AND GAZEBO GUY A DEPOSIT YET FOR HIS WORK??

CHECK, CASH, OR CC ??

IF SO, HOW MUCH DEPOSIT TO THEM AND WHATS THE REMAINING BALANCE??

BRUCE

 

We still owe them about 6k

 

YOU LEFT A MESSAGE WITH CORPERATE..

WAIT TILL 4 OCLOCK TODAY WITH ANSWER..

THEN WE MOVE ON, JOISEY STYLE

B

 

I think we might have to send in Frank Rizzo or Sol Rosenburg to figure these jerkys out. Amy had just called and said one of them who is working alone there today (after I told them not to work on it until they have a seasoned vetern with them) dropped one of the roof pieces and had it come crashing down on top of the gazebo floor. Oh what fun. I think they are up there slapping themselves with the hot mops.

 

My opinion from looking at the pictures is that you have a very dangerous situation here. Someone could be seriously hurt from this botched installation.
You mentioned that these guy's do this work on the side. I hope this work was not done on the side. I would call the local building department and have the building inspector come look at it. Yes you will catch some flak if you don't have a permit but they could condem the work and then you have a real legal leg to stand on. Most building depatments will forgive if you just pay the permit. In this case I think the building department would require the mess removed and re-done and that would be to your advantage. DO NOT PAY THEM ANY MORE MONEY!!!!

 

I have been there and bought all the t-shirts. You do not want to get me started. I'll just give you a little taste. I hired a painting crew and asked them how long they thought it would take to paint the house. "Two weeks, tops", he said. Well, two MONTHS later, they finished. I don't understand how they can make a living.

 

Better take your heart medication!

 

Only the Patio guy and the retaining wall guy are working on the side and have done a great job and are done. It is the professionals that are having the problem. The deck/gazebo guys do have a permit taken out from the city. I found out today from the home office that this crew has only bought their franchise (they buy the franchise and are assigned an area to work in from the home offfice) in Feb and have never put up a gazebo before. Some or all of this info would have been nice to know up front instead we were told they have been in business for 20+ years.

 

I hear you. When this first started I asked how long will this take? The answer was 2 weeks. And know that the gazebo gets prebuilt before (An amish company in ohio built it and shipped) and all they have to do is piece it together (no cutting at all required). The deck portion is only 10' out from the house and 14' wide with steps going down and we are going on the well over a month from the signing of the contract. I have seen many decks larger then ours go up in a weekend and I wake up every morning wondering why I just didn't build it myself.

 

I'll agree with you on the Patio! I was looking at the last pic and it's fairly amazing how they were able to match up the slabs. Rises with rises and the stone patterns flow from one cut stone into the next.

You got your $$$ worth with those guys!

 

The stamped concrete was amazing to watch. All they did was smooth it out and then started to throw this dust (for the color) and then smoothed it out again and then dusted it with a releasing agent and then they had these rubber mats (4'X 4' and about 6 of them) that they laid down and started to stamp the pattern in. The next day he came out and cut the expansion lines in and pressure washed it and then sealed it. Total time with pouring the cement to the finshed product was about 6 hours (of course they let it sit overnight to dry)

 

damn... damn! I am glad the guys doing it on the side did a sound job. Now I wanna know what these guys are going to do to correct the problems.

 

So far I have contacted the home office and requested that these guys lay down their hammers since they will have no clue on how to use them. I requested another crew come in that are seasoned and know how to put up a deck and gazebo to correct the problems and finsh the job ASAP.

 

Pat,

It looks like a lot of inexperience in those pictures.

 

You said a mouthful that's for sure.

 

WOW. The shims on the post take the cake. Send them a certified letter and tell them the building inspector will be out there in 15 days, advised to go over it with a fine tooth comb.

 

Pat, I can understand why you're upset. I'm just thankful that you took the time to review the workmanship. I'm concerned for the other homeowners that might not understand some of the dangers this company creates.

I do believe you will get satisfaction by contacting the corp. office. I think a seasoned builder could fix the problems without much difficulty.

I do think the building inspector and contracting licensing bureau for your county should be contacted. You might save someones life.....

 

I've had my share of fun with contractors. I was the Resident Engineer for a $1.8M bridge on the north side of Chicago.

I'm not really familiar with residential improvements, but does your contract specify for some sort of punch list to identify everything that's wrong? Definitely hold any remaining payments until you get this sorted out.

On some of the more specific points, you can shim a support post, but ideally the shim should be of the same cross sectional size and material as the main post, and the bracket into the concrete footing should be secured to both the support and shim to prevent separation. Picture 2 is simply horrible. The nail isn't going anywhere. You should not put any load on the gazebo floor with a structure built like that. Things like the steps should be easy fixes for the new crew.

 

My dream garage is a nightmare. I now have water damage in 3 rooms. All I can say is don’t pay them by the week. When you see things that are obviously f***** up, stop & don’t listen when they say they will take care of it. I’m still looking for solutions & they haven’t even started on the garage. From now on I’m a brutal ***** w/ contractors. Waiting….

 

The phrase "catastrophic failure" comes to mind. That structural work is severly defective. It looks like you need to call the building inspector and an attorney.