We needed to have our 3 car driveway, front sidewalk and a 3 foot deep section of our garage floor cut out and re-poured. We contacted Big Time Construction because a coworker highly recommended them. We had Joe (one of the owners) come out and give us a quote. We also got 3 other quotes from companies I found on Angie's List that were all highly rated. Big Time's quote was the 2nd lowest but we didn't select them on price only. After talking to Joe and all the others about the job, it certainly seemed like they knew what they were talking about. The recommendation from my coworker was a big factor too.
After they came to tear out all the concrete and do the framing, we had to get a village inspection. We were pleasantly surprised when our village inspector said that it was a very clean job and one of the best he'd seen. He said he wished all contractors did as good a job. I have to admit, we weren't expecting that kind of response (and no, we don't know the inspector or have any relationship to him nor do we have any relationship to Big Time).
The day they came to pour everything, they really did a super job. I'm somewhat of a perfectionist so I can always find little things wrong, but I've built 4 houses and dealt with a lot of contractors and these guys were very good. They were respectful of our property and surrounding landscaping (OK, a few things were stepped on but seeing what they had to do and how in-the-way some of the plants were, they did a good job being careful).
I would have given them 5 stars except for one thing: their overall responsiveness / timeliness. I'll admit, this was frustrating at times, but I figured in the end, if they did a great job, I could deal with the frustration. I even called my coworker to see if he had experienced the same thing. There would be times when I didn't hear back from Joe for days and on the day the driveway was to be torn out he said he'd be out at 8:00 a.m., but didn't show up until after 10:30. My husband had to call him twice that morning to see where he was. On the day of the pour, the cement truck arrived on time at 8:00 but we had to call Joe again and ask where he was. They were about 30 minutes late.
Like I said, the responsiveness was frustrating (and I mentioned that to Joe at the end of the job), BUT, they really did a great job. His workers were very good at what they did. We were especially impressed by Carl (or maybe Karl). If you can deal with the lack of responsiveness at times, I certainly would recommend them. read more