MILLENNIUM LAWN & LANDSCAPE

Description of Work: Groundcover planting, installing a palm tree, mulch and paver walkway

Description of Work: Design landscpe, recommend plants and install them on our acre lot.

Description of Work: Trim palm trees, replace sod, trim bushes, mow & maintain lawn

Description of Work: Grounds re landscaping. Drainage problem. Millennium lawn and Landscaping advertises to specialize in drainage problems: Replace existing retaining walls next to house and water with RR ties, extending same walls around side of house. Replace existing RR tie wall at back of property increasing the height of the wall and fill with dirt to level yard. Install 150’ driveway leading to water to act as a drainage path plus driveway/boat ramp. Install underground drainage for all house rain gutters and run out to lake. Originally to install recommended ground cover of Jasmine in shaded areas and Bahia grass in sunny areas. James (owner of Millennium landscaping) stated the job would be completed in 3-4 days. First down payment paid in June and Job scheduled to begin July 9th, no one showed or called. I phoned James on 7/12, Started 7/13 @ 1:30 pm Black drain pipes were run up to the existing white gutter drainpipes and taped with black tape and duct tape. James told us this was common practice and ‘homeowners just paint it the color they want’. (Photos available) I personally bought white flexible drain pipes and provided them, requesting them to be installed and the black pipe and tape removed. He complied after a discussion. I additionally requested the drain on east side of house not be placed where road was to be dug out and laid. It should be inside the new retainer wall they were going to build. It was installed there anyway. This caused continuing problems throughout the installation process of the driveway and prevented the pavers from being able to meet their desired timeline. The retaining walls were installed; when it became apparent that the RR ties being installed were not being’ hand selected’ as James originally promised. We understand that RR ties are used and may not be perfect, but some were delivered rotten with; large missing rotted chunks. We did not want these used; we felt we were paying for solid ties that would last over a long period of time. Trying to express this to his non- English speaking crew was difficult. His Forman said he understood and would fix, yet they would merely turn them best side out and install them anyway, (unless one of us happen to be home from work to reject the Ties). This problem had to continually be brought it to James attention. If James was personally selecting the RR ties to be delivered then he was making poor choices. I had to request a soil barrier to be installed behind the wall to keep soil from escaping between the RR ties and prevent erosion, although James told me they always install one. I had to personally show his men when I saw them NOT putting one in and made them go back and redo a large portion of wall. They didn’t even have the material on site and again had to leave the job to go get some. The ground in front of a potion of rear wall had to be dug up so the barrier could be re- installed correctly after a rain storm left us with a large sink hole type area in the back yard after sod was installed w/ dirt clearly running between the ties into the water. (Pictures available) Millenniums crews appeared to be hard working. However, they lacked supervision and direction. James told us he would be there everyday to guide his crew, this turned out to not be the reality of the job. I felt obligated to take time away from my personal job to over see the construction as much as possible, and asked my wife to do the same and to take photos. At one point I supplied his crew with a level. They seemed to welcome this new tool and used it throughout that phase. Sadly, I could only be there occasionally. And this job was now spanning months. That is why I hired a Professional…to be there for me. I expressed this to James. He insisted he was on sight all of the time. Yet we only saw him on site for a few minutes on the days he came. We arraigned our schedules so that one of us could be here as much as possible. Although Millenniums foreman was pleasant and would agree to do as you said, things did not get done as asked for a group of reasons. One we felt being English. I believe he just did not understand. Also, The foreman often had to “go to the shop to get items” leaving the rest of the crew 1-3 men mostly to continue working with no supervision or way for as to communicate with them as he acted as a translator Often throughout the job we had to stop the crew from working and redirect to prevent them from continuing something incorrectly. Once we had to redirect the same problem 3 times as they just continued to dig where we had asked them not to. Language was clearly a barrier even though the Forman said repeatedly, “Ok no problem, I’ll fix don’t worry” this became a standard phrase heard throughout the job!! Our frustration and concern increased with each passing day. Another problem was that the crew would show up only 1-3 days a week and some weeks not at all w/o any warning and some days just for a couple hours. After expressing to James that this was unacceptable, he did comply by phoning me and letting me know if they would be out. One week they didn’t come due to ’equipment failure’, however our job had a lot of work at that point that didn’t require equipment use? This was frustrating because