SUMMARY: While working with Winmill rep Darren, the deck was built, but did not meet City…read moreStandard/Code. Permits were not pulled. Company license had not been renewed for the year during entire deck build job. Eventually, owner reached out and finished job 5 weeks later. Based on this experience alone, WOULD NOT RECOMMEND. DETAILS: I worked with Darren for the majority of the project. Tear down of the old deck went fine. However, I noticed that the crew was pouring cement footings for the 6x6 posts only about 6 inches deep and flush with the ground. Knowing the City of Wichita Standard for Residential Wood Framed Decks (which spells out the requirements for concrete footings) to a decent degree since I was looking to do the deck myself but decided against it when I realized it was more work than I wanted and I would rather hire it out to professionals, I knew that the code requirement was that the footings needed to keep the wood 6x6 posts at least 6 inches above the ground to prevent rotting. This would mean that, at best, the 6 inch thick concrete footings that they had poured would just sit ON the ground which is not adhering to the City Standard/Code for going into the ground nor provide a solid base for the deck. I asked the crew lead (Jose) to repour the footings and he asked me how deep he should pour it. I explained to him the City Standard and we proceeded with the repour. The rest of the deck build seemed to go fine without any further issues. Upon payment to Darren of the remaining balance due, I asked if permits had been pulled for the job (something I admit I should have asked prior to the project starting). He stated that since we only replaced it with a deck of the same square footage (10ftx12ft), we did not need to pull permits and not to worry because he's done several deck projects like this recently without needing to pull permits. He also stated that if we had added square footage, then that would have required pulling permits but we didn't, so we were good. I took him at his word and handed him the check. When I initially thought about doing this deck replacement myself months ago, my friend in the City Inspection office told me that I would need to pull permits if I were to do any work on the deck myself since it is an elevated deck (it is 6.5 feet from deck boards to ground/grade at the lowest point, 7.5 feet at the highest). So I contacted MACBD to make sure I was all good, but was told that permits NEEDED to have been pulled prior to the start of the job since the deck is more than 30 inches above grade (per Wichita/Sedgwick County Unified Building & TradeCode SECTION 2.2.140. - SECTION 105.2). Also, the City Inspection office informed me that Winmill's license had not been renewed for 2023, so the entire deck job was done with an EXPIRED LICENSE. An inspector actually stopped by the same day to look at the deck and let me know of several other items (brackets had not been used on any guard rails, flashing was not used on ledger board connecting to house, no handrail installed) on the deck that were not up to code and would have been written up during a normal inspection had permits been pulled as required. The inspector contacted Darren to let him know of the issues that needed to be fixed after he got the permits worked out. After a few weeks of trying to get a hold of the Winmill rep to see if permits had been worked out so that they could finish the job, I received a text message from him stating that he was no longer working with the company and to contact them directly. After finally talking to the owner Scott, he was able to finish getting the outstanding code violations completed the week after. So, a job that was promised to be completed in a few working days ended up taking 5 weeks and was more expensive than any of the other bids which would have been completed weeks earlier. Overall, I cannot recommend Winmill for a deck build.

Beautiful work on my roof replacement. Very professional, quick and quality work. I highly…read morerecommend Winmill!! Valerie Anderson