Always disappointed when I pay for work.

[F124C]

Yes, Hence the reason I had the floor coated. He ground it first. In the floor contractors defense he has been a stand up guy to deal with once I notified him of the problem. He was out today and reground the bad spot. He repainted it and put down more flake. He is coming tomorrow to clear it.

So things might be looking up. Of course I won't be home to supervise but I have faith he will make it right.

Hopefully,this time, you'll get the floor the way you wanted it!

Last garage floor I had laid, I stressed it needed to be level in order to be able to use a floor jack, check steering angles etc. Contractor got the floor level by tamping (chopping) with the edge of a long board. The surface was corrugated like what you'd get by driving a tracked vehicle across dirt. The C. said I should have asked for level andsmooth. I swear some contractors are deliberately thick!

Another C. used to advertise that his guarantee of customer satisfaction was "We'll keeping fixing it until it's right!" He went out of business.

AL.

 

[404]

Hmmm, allowing for inflation that would be..... Wow, Whee!

Need any work done, Sir.?

AL.

Al, thank you for the offer, but since then I do most everything myself. I did have some regrading done around the house, I made a scale model out of styrofoam to show the slopes and grades. Had to show them the model several times to get things done the way I wanted them.

 

[jn503084]

Slightly off topic but still related. My pickup had a recall( air bag harness replacement) so like the good owner, I made an appointment with our Chevy dealer. I picked the truck up late after work and there were cut pieces of harness tape, an old harness, and the seat track covers were scratched.

That upset me, but then I saw the passenger side air bag connector, new in the package sitting on the console.
I went through the roof. I marched back in and showed my advisor the "work" that had been performed.
2 days in a rental car, I got my truck back with replaced seat trim, a full detail and an oil change coupon. Before I left, I did check to see that the seats were actually bolted back in the truck. I guess you get what you pay for nowadays..

 

[OJ Bartley]

I am very picky on the way I want things done. maybe its because I was in the automotive service industry for years before a career change. I always took great pride in my work.

There's your problem. Well, not YOUR problem, but the problem is that so many people these days don't give a **** about the quality of work they do. They strive for "good enough" to get the job done and get out. The other mantra I've noticed with a lot of construction/trades people is "not my house". Even if someone is capable of doing good work when properly motivated, they rarely do it.

I often think to myself "I could have done a better job if I knew how to do that". Sadly, we don't have the time to learn how to do everything well, and sometimes you have to hire something out. Hope your bad run ends with the next outsourced project, and you manage to find one of the good pros who cares about his work and his customers. Then hang on to him.

 

[TAMPAGT07]

I did new construction during my summers in college and 30 years later I still remember the house where the woman brought out a pitcher of cold water when we were working on a really hot day.

I still remember the houses where the hot housewife/daughter would lay out side in their bikini's when I painted their houses, much more then the pitchers of water....

 

[Slowgsr]

99% of my customers are very satisfied, all my work is word of mouth. No uniform, no advertising, no names on my vehicles yet im busy 365. You should get what you pay for, sure i price work and dont get it but thats life.

Another thing is i dont get paid until my work has been signed off by architects, designers, engineers, inspectors and the customer. So im used to doing high quality, to be honest i dont do low quality work, even if the customer doesnt care. I just dont do cheap work.

 

[Choirboy]

I had work done by a very high quality contractor, and he was a great resource for referring subs. His one big fault is that he never shows up when he says he will, never answers his phone, and never calls back. His work is impeccable, when you can get him.

That seems to be a big problem around here- getting the guy to show up. I call a guy three times, and if I don't get a response, I move on to someone else.

Sounds like we've hired the same contractor! Didn't realize he commuted from Iowa to SC....... lol. The problem is the best people are in-demand, so you have to wait for a spot to open up. I called about a particularly weird roofing job in November. There was a misunderstanding in scheduling that took a while to get straightened out. It is almost October and I'm hoping he'll be here soon!

 

[Choirboy]

The worst is the guy who finishes a job, takes a look at the pile of **** that he just did and says to himself, "Oh yeah, that looks great." If you get stuck with a guy like that, he'll never fix his mess because he doesn't know what a good job looks like.

I bought my house from that guy! He had a version of the Midas touch, only everything he touched turned to, um, 'fresh organic fertilizer.'

