Chimnee Cricket

No issues with quality of workmanship. Their customer service is sub par. The installer is consistently late - by hours! One example of several: had a 9am appt. I called them at 10am because he hadn't shown up or called. Got a bunch of lame excuses from the appointment scheduler and then from the installer when he finally arrived at 1:00. And this was a 4-5 appointment job. Management said they would "take care of me". In fact they were going to pretend that these issues never happened, and hounded me for payment repeatedly for a couple of days until I was able to call back and complain. I asked to speak to the owner, but apparently he "travels" and can't be reached - what, no cell phone service?  I can't recommend a company that places such little value on their customer's time or experience. I would recommend that they don't schedule appointments until the afternoon if they are unable to arrive in the morning due to "traffic" and "parts coming in late". 

The guy does good work but he was contracted in July and didn't do the work until the end of October. The work appeared to be very good but I would have hired someone else if I had known I would have to wait 3 1/2 months to have the work performed. As a result of the delay, I had other damange to my inside walls the rain that got in.

      So far they have never shown up or returned phone calls.

Initial meeting with Chirstopher went  very well, he appeared very knowledgeable and was able to discuss my concerns and explain in detail what was needed to bring this fireplace up to safe usable condition. He answered all my questions about safety. I was told the work would take all of 4 hours.  Christopher informed me I would be able to burn a fire immediately if the firebox was "primed" and he explained how to do this, if not primed I could burn in 24 hours after the repairs were made. The work was scheduled for Dec. 6th, 2012.  
 
The crew of 2 arrived 12:15 pm and set right to work.  They got right to work installing the damper cap and 1 (Steve I believe) then came in to begin repair of the firebox.  Initially grouting around a few loose bricks was removed by grinding it out and within minutes Steve began adding new grout. I approached him and inquired about the other walls were there was cracked grout and holes in the grout.  He stated that only the grout around actual loose bricks required grinding and that he would grout over the other places.   Having repaired cement steps myself,  I was quiet curious as to how the new grout was going to adhere to old damaged stuff with no prep or cleaning, but Steve stated he had been doing brick work for 2 decades and knew what he was doing. I became alarmed when a short time later -1:30pm- he was cleaning up so I again approached him. When I looked at the firebox I could see were wet grout was added, but not all the walls had fresh grout and the floor was completely void of repair.  At that time I informed Steve that the entire firebox was to be repaired including the floor and the chimney still needed to be cleaned.  He then told me he did not know this so I asked if Christopher had given him a work order or instruction and he replied he had not given him anything only told him to do the damper and repair the loose bricks.  I then showed Steve the contract with the list of repair items.  He informed at that time he had no more grout and did not have a brush to clean the chimney.   I informed him I was not happy with this, and that I had an appt. and would return in no more than 1 1/2 hrs.  He offered to go to the Home Depot and purchase more grout and return to finish the firebox, but would have to reschedule the cleaning. I left for my appt before the crew left and they had a 15-20 min drive one way to Home Depot.  I return just under 90min later.  The Chimnee Cricket crew was not at my home.  On inspection I could see wet grout on the floor of the firebox and everything was cleaned up.  This worried me because they had 35-40 min total drive time, what ever time it took to enter the store, pick up grout, and check out.  At best the crew had a max of 45 min to re-grout the floor and clean up.  Within a few minutes the crew again arrived informed me of the floor work, told me they also purchased a brush and cleaned the chimney and they hung a large storm window that I had taken down and repaired.  "Just to be nice." All of this in 45 min.  
While I was very suspicious of how a "full 4 hr" job took 2 hrs I paid the balance of the $1100.00.
2 weeks and 3 small fires later as I cleaned the floor of the firebox the grout work began flaking off-no wonder- it was at best paper thin and covering loose that easily moved under the broom.  As it was the holidays and I was heading out for 2 short trips I decided to call Christopher after the 1st of the year.  
Christopher seemed very concerned when I informed him of the workman ship and he schedule Jan 18th to personally repair my fireplace and clean the chimney (as I do not believe it was ever done).
On Jan 18th I waited for Christopher to arrive and when it was well past our schedule time I called him and stated his wife and daughter were ill and he was taking care of them.  I was suspicious of this because of the background noise I could hear. He asked if he could call me the following week to reschedule as his calendar was not handy.  I agreed.  2 weeks later I left him a message and  requested he call and reschedule. No return call.  Again on Feb 18th I left a message informing Christopher I was very unhappy, that he had $1100.00 dollars to do a job and that I was at the end of my patience and please call to schedule this work.  It is now a full 3 full days later and NO CALL.    Christopher has had more than enough time to correct this problem.  I totally regret hiring this company and would never recommend them.

The overall experience was excellent. The company was professional.  The chimney looks great. I will use them again.