Revdex.com:
I have reviewed the response made by the business in reference to complaint ID [redacted], and have determined that this does not resolve my complaint. For your reference, details of the offer I reviewed appear below.
[To assist us in bringing this matter to a close, we would like to know your view on the matter.]
Regards,
[redacted] 1. I have only talked to [redacted] of Innovative Exteriors one time. Numerous other calls have not been returned. [redacted] told me that he had no idea why we where not paid and he would have his office investigate and call me back that afternoon. I did not receive a return call. The date of this conversation was 7/28/15. Now he says that we are "willing to come to an agreement", but he also indicated he is "in the process of puting together all the man hours an materials used to correct the damage"?2. I am beginning to understand the propertied problem, from Innovative Exteriors response to the Revdex.com. Two tree locations were not accessible via the home owers association. Innovative Exteriors on site supervisor (who hired us to do the work) negotiated an agreement with a neighbor to use their drive way and a portion of their back yard for access. The on site supervisor told me that any damagae caused by our truck transversing the site would be Innovative Exteriors responsibility. I then agreed to move the remaining two trees.Stoneridge Farms LLC
We have already agreed at our meeting on May 22nd, to replace the blueberry bush and the Japanese Maple per our standard nursery warrantyWe will not be offering to replace the Taylor Juniper as they were noted on the landscape plan and were approved for installation by the customer prior to
installWe have also agreed to bring one of the buried downspouts back above grade and customer had indicated they would get a drain pad so that the water did not wash away the mulchThe other draintile was noted and we had agreed at our meeting to install a pemitter or a grate as the customer has specifiedWe do not feel as though the weed barrier needs replacementThere are weeds that will settle on the surface of the weed barrier and the possibility of a few coming through, but this is a case where they feel that because they had weed barrier at their last residence in the city of Wauwatosa that the weed barrier is ineffective at their new residenceThis is a case where they have moved from a city lot with very little weed infestation out to a rural area where weeds of all kinds are far more prevalentThe photos of the weeds at the sites where weed barrier was installed is not overly excessive and does not need replacing, rather an hour or two of weeding and some roulike most homeowners useThe arborvitae's are very much in good health and I do not see this needing to go any further than some root stimulator and some light pruning.We will replace the tar paper used in the raised planter boxes with pond liner per their request, however it will be at our discretion based on the contract to use what was called out in the original proposal, even though the customer had approved this at the time it was being installedThe wood sealer that was used is in our opinion a quality product and the customer indicated to me that they even witnessed the sealer being applied, they are not happy with the appearance of the wood because it has been exposed to sun for the last eight months and has faded beyond their expectationsThis is a maintenance item that we feel will have to be addressed by them as they continue to own the home.Lastly, we have already indicated to the customer via e-mail and in person that we will top dress and reseed any disturbed areas that were affected by our equipment during the installation of their landscape and is typical of this to be offered.Regards,
Sean P[redacted]
(O) ###-###-####
(F) ###-###-####
innovativeexteriorslandscape
Revdex.com:
I have reviewed the response made by the business in reference to complaint ID [redacted], and have determined that this does not resolve my complaint. For your reference, details of the offer I reviewed appear below.We tried to be concise and keep our complaint limited to the items that need addressing. IE's response and refusal to take responsibility for all of them, however, makes it clear we need to explain to the Revdex.com and to the public additional context of our complaints.Facts and additional details of our I.E. landscaping experience:Plants were delivered the day work started. Landscape beds weren’t even cut, downspouts not buried etc. Plants sat unplanted for about 30 days. We took on the task of keeping everything watered (on IE's behalf).Dirt for the beds, which weren’t even cut, and planter boxes, that weren’t even built yet, was delivered and dumped in the road in front of our house without our knowledge or permission at the start of the project. It was there at least 3 weeks prompting multiple visits by officials of Waukesha County, including twice by a county sheriff, as well as complaints from the neighbors. On one of those sheriff visits IE's business [redacted] was actually on site and told him that the