The fence is beautiful! The installation process, not so much.
I chose them because they'd done a friend of mine's fence in the fall. Like my yard, his had an existing fence and tons of landscaping. The guys who did it - you would've never even known they were there. I was truly impressed! My experience (different installers) couldn't have been more different from that.
First, they're incredibly heavy handed with their accounting and legalese. When my yard started to look as if a college football tournament was going on - I checked the contract and they have a clause in there basically indemnifying them from any and all damage to your property (so be warned). However, they don't ever disclose the tools or machines they'll be using and based on my friends installation - and my own experience with other fence installations from other companies - I never would've seen a Bobcat running around my yard. So, how can you be expected to sign off on equipment damage when no on tells you what they're using? The two 20 something installers couldn't be bothered to carry the 8' sections of 4' high fencing by themselves and instead road around the yard with them on the Bobcat. They would lean the 4x4 poles on delicate trees (breaking the bark and limbs) rather than put them on the ground and bend over when they needed them. Let's just say, they clearly didn't give a rats you-know-what about my property. You don't have to own a house to know how to act at someone else's property.
They say to watch their installation video before hand - so I did. In it, they say they'll consult with you the first day to understand your needs and how you want things like the gates and the height of the fence off the ground. They asked about the gates, but never about the height off the ground. They bill themselves as "experts", so I figured they had a formula or at the very LEAST, would MATCH the distance off the ground from the fence they were replacing (seems a reasonable expectation). Wrong! For the most part, they put it right on the earth; and given it is a shadow box style fence, I now have grass and weeds growing up in the spaces between the pickets and can't get to it with the string trimmer - so I either need to buy chemicals (which will be an endless expense) or do it by hand. I also had mature landscaping I'd installed at each of the previous fence's posts (to hide them from view) and without asking me, they changed where the posts go and so now all the landscaping is misaligned with the fence. Again - they clearly don't care about the home owner experience.
The day they finished installing the fence, I received an invoice for the balance, even though 1) I had told them there were things I wanted fixed (split pickets and they left the post like 7" above the picket line which looked awful - especially to the neighbors) and 2) they had yet to install the railings for my front steps that I'd also contracted them to install. It left a bad taste in my mouth - you're collecting for a job you haven't even finished yet? Calm down. Oh, when I told the installers that I didn't like how they left the posts they way they had cause it didn't look right from the neighbors side, he actually said to me, "Well, what do you care? That's the neighbors side." Are you kidding me? Wow. They also clearly didn't care for the neighbor's experience.
I reached out a couple of weeks back about a gate they had put in that doesn't swing open all the way - stops 90 degrees from the fence line - but no one has bothered to respond. Now that I think about it - I first started this process by stopping by their offices. I left a drawing, to scale, with measurements. I was told someone would get back to me. 10 days went by and nothing. I finally called - they were able to squeeze a site visit in for me that day, and the guy that showed up to do the estimate acted like he was doing me a favor. When I asked about the delay he actually said to me "Didn't you just call this morning? That seems like a fast turn-around to me. Just saying..." and so I shot back "I stopped in 10 days ago and had to call this morning to follow-up because no one there bothered to follow-up. Just saying..." I should have taken that as my all I needed to know moment.
When they installed the front railings (I had 4 independent railings installed; it's a two tier set of steps, a railing on each side of each tier, so 4 in total) at first blush, looked good. But one day I happened to stand directly at one end of one of the sets of two railings and looked down the run - the two sections aren't parallel with each other on one side, but are on the other. At this point, I didn't even bother. I know they can't fix it as they can't re-drill so close to the existing holes to correct the drift and frankly - I'm over them.
Update 11/18: Amanda: I don't know what review you read, but you never resolved a thing. read more