 

[stikman56]

I fully understand what you're saying, been through it. I too hate hiring anything done, but we're having a home built right now. I go behind them and make corrections on what I see. I've been on the roof of both buildings nailing down sheeting that got missed,( I'm talking whole edges of plywood) corrected walls that were crooked up to the vaulted ceiling, even ripped out two very crooked studs in the shop walls that were making the walls stick out, it looked horrible. It's the way it is these days, sad to say. I'm not allowed to make any changes to the house until it's finished, but I can and will as long as this **** keeps happening. They can simply kiss my back side as far as I'm concerned. It's not acceptable.

 

[mpire]

You just can't win.

I had a set of wheels painted about 5 years ago. The guy was referred by a friend. He came to my house and did them in his cart in my driveway. He did an OUTSTANDING job.

Yesterday the same guy came back to my house, oh wait, it wasn't the same guy. It was his employee.

Well, there are runs in the clear and **** stuck in the paint. Its another set of the exact same wheels, and I want the same result.

He is coming back on Monday to re-do them.

I feel like a bit of an *** for pointing out the imperfections and runs in the clear, but what am I supposed to do? Its $500 to get the wheels painted, all I am asking for is the same quality as LAST TIME.

I am not paying him until I am satisfied and the work is up to expectations.

Is it my fault that they set the bar so high?

 

[CJ7VFR]

Is it my fault that they set the bar so high?

No it's not your fault at all.

What the first guy gave you was what you wanted and what he said he would do. It came out great, and I am sure you told him it was great at the time.

Now, because you had such good service and excellent results from the first time, you said to yourself, hey, I need more wheels painted, so why not hire the guy who did such a great job the first time.

You didn't HAVE to call this guy again. But you did because you got results that were great. That is exactly how "Word of mouth" references come to be.

If someone is happy with work done, they tell others about it, and that person will get more work.

If someone is NOT happy with work done, they will tell others to stay away, and that person loses work.

Had the guy who painted your wheels done a crappy job the first time, then you would have NEVER called him again to do your other wheels. But because he did such a great job, then you called him because of the work he did.

For him to now have employees must mean his business is growing, and customers like you really liked his initial work. But what will eventually happen is because his "employees" are doing less than stellar work, people will start to complain about it, and this guy will actually start to lose money because he will constantly have to re-do the mess his guys are making.

And even though he may re-do the work to his original great standards, his customers will now think twice about hiring him because of the **** job his employees did.

It's a vicious cycle. You start your own business and build a customer following based on the work you do. Then you get really busy and have to hire people. Then those people do **** work and customers complain and want things re-done. Then it costs you money to re-do things and future business falls off. And then your business goes down the toilet and you have to start over.

Jim

 

[Cato]

You get what you pay for. Quality work costs BIG money.

I bought a fixer upper home that needed everything done. I quickly learned that all the contractors were either low lifes, half wits, or both.

I learned that you can't give them an inch, or they will take a mile. That means hire them for small individual jobs. That way if they screw up or flake out, it's easy to dump them and move on without too much damage to your property or wallet.

My brother in law made the mistake of hiring a guy who promised to handle her whole home remodel. Every time they would pay him, he'd disappear for weeks at a time.

 

[Gotcha640]

We have a handy man in the area (south Houston) that does everything from install a toilet to new builds. He charges $100 an hour, works 100 hours a week, and he no longer takes new unknown customers. He books a year out, and calls his clients a few times a year to check in.

His work is consistently better than expected, and while I don't make enough to pay for all the things I want done, he has a list of the repairs I need and he does them as I can pay.

Find that guy in your area.

 

[Lassen Forge]

I bought a fixer upper home that needed everything done. I quickly learned that all the contractors were either low lifes, half wits, or both... you can't give them an inch, or they will take a mile... My brother in law made the mistake of hiring a guy who promised to handle her whole home remodel. Every time they would pay him, he'd disappear for weeks at a time.

Either... your BIL lives in the bay area, that, or our general disaster of a GC we had moved to SoCal. This is the same **** he pulled - "I have another job I need to finish"... "I have a family emergency"... "One of my guys are sick/injured/fired"... "My work truck/pickup/wife's car broke down"... I was waiting for "The dog ate my klein belt"...

What I remember vividly was they did about 1/2 the job in 72 hours, took better than 72 DAYS to do the other half. Not again. Now if they're absent for more than 3 working days they're fired. If they install or use materials substandard or not as specced, neither work to install or remove the ****, or cost of their faulty materials are compensated.

One contractor remarked "Geez, those seem like harsh conditions, you'll be lucky to get anyone to agree to that"... Guess who didn't get hired. What I've found is the GOOD contractors are way OK with this (or so I've found), because it doesn't affct them at all. What it does is chase away the ones like we had before. Thank God!!!

