S&P Construction Ltd

I hired S&P as the guy that quoted the job was convincing. I wish I would have gone out for three bids. This guy job told me they would take old posts out (not just try and cut them off). He also showed me pictures of jobs like what I was wanting (they looked great). They also told me the job would take 3 days. It was late October 2019, so timing was a big deal with winter coming. After the job started (day two), they told me I had to pay another $1K for post hole digging as they ran into roots. What... they saw the job under 35-year-old trees without a word to me about extra costs. I refused to pay. The job stopped and now I was out a fence with my dogs waiting to go outside. I called the owner and we argued about this mess (he was unpleasant to deal with). I was about to fire S&P and bring in another fence contractor. He asked me to meet him halfway. I was not happy, but I agreed to pay him $500 more on top of the $11+K job as quoted. They did send guys over that weekend and after three more days they were done (double what they estimated). But they still missed all the vertical boards which I did not notice until spring (it snowed the evening they finished). I had to go out and spend more money and three weeks of my time fixing their mess. They used a nail gun but missed a lot of boards. I used over 2000 screws to fix. They did not cut the fence posts in line with the fence. I had to fix. They did not finish the bottom 3" so that took me another week to fix (it looked awfully bad in the spring once the snow melted). They did a poor job with the concrete at the bottom of each post so that took me using a jack hammer to fix the bottom 3" that was missing. They also did not take the old posts out as promised. They did a bad job cutting them low enough so again they cut ugly notched in some of the bottom boards to get around old posts (I had to take them off and cut out the old posts and then buy new boards and replace. They also cut a large 4" wide root for my large Birch tree which now dies at the top due to stress. I told them not to cut and any large roots. I would never recommend S&P to anyone. Go out and get three quotes and ask for references.

This company really impressed us and we were so lucky to find a good company that provides quality work for a great price. We shopped a lot of companies and S&P construction stood out by far. Our Corner deck is the talk of the street and people were approaching us each day asking who was our builder. They were 10k cheaper then most places. Our fence is perfect with added features. Would recommend this company to anyone 100%, thank you S&P from Richard and Krystal.

My fence blew over in a storm. I'm handy enough to be dangerous (mostly to myself), but I'm also very busy. I'm a software engineer and my job is demanding. Likewise my wife has a senior position, we have two small kids, and to top it off we are in the middle of a huge reno of our modest little home (big reno is cheaper than new house - especially when the house is almost paid). So I don't have time to dig holes. I contacted these guys to do the hard part - the posts. I can (and have) put the rest of the fence together myself.

For a simple small job it went sideways, big time. Instead of giving a sob story and complaining, I'm going to offer some lessons learned in the hope it helps someone else.

First, an observation:
I've had big jobs done ($20K+ foundation repair, $25K+ roof repairs), and small jobs (<$1K). It's always the small jobs that cause the most conflict and hassle. I think I've figured out why: diseconomy of scale. Contractors just don't want your small job. From their point of view, small jobs suck. It's a misallocation of resources that could otherwise be more profitably deployed. They just want to do 'good enough' and move on to more profitable big jobs. Frankly, I wish they'd say 'no' to small jobs if they really don't want them.

Anyway, on to the lessons learned:

1. If your contractor doesn't take the time to meet you in person and discuss the job and explain *how* they are going to do the job, then fire them and go elsewhere. Especially for a small job. You need to understand what you are getting and that it meets your expectations. If they avoid meeting you beforehand, It's a sign that they just aren't that into you. Fire them and move on.

2. It's tempting these days to just arrange a small job (like a few fence posts) via email. It's just so easy and you don't have to take time off work etc.. But you really, really want to meet your contractor. Especially for a small job. Especially if you live in a modest house in a working class neighbourhood. By meeting the contractor you can take the measure of the man, so to speak. If they look around at your property with a snobbish sneer, then fire them. They aren't respecting you or your property and the quality and care in their work will reflect that. In other words: they just aren't that into you. Fire them and move on.

3. If you do know something about the work to be done (and let's face it, it's pretty easy to look it up these days), don't assume that the contractor has the same idea of what constitutes a quality job. As a homeowner your incentives are to get the best quality for the best price. The contractors incentives are profit. And sometimes good enough is all they really have any reason to do. Especially in the absence of instructions/agreement to do anything different. If you expected gold standard work and get 'good enough', you're going to be dissatisfied. Better to figure it out early on and set expectations explicitly, or fire them and go elsewhere. This is especially relevant to small jobs thanks to the diseconomy of scale at play. From e.g. a fence contractors point of view, a job for seven fence posts is a waste if the same crew and equipment could go to a job site, stay put, and install seventy or seven hundred posts. So face it. If you have a small job, right from the start they just aren't that into you and you're more likely to get 'good enough'.

4. Take the time to drop in on the work in progress. Many construction workers are great people who respect their customers property, but construction is also a dumping ground for people who can't do much more than operate a shovel or swing a hammer. If you are present, it deters those bad apples from e.g. wrecking your garden 'cause it's easier to push the wheelbarrow over the flower bed than to go around.

As for the quality of the work for my small job ... I can't say it was bad. It was 'good enough'. It wasn't what I expected or wanted for the eye-popping prices being charged, but because of the mistakes I made in handling the contractor I didn't get what I wanted. I have to own that.

Two major problems with my job where that they unnecessarily wrecked my garden (trampled plants, blob of concrete in the bed). The second and biggest complaint, and the primary reason for the low rating, is due to the way their foreman/boss dealt with me. I don't think it's dignified to air dirty laundry, so I'll leave it at that. I paid them full price to make them go away. It wasn't worth a few hundred bucks to continue trying to haggle with them. I suspect they felt the same way. After all, it was a small job and I'm pretty sure they just weren't that into it. So we're even.

Good luck with your project. Especially if it's a small job.

Very impressed with how my deck and fence turned out! Great workmanship and good guys to deal with. Communication was great and cleaned up everyday. I would highly recommend this company to anyone looking for a deck or fence.

If you want your deck to look like it was made by novices, spend a lot of money on it, deal with lots of attitude, and then pay them extra to fix what shouldn't have happened in the first place, in addition to cleaning up after their mess yourself, go with this company.

Wow. We are so impressed with the efficiency and workmanship of S&P Construction and crew. Our new fence, built in September, not only improves our yard but brings the appearance of the neighbourhood up significantly. We were amazed that they were able to start and finish the fence (both sides of yard) in less than one week! We are totally satisfied with the job and hope that Sterling's company will want to do our inside renovations when we are ready to start that task! Great crew. Thanks guys!

We are very happy with the outcome of our deck! We had a idea and a vision, S & P Construction helped it come to life. The quote was fair. Everyone we met from the company were friendly and knowledgeable. Sterling was always accessible to contact at any time. Overall we have a awesome custom cedar deck and feel we made the right choice going with S & P Construction.

Sterling and his team did an excellent job on our patio and we couldn't be happier with the results. We highly recommend them for Concrete Patio installations.

Old patio deck was deteriorating and had to be demolished and removed.New deck with new substructure and Fibron PVC decking in its place.Sizable job.

We had a fence built by this company and are very satisfied as well as a stamped concrete patio subcontracted through this company and are also very pleased. We got great value for our money.