dirt would be gone by that Friday. The dirt remained there until the following Wednesday.Landscape beds were cut before the downspouts were buried. A mini excavator was then used on our property on a rainy day causing a muddy mess of the beds and excessive lawn damage.Decorative stone for utility bed near the home was delivered at the beginning of the project and dumped in its intended area before sloping the ground away from the foundation, before installing weed barrier and before its downspout was buried. The crew was stopped by us as they began to spread the stone, and it had to be undone.Pea gravel for the planter bed area was dumped in the yard and workers began to spread it, prior to the bed being leveled, prior to weed barrier installed, prior to planter boxes even being on site. The gravel had to be gathered up and moved to the driveway, needlessly trashing the lawn again with multiple skidsteer trips.Along with the previous examples, we were able to stop several missteps midway, if we were lucky, and point out details that needed to be done first. There was no project manager on site most of the time. While the workers were always pleasant and hard working, it was obvious the crew was not properly instructed on what was on the proposal. Much labor time wasted. Much anxiety day to day as we felt tied to our house every moment there was work being done (or inexplicably not done) as we realized we had to try to be on top of it all.IE's skid steer sat in our driveway for at least three weeks. There is still a visible rust line on our new concrete driveway from the skid steer bucket.The project manager on our job was terminated by IE due to incompetence and mistakes made on our job (and other jobs as IE's [redacted] later revealed). Apparently we were not the first negative experience with this guy. IE chose to have him represent their company and sent him to our house for our project, therefore IE is ultimately responsible for the mistakes, failures, and disappointments that have been created here.IE finally assigned a new project manager who did his best under the horrible circumstances, to limp us to the finish in the fall, only for us to discover in the spring what still wasn’t done correctly.To address the specific areas we have asked to be remedied:Taylor Junipers - IE will not replace the junipers. His reasoning is that it was on the proposal and we agreed to it. Yes, we agreed to them per their recommendation by IE's project manager who turned out to be incompetent. We don’t think it should be up to the client to know that a professionally recommended tree selection will be inappropriately sized in its designated location (directly under the second story windows) in a few years. IE is saying the responsibility of this mistake is ours. IE's guy should have known the basic specs of a tree he selected. We did not discover this impending problem until the spring when looking up its specs in deciding on other plants to add to this bed. The mistake is theirs. The junipers need to come out and be replaced with a shorter species. We propose to do the work in picking up replacements, digging up the Taylors and planting our new trees. We would accept to simply be reimbursed from IE what we paid them for the junipers.Arborvitae - The arborvitae look terrible due to IE’s poor planning. At one point they were moved off the driveway and sat in a heap near the planting site, crushing each other for about 10 days. No they are not dead, but the damage from their mistreatment is clearly evident. We are expected to accept damaged plants. We will accept IE's application of root stimulator and pruning the damaged areas, for now. If in one year the damage hasn’t recovered, they will need replacing.Weed Barrier - All of the present weeds and grass in the barrier areas are coming THROUGH the barrier, not “settling on top of the barrier”. There are two types of weed barrier used on our property. Where the good, heavy barrier ran out and the thin, perforated plastic barrier was used is exactly where the weeds begin their show. This is not just a few weeds, it is excessive. The entire area is overrun. Typar weed barrier was specified on the proposal. This is not what was used. Us previously living in Wauwatosa has nothing to do with anything. By the way, we never used any weed barrier on our city lot, like IE has stated. Our experience with effective and ineffective barriers comes solely from our experience with IE. We want the ineffective barrier removed everywhere it was used and correctly replaced with either the same effective weed barrier on the property or Typar weed barrier.Cedar Planter Beds - The proposal states cedar raised planter beds. IE's [redacted]'s comment when he visited us May 22nd was that the wood looks like pine. He told us that he would verify the wood species used. We haven’t heard the verdict on this. If this is true, then IE will need to make new cedar planter beds. As for the failed sealant, yes we saw the crew applying sealer, but we were not sitting there watching the entire process. Boards were either missed or not enough product