I generally do not write negative reviews (if you look at my profile, all my other reviews are 4+ stars), but after continual problems and frustrations, I feel I need to share my experience to allow potential customers to make an informed decision. I want to be clear that on a personal level, they are perfectly nice people, but the project and long term relationship has been a constant source of stress.
We hired the company on the recommendation of a design firm. The entire project took over six months due to permit issues, which were not the fault of the company, but should give context to the length of the professional relationship. Following is a list of the bigger issues we had during this process - and specifically ones that I feel should have been noticed and addressed as part of their standard scope of work, and instead felt as though they were hoping we would not notice or care about:
- Following the installation of our sink, we found a huge pool of water in the cabinet due to the plumbing done by Alex Construction. After several rounds of them unsuccessfully trying to fix it, we ultimately hired our own plumber out of pocket to fix it. He had to redo all the plumbing because, as he put it, the original work was not salvageable. He also pointed out that the way the garbage disposal was installed would mean we would regularly need to take it apart and clean it to address clogging.
- Following cabinet installation, we were told it was safe to start putting our dishes away. During this time I found that many of my dishes were sliding to the back of the cabinet - because they did not install all the braces beneath the shelves, causing the back of the shelves to fall down because they were unsupported. Other shelves did not quite fit the cabinet, and instead of trying to sand down the shelves, they were hammered to try and force the fit, causing the wood to crack. After contacting them with photos they fixed the issue, but there is no way anyone would do that type of install and think it was done and ready to go.
- They installed new floor vent covers, but we found afterwards that they couldn't open because they installed them directly on top of the floor's support beams, preventing the flaps from opening/closing. Again, after contacting them they came by to fix them after a couple of weeks.
- The dishwasher was installed sloppily, such that the metal covering on the bottom of the dishwasher was warped and bent to try and force it to fit the space available. This caused the plate to deeply scratch the wood floors.
- Our oven vent hood stopped working about a month after install. We were told they could come out to take a look, and agreed on a date and time. After waiting all day, with no word from them, they never arrived. I sent a message asking whether they were still planning to come out, and received no response. This was a month ago, and I have still not heard from them.
- Today, our doorbell rang and it was the flooring contractor who did a beautiful job on our kitchen floors - he asked if we had any way to get in touch with Alex Construction, because he hadn't been paid for the second half of the work he did. This is what pushed me to add this review on Yelp, as I think that is completely unacceptable and unfair to someone who actually did great work on a timely basis for us.
This is not including the various other small problems we had throughout the project. To be clear, just one of these issues would not have been a big deal for us (except for the not paying the other contractor item), but all of them together, in addition to the many other issues we had throughout the process, are enough to push me to write a review to help others make an informed decision. Though the project was eventually completed, and does look nice, I can't give 2 stars now that I've found they haven't paid people for their work. read more