Another shady contractor - ripped off my mom this time.

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goldfish21
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10 May 2023, 1:19 pm

Took a 1/3rd deposit ($2700) to remove grass and install artificial turf. Industry specs are 4-6" taken off the top, weed cloth, then a couple grades of gravel compacted for drainage, artificial turf spiked down, sand raked into it to hold it in place etc. Something like that.

Guy says to my face he'll take it down 4" everywhere and then use pressure treated wood to hold two edges. They scraped the grass off, barely dug down at all, and used regular pine boards. They were so offended when I criticized their work and said it was unacceptable. Dude didn't measure anything - even with a 2x4, a level, and a tape measure I can see it's less than 1" off in some places and super uneven. Didn't even scalp the grass off in some places! Minimum 4" my ass gtfo of here.

Anyways, he said he'd calculate costs and refund the rest of her deposit.. and now of course doesn't answer his phone. Cash no receipt no legal recourse, but, I have a few dozen pics of his his shoddy work and will put him on blast everywhere, leave negative reviews on his family's home building business he operates under, report to the BBB, complain to the lead generation site he was found on, and possibly report to the tax man. We have his home address and might go visit to see if his cell phone reception is okay there.

So, a friend backed a truck and trailer up yesterday and I'm digging it out myself - down to 6"+, with a bit of help of some friends/neighbours. Guy is coming at 6 to measure up for proper materials to order for Saturday.

My mom wasn't thinking clearly At All about vetting this guy or getting a receipt etc because she just wanted to find a local company that could do it asap so it looked good so my dad could see it before he passes - so I don't really fault her too much for not making the best of decisions.

Anyways, this is fun. Gonna be interesting going over to that guys house sometime. Unfortunately my older brother started feeling sick yesterday, so it may have to wait until he's well. He's.. calmer than I am, and has some physical defence/offence training that I don't just in case this guy or his brother/father want to get physical. Should simply be a matter of words.. like "You owe us about 2 grand. Pay it or we relentlessly slag your business online FOREVER and you'll lose more business than that every single month into perpetuity."

Makes me wish it wasn't so risky to just break some fkn legs and collect what's owed to people. Little wonder that's an actual black market industry - lotta people out there deserve to have their legs broken.


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goldfish21
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11 May 2023, 12:30 pm

Pretty sore from shovelling and wheelbarrowing - had a little bit of help but mostly dug the small back yard down 6" myself and wheeled every load up a ramp into a 14' trailer, then the rest piled by the road for a machine to take. Some fine tuning to do later this afternoon/eve to grade it better, make sure it's deep enough everywhere and has a slight slope towards a drain.

Unloading the trailer to get rid of soil is gonna be quite the job today.. not a dump trailer, gotta shovel it all off. Hoping to have help. Gotta get moving and get outta here in the next half hour to have time to unload it.

My body feels pretty worked. I've been pretty sedentary most of this year. It's good to do work but damn when this is all over I'm gonna just need to eat and sleep and drink water and eat again and again - went from 0-100 in terms of physical activity real fast. Not too much to do over the next 48h, but then Saturday will be go time.. mostly wheeling gravel/crusher dust/sand etc. At least there will be 3-4 ppl.

HOPEFULLY all the things get completed Saturday and then I can just sleeeeeep on Sunday. Something like that. Quite the logistics to get the rest done in a day with delivering/picking up/taking away various materials to and from a few different places all before they close in the afternoon. Blah blah. Might go get some flowers and stuff for the front that we haven't done yet, back too maybe.. might go to town on that after fine tuning the grading etc. And maybe my dad will be able to see it looking good - he's in rough shape, hard to say if he's still this side of the afterlife by Saturday evening as he could depart at any moment, really.


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goldfish21
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12 May 2023, 3:34 pm

People are moving mountains to get materials in time to Try to complete the entire job tmw in hopes that my father is able to see the finished result before he passes.

I’m off to pick up some kinda premium artificial turf direct from the wholesaler that doesn’t sell to the public at all because I phoned this morning & asked if they’d be able to do a rush order so we can try to finish tmw what a contractor started days ago so maybe he can see it looking good like he wanted - with flowers; I picked up 6 big hanging baskets yesterday. Wholesaler phoned me back and said yes 2pm pickup.

I still have some dirt to wheel today. But should be really close for tmw so barely any fine tuning by the pros tmw morning.


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No :heart: for supporting trump. Because doing so is deplorable.