applied or the product failed. We agreed with IE that over time, the wood will need regular resealing, however they looked faded dried and began cracking by January (3 months later) not after eight months. Yet, even if it has been eight months, we don’t know anybody who thinks it’s expected to reseal a wood deck, for example, twice a year to ensure its longevity. We have offered to do the work if IE agrees to pay for the product we specify. Alternately, we will buy the product we want and IE guys apply it. Either way, the raised beds need to be resealed.Planter Bed Liner - Since IE wants to put the onus on us for the beds needing to be relined, we insist on relaying how that happened. The crew began filling the unlined boxes with soil, but we once again stopped them and pointed out that they are still missing the POND liner. The new project manager was also unaware despite it being on the proposal. The project manager made a run to a nearby hardware store while the crew waited around. He returned with roofing tar paper. We questioned it, but he assured us that this product substitute will work just the same. On the spot and in good faith, in order to keep the project moving, we trusted and accepted the professional advice. In spring, we discovered the paper had torn away from every staple holding it down, the paper corners stressed and torn and even holes in places beneath the soil line. Our own further research on the use of this product in this way is that it will break down quickly. This also lead to the additional knowledge that this product is impregnated with petroleum based products that will leach into the soil and should not be used especially around food growing gardens. While IE now agrees to install what should have been installed all along, they suggest that this was our uninformed mistake and not theirs. These are raised vegetable garden beds. The proposal specified pond liner. It must be plant and food safe.Plant replacement - We accept the Japanese maple and blueberry bush replacement. We will even plant them since we have already re-mulched and prefer to do a careful job of it.Grass repair - We accept topdressing and reseeding all areas in need.French Drains - This is a priority as again we had water pouring next to the foundation today (6/11/15) from multiple downspouts. We accept bringing the front garage downspout back above grade and reworking all other drains to include a pop-up emitter or grate. We have indicated what parts of IE's response we accept and what remains unsatisfactory.Regards,
[redacted]
Revdex.com:
I have reviewed the response made by the business in reference to complaint ID [redacted], and have determined that this does not resolve my complaint. For your reference, details of the offer I reviewed appear below.
[To assist us in bringing this matter to a close, we would like to know your view on the matter.]
Regards,
[redacted] 1. I have only talked to [redacted] of Innovative Exteriors one time. Numerous other calls have not been returned. [redacted] told me that he had no idea why we where not paid and he would have his office investigate and call me back that afternoon. I did not receive a return call. The date of this conversation was 7/28/15. Now he says that we are "willing to come to an agreement", but he also indicated he is "in the process of puting together all the man hours an materials used to correct the damage"?2. I am beginning to understand the propertied problem, from Innovative Exteriors response to the Revdex.com. Two tree locations were not accessible via the home owers association. Innovative Exteriors on site supervisor (who hired us to do the work) negotiated an agreement with a neighbor to use their drive way and a portion of their back yard for access. The on site supervisor told me that any damagae caused by our truck transversing the site would be Innovative Exteriors responsibility. I then agreed to move the remaining two trees.Stoneridge Farms LLC
We have already agreed at our meeting on May 22nd, to replace the blueberry bush and the Japanese Maple per our standard nursery warrantyWe will not be offering to replace the Taylor Juniper as they were noted on the landscape plan and were approved for installation by the customer prior to
installWe have also agreed to bring one of the buried downspouts back above grade and customer had indicated they would get a drain pad so that the water did not wash away the mulchThe other draintile was noted and we had agreed at our meeting to install a pemitter or a grate as the customer has specifiedWe do not feel as though the weed barrier needs replacementThere are weeds that will settle on the surface of the weed barrier and the possibility of a few coming through, but this is a case where they feel that because they had weed barrier at their last residence in the city of Wauwatosa that the weed barrier is ineffective at their new residenceThis is a case where they have moved from a city lot with very little weed infestation out to a rural area where weeds of all kinds are far more prevalentThe photos of the weeds at the sites where weed