Looked at this job in Jan 2006, could not get to it till November 2006, SO he had someone else start the work!
Got a call to come and install the kitchen cabinets.
List of the problems to date:
New walls with steel studs,no blocking for cabinets, walls not plumb, not flat, not straight, not at right angles.
Insulation poorly installed (cold drafts through the sockets), electrics all over the place, poorly made holes for the high hat lights. Incabinet lights not centered. cheapest strip sockets used.
Lime stone floor tile not level, not flat with each other, full bed not under each tile (a few have collapsed.
The sink base steps out from the rest so the counter top people drilled the faucet holes in line with the cabinet back. Sink is installed so should be fun to cut out the back where needed.
How come nobody cleans up their mess? new hardwood floors installed in other areas and electrician leaves off cuts of wire and bits of metal off the boxes. Left behind saw dust and bits of wire in all the cabinets.
Sure is depressing to see this kind of “quality”!!
grumble grumble!
Replies
If you "Got a call to come and install the kitchen cabinets" I think you should do so.
as far as stuff like, "Insulation poorly installed (cold drafts through the sockets),"new hardwood floors installed in other areas and electrician leaves off cuts of wire and bits of metal off the boxes. Left behind saw dust and bits of wire in all the cabinets.", Sounds like it doesn't have much of anything to do with installing cabinets.
If you find the working situation so appalling, go somewhere else. Reminds me of a very skilled trim guy I used to have who more often than not let me know that the porta-potty needed to be cleaned (it was under a 1 service visit per week contract).
Did you want some cheese with your wine?
I have installed the cabinets and with a little fighting with the "features" of the room, its just the lack of "do a nice job" which annoys most!
Sounds like t he job has been poorly managed.
Like someone's tag line here says "if it were easy, anyone could do it". insert "anyone could do it and do a good job" - manage the job site that is...
Good luck with your personal quote there mattI want trade partners who care about the job. Sounds like nigel careshave you heard of venting? sorry you're having a bad day
Barry E-Remodeler
I had a great day! I think Nigel is the one who is having a hard time at it.
Don't get me wrong, I hate tradespeople who don't clean up after themselves, etc, but I also have to put up with a lot of cry babies.
Matt,
I am nkown for my clean job sites and good manners. That's why the trades people in my area will fight over who works after me. I also have a waiting list 1 1/2 years out of customers.
I don't put up with cry babies either, but I also don't put up with people who don't know the difference.
If you can't do it right, then learn to do it better.
Yea - the place does sound like a mess. And being around all those problems isn't very conducive to doing top notch work... I can't stand when subs don't clean up after themselves because then the next guy who come in feels like - "why should I clean up". I can't even tell which trash is mine and which is not. I guess you guys on the remodeling side get less of this because you are in more of the one man show in control kind of deal. I'm in new construction, and one bad apple doesn't necessary spoil the barrel, but sometimes it puts a bad flavor to things... I have cleaning people who come in several times during the construction process to keep things neat. I love those people! The painters sweep the house too.
"you guys on the remodeling side get less of this"
Not really Matt. There's usually people living in our job sites. You can't just close the door and forget about it till tomorrow. Imagine the deal breaker when a don't give a #### guy bids against your proposal which includes keeping things liveable and as normal as possible.
I was surprised by your initial response, remembering the problem you had with the tub and responsibility on one of your jobs. Must have been another day full of fun.A great place for Information, Comraderie, and a sucker punch.
Remodeling Contractor just outside the Glass City.
http://www.quittintime.com/
About a month ago we left the job ready for counter top template and install. WE cleaned the whole job area, including vacuum the cabinets and all the floors. Place looked nice.
Sparkie came in and spent 4 days "finishing" his side of things. Left clipping, dust, bits of wire, break outs from the boxes all over.
Counter top guys, bring in the slabs of stone and have to do some grinding to make it fit. NO water spray, NO vacuum to reduce the dust! (plus drill the holes in the wrong place)
I just find this "standard" hard to accept. (ok ok a little venting)
Matt,
If you have to hire people to claen up your job sites, then sounds like your carps don't really care about the mess they leave. Why should they if you spend the money to clean up after them. Yes I remodel, but sometimes I remodel new homes because of the "caring" builders walk away.
Craftsmanship is something earned, not just when you pull on a tool belt. Need to stop before my soap box gets way to big on this subject!