the rainy season had begun, and the original retaining wall had been removed; now erosion was becoming a problem. I had to add 3 unplanned drains to stop the erosion during the construction process, at an additional $1050. I was stressed out wondering when I arrived home how much more erosion occurred and did it affect my homes foundation. Millennium made no attempt to provide for temporary erosion relief during the construction phase. Already the roots of a large Oak tree were visible as a large crater had opened up. I personally worked in the rain with a shovel to build some sort of dam to stop the wash out of the dirt. All while directing James crew on what to do with the back hoe they had on sight to help. Part of our new wall was undermined from the erosion; (photos available) James was phoned and did not come out to help. I repaired the washout from under the retaining wall. It was just not a priority for James to stop the erosion. We changed from a Jasmine ground cover and Bahia grass and went with sod over the whole yard with a sprinkler system to support same. Our yard has both full sun in parts and almost full shade in others. I asked James to recommend the correct sod. He said St. Augustine/ Floratam for the whole yard. I asked about the shade tolerant Bitter Blue strain of St Augustine as I have been told Floratam is not shade tolerant and he said “ No, Floratam would be fine as both were grown in full sun and it didn’t matter” (we also have this on a recorded message he left us). I’ll get back to that topic. About this time James came to me and told me that he had spoken w/ other professionals and the crushed asphalt he originally recommended for the driveway would not work for our situation, due to the grade change and amount of water that moves through the area. My drainage expert was now admitting it was more than he could handle, while I appreciated his honesty, this was a major portion of the overall project he tossed back in my lap to resolve. He did give me the name of a paving company to call. James told me I would need to contract them myself. We had also decided to have some additional walkways installed. These would originally be filled with the crushed asphalt, but since that changed we decided to go with shell as James recommended. During the initial bidding process James and I discussed the amount of fill dirt that would be recovered from the installation of the driveway. This could be used in other places where fill would be required. James charged me for 100yds of fill dirt @ $30yd brought in before the drive was cut. He delivered 90yds and owed me 10. The dirt he brought in was of questionable quality and clay like, not draining well. James referred to is as “Red dirt” When it became apparent that this dirt was not intended as a base for the new road but rather to be used in the flower beds and yard I had to ask James to have his men remove it as we experienced standing water after rain. In one area a green algae had begun to appear from the standing water. This dirt simply did not allow the water to percolate. James brought in some clean topsoil to put in the gardens after removing some of the hard reddish fill dirt. It was spread mostly on the front, sides of the house and some in the back western side, and the gardens. Sadly, when the driveway was cut the sod had already been laid. The pavers had to remove 40-45 yards of rich, fertile native soil. This was taken away to a fill depot. Fortunately the pavers did not charge me to remove the excess fill dirt then. The drain pipe aforementioned that was installed where the driveway was to be cut posed new problems, and was damaged due to being in the way of the heavy equipment. I insisted this be relocated and repaired. When I inspected the repair Millenniums crew did, I found the pipe repaired in more than one area with duct tape and in another with blue painters tape. How many more pipe joints in my yard are done with the same quality that I did not catch? It also had to be dug deeper as James would still not move it, the sod was now laid. We had requested some simple steps in the retaining wall closest to the house; this was not completed until James was reminded. They had already laid the sod, and installed the sprinklers. They installed the steps, they were not measured and now we have 3 steps all of different depths and lengths that are huge in size, not of a standard size one would expect. James did agree to repair them but since it would cause damage to the new sod to resize them correctly I told James to leave them as is, and bring in the topsoil discussed. By this time my frustration with the project was taking its toll.

Description of Work: Put down 20 yards of mulch, trimmed 2 large oak trees, planted 4 25gal Holly trees, moved 2 Magnolia trees, re-did irrigation around new pool.

Description of Work: We called them and set an appointment for November 23rd between 2 and 4.

Description of Work: I have used Millennium lawn service for about two years for routine residential lawn service. I am happy with their work. They are reliable,always here same day same time. It's also convenient to have a company do all services: fertilize, pest control, tree trimming, etc. Occassionally an issue comes up and I telephone the office. They are very responsive. I have also had some landscaping done.

Description of Work: Millennium landscaped our backyard and pool area. They also replaced sod and did irrigation and lighting repairs. He planted large trees and all types of plant material.