barrier was installed is not overly excessive and does not need replacing, rather an hour or two of weeding and some roulike most homeowners useThe arborvitae's are very much in good health and I do not see this needing to go any further than some root stimulator and some light pruning.We will replace the tar paper used in the raised planter boxes with pond liner per their request, however it will be at our discretion based on the contract to use what was called out in the original proposal, even though the customer had approved this at the time it was being installedThe wood sealer that was used is in our opinion a quality product and the customer indicated to me that they even witnessed the sealer being applied, they are not happy with the appearance of the wood because it has been exposed to sun for the last eight months and has faded beyond their expectationsThis is a maintenance item that we feel will have to be addressed by them as they continue to own the home.Lastly, we have already indicated to the customer via e-mail and in person that we will top dress and reseed any disturbed areas that were affected by our equipment during the installation of their landscape and is typical of this to be offered.Regards,
Sean P[redacted]
(O) ###-###-####
(F) ###-###-####
innovativeexteriorslandscape
Revdex.com:
I have reviewed the response made by the business in reference to complaint ID [redacted], and have determined that this does not resolve my complaint. For your reference, details of the offer I reviewed appear below.We tried to be concise and keep our complaint limited to the items that need addressing. IE's response and refusal to take responsibility for all of them, however, makes it clear we need to explain to the Revdex.com and to the public additional context of our complaints.Facts and additional details of our I.E. landscaping experience:Plants were delivered the day work started. Landscape beds weren’t even cut, downspouts not buried etc. Plants sat unplanted for about 30 days. We took on the task of keeping everything watered (on IE's behalf).Dirt for the beds, which weren’t even cut, and planter boxes, that weren’t even built yet, was delivered and dumped in the road in front of our house without our knowledge or permission at the start of the project. It was there at least 3 weeks prompting multiple visits by officials of Waukesha County, including twice by a county sheriff, as well as complaints from the neighbors. On one of those sheriff visits IE's business [redacted] was actually on site and told him that the dirt would be gone by that Friday. The dirt remained there until the following Wednesday.Landscape beds were cut before the downspouts were buried. A mini excavator was then used on our property on a rainy day causing a muddy mess of the beds and excessive lawn damage.Decorative stone for utility bed near the home was delivered at the beginning of the project and dumped in its intended area before sloping the ground away from the foundation, before installing weed barrier and before its downspout was buried. The crew was stopped by us as they began to spread the stone, and it had to be undone.Pea gravel for the planter bed area was dumped in the yard and workers began to spread it, prior to the bed being leveled, prior to weed barrier installed, prior to planter boxes even being on site. The gravel had to be gathered up and moved to the driveway, needlessly trashing the lawn again with multiple skidsteer trips.Along with the previous examples, we were able to stop several missteps midway, if we were lucky, and point out details that needed to be done first. There was no project manager on site most of the time. While the workers were always pleasant and hard working, it was obvious the crew was not properly instructed on what was on the proposal. Much labor time wasted. Much anxiety day to day as we felt tied to our house every moment there was work being done (or inexplicably not done) as we realized we had to try to be on top of it all.IE's skid steer sat in our driveway for at least three weeks. There is still a visible rust line on our new concrete driveway from the skid steer bucket.The project manager on our job was terminated by IE due to incompetence and mistakes made on our job (and other jobs as IE's [redacted] later revealed). Apparently we were not the first negative experience with this guy. IE chose to have him represent their company and sent him to our house for our project, therefore IE is ultimately responsible for the mistakes, failures, and disappointments that have been created here.IE finally assigned a new project manager who did his best under the horrible circumstances, to limp us to the finish in the fall, only for us to discover in the spring what still wasn’t done correctly.To address the specific areas we have asked to be remedied:Taylor Junipers - IE will not replace the junipers. His reasoning is that it was on the proposal and we agreed to it. Yes, we agreed to them per their recommendation by IE's project manager who turned out to be incompetent. We don’t think it should be up to the client