Nailerman
If you can't do it right, then learn to do it better!
Nailer
I dont need to defend Matt, he's quite capable of doing that himself.
BUT, I've been around job sites that are paying by the hour and it makes no sense at all to be paying a carp $45-50 an hour when the laborer can do it for much less.
More carpentry gets done and money is saved for the HO - its not always as cut and dried as it seams.
Doug
DougU,
I have also been on those kind of sites to. The problem I see is that some carps have the " they only hired me to insall" attitude. Which then leads to a "could care less about what you think" attitude with such carps. If I am paying a carp $45 or $50 an hour they should have enough pride in their work to not warrent a clean up person.
I also have to look at the fact that I am mainly a one man show, that does alot of sub work for gcs. So I am some times walking into places were that attitude is preasent. It doesn't make sense that I have to clean up some one else mess to do my work, that also wastes clients money.
So if sounds a bit thunderous forgive me.
nailerman
If you can't do it right, then learn to do it better!
Did you want some cheese with your wine? But how do you improve if you dont what going on, It could be called complaining, whining or just letting you know the toilet bad.we had a brand new work truck that side swipe a pole so the whole side was creast from front bumper to tailgate. The truck beem covered in red mud for over six months. Finally it got wash, and boss ask when did that truck get wreck, about seven months ago.at time it might be whining but you just want grab you boss by the ears and say "Do your freakin job".
I'll give you more sympathy than Matt did--it is frustrating and depressing. Hard to leave things screwed up and not want to fix them, because you know that you will be doing a nice job of installing cabinets over a crappy wall and floor system. (Not to mention that it is difficult to install cabinets where walls aren't plumb and with 90 degree corners and floors aren't level.) I always want to tear out the bad stuff and start over, but sometimes you have to do the best you can with wht's already there. The problem is, no matter how good your job, it will never look perfect because it is like a diamond set in a dimestore ring. Maybe next time they'll wait for you to do it right from the get-go!
Most kind.
With the cabinets, I normally take 15 to 45 minutes each depending on wether its a sinkbase ,corner or standard. With the floor and wall so far off, ended up close on 60 to 90 mins each trying to get a good average.
Base cabinets ended up level with 3/4" gap at the back top. Wall cabinets also had 3/4" cap at the top. This varied a little depending on where in the kitchen.
One wall has a 2 1/2" bow over 16' but I had to follow the wall because of the cabinets were a very tight fit. (a 2" filler was left out from the plan, I could have used another 2" of space).
Cabinets were touching the floor in one corner and 12' out 1 1/2" packing to get level.
I guess it bothers me to see someone get ripped off!
Wow, I put a kitchen in a house that'd been moving since 1838 and didn't have those variables. Well, take that back. B/4 furring and shoring I suppose it was. And we knew up front b/4 ordering what we had. To walk into it is a drag.A great place for Information, Comraderie, and a sucker punch.
Remodeling Contractor just outside the Glass City.
http://www.quittintime.com/
I'm not a remodeler, but I'm curious. Do you point out to the homeowner the substandard construction? Do you make do the best you can? Should you walk away? Did the customer want to go "cheap" and were aware of shortcoming?
Like I said, just curious.
"Roger Staubach for President"
Its a fine line to follow. Most of the time I keep fairly quiet and work around the problems as they are not this bad.
But when a customer asks why things don't line up where he expected, I have to break the news. This customer did'nt help with being slow to pick things he wanted but thats the name of the game sometimes.
They know they got screwed as things show lack of pride ie no cleanup. no drop sheets, etc
With most remodeling, people still live in the house and that means keep it clean! My area is often better than the rest of the house but thats a new theme.
This reminds me of something that happened to me.
I had a meeting with a man that was looking for a guy that would maintain all his properties and help him (flip) a few houses. I was worried if I was good enough to work for this guy. I met him at his most recent project. As he walked me through the house he told me about his (very talented) contractor that did all the work to this point.
This place was a disaster. The deck was a mess, the int. trim was all gapping, the doors were all trimmed too much and all on the bottoms, in fact the raised panels were almost the bottoms. The tile floors were not layed out correctly, the kitchen cabinets and counter tops were'nt scribed.
I then realized that this guy was'nt good enough for me to work for.
It was a good confidence lesson for me.
"They think thery're checking us out when in fact we're checking them out."