Thursday, August 23, 2007

Patience

The Porch People and I seem to have a huge communication gap lately.

Not too long after I wrote my last Porch People post, I received a return phone call from my contact and an appointment was set with the master carpenter.

Of course at the appointed time he didn’t show up.

I was fit to be tied. Saying I was pissed was an understatement.

I put a phone call into my contact that very day.

Since the appointment was for last Saturday, my contact and I played phone tag on Monday.

Oh---did I mention that the appointment was set on August 9th? A full nine---count ‘em nine days before the actual appointment on August 18th.

Can you believe that bullshit?

Adding insult to injury, one of the phone messages I received from my contact was that the master carpenter actually was there and left notes on what needed to be repaired or replaced.

We paid that company $90,000 for our porches and the level of communication that we receive on follow up problems takes the form of a note left on a porch?

Are you kidding me?

I was also told that he showed up at our association around 9:25 A.M. because of “traffic.”

Our appointment was at 9:00 A.M.

It was at that exact moment my head spun around.

What happened to professionalism? Moreover what happened to common courtesy?

And at the very least what the fuck happened to calling when you were late?

I took me a full day to calm down so I could clearly and more importantly---civilly speak to my contact.

I informed him that his master carpenter being late due to traffic wasn’t my problem. When an appointment is set---it’s set. And if for some “good” reason you’re going to be late, you at least have the common courtesy to call and let someone know.

Personally speaking I think these jokers are trying to blow smoke up my ass.

I have a feeling that the master carpenter didn’t want to get off of his can and schlep down to the south side.

We have a porch that’s roughly 18th months old and has questionable structural issues and a company that seemingly doesn’t want to do anything to correct their mistakes.

I’m quickly losing my patience with this situation and the Porch People.

1 comment:

The North Coast said...

Woody, I feel for anyone who's had to mess with contractors and developers as much as you and your neighbors have.

Nobody can deal with these people. Hell, entire courses at architecture and design schools are devoted to teaching people how to deal with these people. Many professionals have really costly bad experiences with them. They:

1. Never show up on time
2. Drop your job and disappear leaving materials allover the place because they got a bigger, more lucrative job.
3. Cut corners everywhere the contract doesn't specify a particular material or techinique, down to matching fittings in the bath and the size of the bolts and nails.
4. Slap a lien on you if you didn't get a lien waver. This happens a lot when you fire them for doing shoddy work mid-job.
5. Hire violent ex-offenders to do jobs in your elderly parent's home..
6. Show up with no proof of insurance.
7. Leave the job half finished.
8. Falsify their experience and qualifications.

Everytime i hear a job was done well, I'm surprised.

It shouldn't be this way but I never heard of things going smoothly.