After ranting last night about the roofers, I felt better. Okay, I didn’t really, but I’ll say I did.
I awoke at 5:30 a.m. today full of hope and the promise of a new day. By midday, I was considering getting a tattoo of a lollipop and the word “Sucker” across my forehead.
The workhorse of the roofing crew, Paul, arrived at 8:15 a.m. today. He has been the first one to arrive since the job began. He starts on his own and busts his fanny the whole day. Turns out, he’s not a full time member of the crew, the boss contracts with him on tough jobs. I can see why. He’s trying to start his own business and uses these jobs as fill-in. Bless him.
Dennis & I went out and did some yard work, starting about 7:30 a.m. When Paul arrived, we all had a cup of coffee together, then he scrambled up the ladder and started laying shingles — alone.
I went into the house about 10:30 and checked the phone. We had received a call at 10:05, but not message was left. No call on either cell phone was recorded. I didn’t recognize the name or number, but I had a bad feeling. We called Paul off the roof to take a break. We all went into the kitchen for a cold drink. about 10:50, the phone rang again. Same number/name as before.
Turns out, it was a member of the roofing crew — not the boss, mind you, just a member of the crew. The boss’ truck wouldn’t start. He was working on it. He would call us to let us know what the status of the job was shortly. Grrrrreat………………
We sat around and chatted for a while and at 12:30 p.m., we sent Paul home. He was willing to stay and he felt terrible that no one else was coming. We didn’t feel comfortable having one man on a roof 30+ feet in the air. That, and he didn’t get paid any more working by himself all day than the other guys did not showing up. Enjoy the day. See you tomorrow.
At 12:30, I called our sales guy’s cell phone. Left message. At 3:00, I called our sales guy’s cell phone. Left message.
At 3:30 p.m., I called the construction company’s office. Bonus! The office manager’s home phone number was on the answering machine’s recording — for emergencies. I thought about it; yes, this was an emergency, yes it was.
I called. I talked. When she tried to talk, I talked some more. I said things like, disappointed, nervous, angry, incompetent, unprofessional, money, stuff like that. She said she’d talk to the roofing boss and call me back. I said I expected a call back even if she didn’t talk to him. Absolutely. She was going to call me back in 10 minutes whether she had gotten in touch with him or not. I expect nothing less, I told her.
At 3:47 p.m. she was ringing me. She’d called the boss twice, and left two messages. She told me she would continue to try and would call me with an update no later that 6:00 p.m. We are T - 15 minutes. We’ll see.
The gutter guy is coming tomorrow. The roof won’t be done tomorrow. A quarter of the house hasn’t even been torn off yet. Rain? We got rain. Thunderstorms are predicted for Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday and Saturday next week. We’ll either have a partial roof and broken gutters or a new roof but no gutters. It’s going to be a mess. The rain will come off the house in sheets and drop right at the foundation.
I intend to throw an Academy Award winning snit about this. Dennis and I have had nothing but trouble getting this roof on. The administrative arm and the roofing arm of this company are pitiful at best and incompetent at worst. I haven’t escalated their classification as fraudulent, yet, but it so close you can smell it.
UPDATE: So the office manager called back at 6:25 p.m. She hadn’t been able to reach to roofing boss all day. Hmmm…..
We spoke for about 5 or ten minutes. I think I made it clear that this whole endeavor is a big, fat, mess and it’s her company that’s responsible. The roofing sub-contractor is her responsibility. She told me that the job would be done tomorrow. I just don’t see how. The porch needs to be shingled, the back quarter of the house and the dormer need to be torn off and felted and shingled. The property needs to be cleaned up - both by the house and in back of the barn, the goopy tar from the old shingles needs to be cleaned off the house in several places, and that’s just what I know about. I’m sure there’s more.
Meanwhile, the gutter guy, scheduled for tomorrow, has to be postponed. The seamless gutters are formed and attached to the house after the roofing is complete.
To make matters worse, rain is in the forecast for most of next week and there is so much roofing debris in the gutters, the water is just going to spill over the top. Crap, crap, crap.
And, the dumpster is sinking into the asphalt, which I am sure we will be responsible for repairing.
Crap!
Horaayy..there are 2 comment(s) for me so far ;)
I’m not sure how your contract with the roofers are written but at this point, if I were you, I would contact the office and tell them the deal is off. Give them 3 days to come and clean up the work site and remove the dumpster and fix any collataral damage. Then I would call Paul who has actually been working and is trying to start his own company and see if you can get a new contract with his team.
If your contract was written with a due date on it and it is past that due date, I would call back with words like damage to foundation, interior, asphalt, walls, etc. Add to those words things like your are assuming the cost and law suit.
If they put the dumpster on the property, they are responsible for any damage that it causes, same with any debris. If they have not cleaned up the site well enough and that makes rain go into your walls and/or foundation, they are responsible.
Seriously, you are getting pushed around. You need to push back with everything that you have. What you have is the contract, the law, and money. They are your employees, don’t forget that. Last I recall, if I continually don’t show up to work and don’t call, it’s a firing offense.
[...] The cost of the asphalt repair will be deducted from the balance. The cost of the flat tire from the poor clean-up job (oh, didn’t I blog that?) will be deducted from the balance. We backed off our airing deck railing being broken, although the owner did say he would send someone out here to replace it at cost. [...]