 

[56FordGuy]

I've been through this twice with fence builders. First guy did a decent job, but used substandard materials. Within a year the wood posts had rotted and began to break off- and he was out of business by then.

Second guy used decent materials but didn't tamp the posts down well, the first time because the ground was too wet. Not sure why it was half assed when they came out to redo it, but they finally got it somewhat okay the third time. I still need to fix a collapsing corner and retamp probably 20 posts, but it's easier for me to do that than keep arguing with the guy. Kind of funny, I went with his bid because he's a full on, legit company. My other bid was from a guy that just builds fences on the side, I was worried if there were problems he might just disappear. Hiring the "pro" didn't make much difference...

I'm genuinely beginning to think there are no good contractors available. The good guys are booked so heavy they can't take new work, and the guys that are available are looking for work for a reason.

 

[sledneck32!]

I don't hire out anything unless I need to or just hate that type of work. I have the tools to do almost anything home or vehicle related, so getting bids is a very rare occurrence for me. I always pretend I am a usual homeowner that knows very little about a job that needs to be hired out when I am getting bids. It makes it easier to tell if the contractor is going to try and cheat me or not, because they won't think they have to hide anything very well to fool me. Then each night after they are gone I go around and check squares, layout, nailing patterns, material selection, etc. If I find a problem I can't fix I have them change it, but if I can fix it myself I usually do. I also sometimes make my own quality improvements as they go along.

I was helping my parents with a new large driveway several years ago and after the contractors went home (the night before the pour) I went over there and checked out the forms, concrete thickness, reinforcement, and final surface slope for any issues. I found that my parents were paying for 4" min concrete depth and most of the forms were set up for only 2" thickness except for along the very edges. There was also a part that had the slope set up wrong for water to drain correctly away from the home. I got out my transit, raised the forms in places, fixed the slope, and adjusted it all to work properly and for them to get the depth of concrete they were paying for. The next day the crew came out and poured the driveway without even noticing my changes. Towards the end of the day the crew lead came up and told us how he was surprised because he had to order one more concrete truck delivery to finish the job than he was expecting. We all just acted surprised, but it was obvious to me (after a few quick calculations) that he just originally ordered the concrete based on only having a 2-3" concrete thickness. That proved to me that he knew exactly what he was trying to get away with instead of it just being an accident.

If a contractor is going to try and cheat you it will most likely be in a way that can't be seen or easily proven once the job is finished, so pay the greatest attention to those things and you will have a much better chance of ending up happy. It does however sound like the OP had visibly poor work done, which is more rare with good contractors.

How do u refrain from giving the contractor an earful? Your a patient man. I wouldve been hard pressed not to fire them right then an there.

Sent from my LG-H811 using Tapatalk

 

[Ponchoguy]

As a rule I try to do everything myself. However, with my current work schedule being about 80 hours a week I find myself paying professionals to do some work for me. In the last year I have paid 4 professionals to do work for me. A new concrete driveway, a concrete shop pad, a new roof and and an epoxy shop floor.

The concrete driveway turned almost black and spalled within a month. It took a year to get him back and tear it out..

The concrete shop pad was not finished to my specs. He never power troweled it and did a horrible hand finish that was worse that the first time I ever finished concrete myself.

I paid a roofer to do a complete tear off. The roof leaked within 3 months.

And finally I paid a professional to epoxy my shop floor. The only reason I wanted to epoxy it was because of the bad trowel finish. Well of course the clear coat bubbled and the repair looks just about as bad. Now I have to get that sorted out.

Am I asking to much to get what I paid for? Its not like I am going with the cheapest estimates. I research the company and go look at stuff they have done. I am never happy when I pay someone to do my projects. ....Sorry rant over...

No, you are a consumer who should get what he pays for, if not, it comes out of the guy's pocket. Money talks, BS walks.

1) I usually tell them, "Would you accept this if this was your (fill in the blank)?"

2) Holding up money from the job always, always gets their attention or leaves you some reserve to have it mopped up by someone else.

3) Word of mouth gets around fast, very fast. Even faster if the area is small....

As you can tell, I try to do my own work where possible. As my supervisor once said, "It's hard to buy a good job these days....".

 

[theoldwizard1]

Of course, getting dependable help IS an issue.

The guy doing the sprinkler had a young 20 something quit after just 2 days, and they weren't 8 hour days ! Called the boss at 11 AM yesterday saying it was the boss's fault for not telling him the night before to say they were working the next day. Then he wanted to know when he was going to get paid. The boss says "When I get paid !! And the check clears !!!!"