Living Lawns Irrigation & Landscaping Inc

On Labor Day of 2012 at approximately 4pm, we heard an extremely loud bang coming from the mechanical room where all water enters the house. Within a few seconds we could hear the sound of rushing water. We ran to the utility room and discovered water pouring out of the light fixture and heating/ac vent. In less than 2 minutes we had water filling the utility room and running down the hall. I ran back to the furnace room and located the main house water shut off valve and shut it. It took a few more minutes but the water finally stopped rushing into the house. I then called a plumbing company but since it was Labor Day no one was available to come until about 7:30pm. When he went into the attic space above the house he found the blown fitting. He replaced it then and we arranged to have them return the next day to do the rest of the fittings. This cost over $1000 in parts and labor for the emergency fix. We then contacted an irrigation system licensed plumber to come and check the whole system. He discovered that there were NO supports for the pipes, the pipes were not pitched properly so water could collect, some of the "shark bite" fittings were not properly installed, the water meter was located above the water heater (about 6' high), the weight of all the copper pipes was pushing down so the pipes were pitched side to side, none of the pipes were insulated, etc. It cost $1025 to completely redo the in home part of the system. Both Plumbing companies told us that had we not been home, this home would be a tear down. City water pressure flows at a rate of 1,000 gal. per hour. I called Living Lawn and left a message on Tuesday after the plumber left. Bob Zienteck called me Wednesday am. After briefly explaining our experience and I'm sure expressing my extreme anxiety, I found him to be completely condescending. He said those fittings are "state of the art" and that the head of McHenry County inspectors was the plumber. He said my plumbers didn't know what they were talking about. No concern and he acted as if this was all my imagination. I proceeded to go to the Village of Huntley and got a permit to have the entire system in the house redone and the exterior part inspected. We also discovered that they had used the cheapest copper piping which is below the grade to be used for village water pressure. On top of all of the above, the home across the street had the same exact thing happen only no one was home. They have had to gut the house. The cost is in the hundreds of thousands to repair and replace just about everything. Living Lawns did the installation for that home too.

Holiday Lighting:After repeated phone calls, Living Lawns owner and son finally arrived to hang lights we purchased from Living Lawns last year. At the end of the day, the garland lights over our front entry were 75% not working. The owner, Bob Zientek said he would call the supplier and be back to us in a few days. That was November 2011--he never returned, never called and did not answer our repeated phone calls to both his office and his cell phone. These lights never worked through the holiday season. We then repeatedly called to get Living Lawns to remove the Christmas lights. Finally, in mid-May when he came to do our irrigation, he took down the lights and then charged us full price for both the installation of the lights and the removal. When we complained he took $50 off the bill but added a storage charge which balanced it to zero. Lawn Irrigation:We began calling in early Spring to schedule our irrigation startup. We called more than ten times--we called the office and the owner's cell phone. We left voicemails. We nearly begged. Our calls were not returned. As the weather continued to warm, we had no idea what to do to get Living Lawns to respond. We asked our landscape contractor to also call Living Lawns owner Bob Zientek--he did and he told us that Bob Zientek had promised to come the first of May. No one showed. The landscape contractor called Living Lawns again because our 2 acres of landscape was in danger of damage and our calls were still being ignored. Finally, and still with no response to us, the owner of Living Lawns and his son came to startup our system in mid-May. The basement was inadvertently locked on the day they arrived and the irrigation controls were inside--they therefore had to return another day for the service. We were charged $120 for this delay. The system is finally in service.