ComplaintsforKalamazoo Excavation and Septic, LLC

• Initial Complaint

  10/27/2022

  Complaint Type:

  Service or Repair Issues

  Status:

  Answered

  More info

  See attached documents. In summary I was upcharged $5000 dollars for problems the company had finding the street lead for a sewer hook up, a 38% increase to the original quote. I also did not get equipment installed that was included in the quote I signed. I got a 300 gallon dosing chamber instead of the 500 gallon dosing chamber I was quoted. Reasons; on the job I was told they did have the right equipment on the job site to put in a 500 gallon dosing chamber (unacceptable, how do they not know what equipment is needed for this job), after the job one of the owners told me that it was only required that they put in a 75 gallon (company does not honor contracts). In the end I ended up paying an extra $1000 and the township payed $2500. Still very disappointed with treatment by the company ownership/leadership. No issues with workers on site that I dealt with. I think we got a low bid and the job was going to get increased no matter what happened on the job. We learned that the estimator for our job was fired in August. I never signed the upcharge invoice but according to owner verbally agreed I guess because I did not stop them from continuing. They had half the money for the job for 4 months and my yard was dug up. I will be pursuing other avenues to get my grievance related to this job out there. I would like to get some of my money back but I don't expect it. I doubt the company ownership thinks they did anything wrong.

  

  Business response

  10/30/2022

  Upon arriving at ************, we began work, and the job was scheduled for 24 man hours, or a day and a half with 2 guys, originally bid at $13,000.00. We had roughly $2500.00 worth of parts on the job, leaving the  hourly charge for work at $437.50/hour. We were armed with the "lead card" from ************** which shows us the sewer lead location. Upon excavating at that location, we found no such lead. We then informed the ****** that due to this, unfortunately the scope of the job had changed, and the cost was going to be increased by $5,000 due to the additional time on site and additional work. Both ************* approved the change order on site, and ************ approved the change order via a phone call.  This is a very common occurrence in **************, and many of our peers are running into the same issue with lead cards being incorrect. It is not necessarily the fault of the township, or the homeowner, but it is definitely not our responsibility to incur the additional costs associated with the mis-information. We ended up spending 64 hours on site. This would have made the hourly charge for the change order $166.67/hour, which is significantly less then our going rate, but our goal was to have a happy homeowner and not lose money on the project due to a change of scope outside of our control. After agreeing to the change order and us completing the work, the homeowner then pushed back on the price to which we lowered the cost by $1500, making the total change order  $3500, or $116.67/hour. Again our goal was to have a happy client, even though they had already both agreed to the $5000. The ****** then pushed on the Township, and tax payer dollars to foot the bill. Due to the lead card they had being wrong, the Township and taxpayers footed $2500 of the bill, so in the end, the ****** had a total increase of $1000. Unfortunately, Kalamazoo Excavation and our township subsidized this sewer for the ******, which is very fortunate for them. In regards to the size of the pump chamber, the original bid did have a 500 gallon tank in the narrative. However, due to the layout of the property, it was impossible to get a machine large enough to transport a 500 gallon tank around the back side of the house. The cost difference between a 300 gallon tank and a 500 gallon tank is $40. Mr. and ************* had the reason for the change explained to them, and also called our supplier to confirm the difference in price. Due to the nature of a forced sewer install when homeowners have a working septic, customers are not happy with having to install a sewer connection at all. When the scope of work changes due to things outside of anyone's control, it can add insult to injury, which is the case here. In any event, we appreciate the ****** patronage of a woman and veteran owned company, and wish our graciousness in lowering the price after it was agreed upon by the ****** would have left them a happy client in the end, like the 100's of other customers we have had the pleasure working with this year.

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