Stay far far FAR away from Drytech.
We chose Drytech over other contractors because they had a physical office, been in business for 20 years, and a good standing with the Better Business Bureau (BBB).
We could NOT be more WRONG.
We hired Drytech to rebuild our aging sundeck early July 2014 which was promised to be completed in a month’s time. Fast forward ONE YEAR LATER, the whole thing ended with us taking Drytech to ARBITRATION.
As other reviewers have indicated, Drytech hires sub-contractors to do the actual work. Within a week of starting, their sub-contractor got in an argument with their carpenter, and BOTH LEFT THE JOB. Instead of getting a replacement carpenter, Drytech hired random workers from Cragislist to continue the job, some of whom jumped into our backyard pool to cool off in the summer heat!
By Dec 2014, the deck had been half-built, torn down due to improper construction and then rebuilt all over again but with so many deficiencies that we escalated matters with Drytech’s owner and president, Ken Magoski. That’s when we realized why Drytech was in such disarray.
Ken is breathtakingly useless. Don’t be taken with his sweet-talking demeanour…his business practices are in the finest traditions of shady used car salesmen you see on tv.
When he came over to inspect the unfinished deck, he blatantly dismissed 90% of the deficiencies, save for a couple of trivial problems that he himself attempted to fix with an electric drill and some glue.
As a sanity check, we got a Professional Quantity Surveyor to assess the deck and produce a report outlining all the outstanding deficiencies...which Ken still dismissed.
To top it off, Ken asked us to pay up, but quoted an amount that was 20% MORE than the signed contract! When confronted, he explained it by saying he’s got a lot of difficult to keep track of paperwork. Reality? A feeble attempt to swindle us for more money. Don’t take your eye off this guy for one second.
Taking things up with the guy at the top usually produces results. But in Drytech’s case, the guy at the top can’t do basic math, pays little to no attention to emails, and has no interest in customer satisfaction.
To sum it up, go with Drytech if you:
- Enjoy having your project delayed TEN TIMES longer than promised
- Need practice remembering the names and faces of random Craigslist workers on your property who may or may not show up day to day
- Like educating the president of a 20 year old company that common courtesy includes not trespassing on your property unannounced
- Want first hand experience going through the BC Arbitration process
UPDATE:
To be clear, it was the lack of consistent workers, slow progress, poor workmanship (see attached photos), and re-work that prompted us to escalate to Ken. We paid according to terms of contract and in fact, we paid AHEAD of schedule in hopes that Drytech would get their act together. The remaining balance (according to contract) was to be paid upon COMPLETION of the deck. Good client or bad, nobody in their right mind would pay the remaining balance before the contracted work was completed.
This was the topic of dispute at arbitration, which was favorable to letting these criminals get paid for a bungled and incomplete project. But at the end of the day, it was still more cost effective to go through arbitration and then hire another company to clean up the mess left by Drytech.
HomeStars readers, the so-called happy reviews were from years ago when Drytech still had an A BBB rating. THIS review is current as of 2015 and today they have been downgraded to B+...but should really be F.
Please consider my experience so you can make an informed decision before ever going near Drytech.
- Approximate cost of services:
- $40,000.00
- Company Response
If you carefully read this email it will become obvious that it is vindictive and exaggerated way out of proportion. The client chose Drytech for all the right reasons but when you do not pay for the work completed then the work stops and problems begin. The job entailed re-building a large sun deck for the client. Eventually all of our workers and sub trades refused to return to the job because the clients frustrated everyone and were impossible to deal with, thus all the delays. In this instance, the biggest issue for Drytech was that the clients refused to any more money regardless of what we did for them. Eventually Ken (the owner) had to intervene and he met with the clients to address their concerns and identify the reasons why they refused to pay. Drytech was trying to collect over $20,000 for a $40,000 sun deck job that was completed. It quickly became evident that the client never intended to pay any more money so Drytech was forced to set up an arbitration session to resolve this impossible situation. In the end the arbitrator forced the clients to pay a considerable amount of money but Drytech was still out of pocket a lot of funds. This was a client from hell and it seems that every few years a client like this surfaces and thinks they can get out of paying their bill by fabricating phony excuses. Drytech is a reputable established company in Vancouver and we did not grow and become a very successful company by treating clients poorly. So when you look at this review you need to read between the lines. Yes, there are some bad companies out there but there are just as many bad clients. Drytech tries to please everyone but sometimes this is an impossible task when clients try to get out of paying money that is rightfully due. You can see from our other reviews that we have a lot of very happy clients which depicts a true picture of Drytech Construction Ltd. Thanks for taking the time to read this honest and accurate response to a totally inaccurate review.