to know that a professionally recommended tree selection will be inappropriately sized in its designated location (directly under the second story windows) in a few years. IE is saying the responsibility of this mistake is ours. IE's guy should have known the basic specs of a tree he selected. We did not discover this impending problem until the spring when looking up its specs in deciding on other plants to add to this bed. The mistake is theirs. The junipers need to come out and be replaced with a shorter species. We propose to do the work in picking up replacements, digging up the Taylors and planting our new trees. We would accept to simply be reimbursed from IE what we paid them for the junipers.Arborvitae - The arborvitae look terrible due to IE’s poor planning. At one point they were moved off the driveway and sat in a heap near the planting site, crushing each other for about 10 days. No they are not dead, but the damage from their mistreatment is clearly evident. We are expected to accept damaged plants. We will accept IE's application of root stimulator and pruning the damaged areas, for now. If in one year the damage hasn’t recovered, they will need replacing.Weed Barrier - All of the present weeds and grass in the barrier areas are coming THROUGH the barrier, not “settling on top of the barrier”. There are two types of weed barrier used on our property. Where the good, heavy barrier ran out and the thin, perforated plastic barrier was used is exactly where the weeds begin their show. This is not just a few weeds, it is excessive. The entire area is overrun. Typar weed barrier was specified on the proposal. This is not what was used. Us previously living in Wauwatosa has nothing to do with anything. By the way, we never used any weed barrier on our city lot, like IE has stated. Our experience with effective and ineffective barriers comes solely from our experience with IE. We want the ineffective barrier removed everywhere it was used and correctly replaced with either the same effective weed barrier on the property or Typar weed barrier.Cedar Planter Beds - The proposal states cedar raised planter beds. IE's [redacted]'s comment when he visited us May 22nd was that the wood looks like pine. He told us that he would verify the wood species used. We haven’t heard the verdict on this. If this is true, then IE will need to make new cedar planter beds. As for the failed sealant, yes we saw the crew applying sealer, but we were not sitting there watching the entire process. Boards were either missed or not enough product applied or the product failed. We agreed with IE that over time, the wood will need regular resealing, however they looked faded dried and began cracking by January (3 months later) not after eight months. Yet, even if it has been eight months, we don’t know anybody who thinks it’s expected to reseal a wood deck, for example, twice a year to ensure its longevity. We have offered to do the work if IE agrees to pay for the product we specify. Alternately, we will buy the product we want and IE guys apply it. Either way, the raised beds need to be resealed.Planter Bed Liner - Since IE wants to put the onus on us for the beds needing to be relined, we insist on relaying how that happened. The crew began filling the unlined boxes with soil, but we once again stopped them and pointed out that they are still missing the POND liner. The new project manager was also unaware despite it being on the proposal. The project manager made a run to a nearby hardware store while the crew waited around. He returned with roofing tar paper. We questioned it, but he assured us that this product substitute will work just the same. On the spot and in good faith, in order to keep the project moving, we trusted and accepted the professional advice. In spring, we discovered the paper had torn away from every staple holding it down, the paper corners stressed and torn and even holes in places beneath the soil line. Our own further research on the use of this product in this way is that it will break down quickly. This also lead to the additional knowledge that this product is impregnated with petroleum based products that will leach into the soil and should not be used especially around food growing gardens. While IE now agrees to install what should have been installed all along, they suggest that this was our uninformed mistake and not theirs. These are raised vegetable garden beds. The proposal specified pond liner. It must be plant and food safe.Plant replacement - We accept the Japanese maple and blueberry bush replacement. We will even plant them since we have already re-mulched and prefer to do a careful job of it.Grass repair - We accept topdressing and reseeding all areas in need.French Drains - This is a priority as again we had water pouring next to the foundation today (6/11/15) from multiple downspouts. We accept bringing the front garage downspout back above grade and reworking all other drains to include a pop-up emitter or grate. We have indicated what parts of IE's response we accept and what remains unsatisfactory.Regards,
[redacted]