Best Brick and Stone

Description of Work: I needed a sidewalk replacement and mudjacking under my driveway (for support since it was discovered that there was missing soil under the driveway when the adjacent sidewalk was removed). When contacted there was an immediate response and a competitive estimate. However, after that it was a struggle dealing with this company!

Description of Work: After some initial scheduling confusion, Jeff, DBA Royal Mudjacking, mudjacked our 3 car wide drive, sidewalk, and side slab. After drilling the holes used to inject the mud, we discovered evidence of a very bad original pour on the driveway. One side of the drive had cement only 2" thick with no embedded rebar. The earth under the drive was poorly compacted and had settled significantly over time creating a void of 18" + in some places. Instead of the job taking one full day, it took four days and considerably more work and materials than any of us had anticipated. Jeff and his crew met this huge challenge and corrected the settling as much as it could be corrected without breaking the cement. Four tons of materials were used to correct the settling. Attention was paid to finishing details and we were satisfied with the results.

Description of Work: We hired Jeff Stevens from Best Brick and Stone to do work for us on an wonderful older home in the Hyde Park neighborhood that needed: One chimney with 16-20 courses replaced, the secondary chimney tuckpointed, the side stairs tuckpointed and capped with concrete, a section of the exterior brick wall replaced where the brick was painted and did not match and two small pillars located on the front steps torn down and replaced. In addition there was some other tuckpointing to be done around the home. The estimated time frame for these repairs was 1 week. He insisted on having a lift at the cost of 1267.00 to reach the upper chimney which he rented and we paid for in full at the beginning of the job. As of today...There is not one single job "complete" at our home and Jeff Stevens has now threatened to sue us and put a lien on our house if we do not pay him. Jeff even called OUR bank with whom our construction loan is through and threatened our bank. At the moment the main chimney that was in bad need of repair is literally - leaning and twisted now that Jeff "fixed" it. Our story goes like this... From the moment I hired Jeff...I knew I had made a mistake. He had a very expensive lift delivered to the property that he did not use for a week - this lift cost US 45.00 per day - and sat for a week while Jeff found and hired people off craigslist to complete our job. The problem was...Jeff will tell you he has an "experienced crew" that has worked for him forever...this appears to be a complete and utter lie. Since day one..."Sal" one of his experienced workers that had been with him forever walked up to him on his FIRST DAY on the job and goes "Hey man...whats your name again?" to Jeff...right in front of us...O.o Jeff continued to have a very care free attitude towards the project and is VERY hostile when asked the most minute of things - almost to the point of me being scared for my personal safety...at the moment I am 8 months pregnant and he is so consumed with rage....I was afraid to go to the job site alone....so I always brought someone with me just in case he showed up. This all brings me to yesterday... Yesterday - 7-18-2010 one of Jeff's workers called me at 9 am to say that Jeff had accused them of stealing some tools and had fired both of them and was going to call the police on them. Jeff was/is equally hostile towards his employees and I felt bad for them since he commonly would berate them in front of me...leave them without instruction....and treat them like dirt instead of the hard workers they actually appeared to me to be. I obviously was not going to get into that whole mess between them - but for fear and concern of my property - I headed down to the house to be greeted by Thad and "Catfish" - who both started explaining the situation in detail. Apparently, on Friday...after I had questioned Jeff on the chimney because it did not look right...he went to Thad and Catfish and asked them to tell me he had torn off the 20 courses of the chimney as was stipulated in the contract. Thad and Catfish refused and said if "she asks me, I am not going to lie to her"...at which time they were both promptly fired for stealing and not following instructions. Thad also explained that the work done on the back wall was not properly secured with masonry ties into the wall and he was told to ignore code and go ahead and lay the bricks in anyway...Thad, fearing for his job...did as he was instructed by Jeff Stevens. So...of course given our past history with Jeff, we asked if we could have the masonry "inspected" and he threw down his phone at our feet and stomped off cursing every obscenity that he could think of at us. We said "Jeff, if the inspection comes up fine, then there is no issue"...this just set him off further and both my partner and I sat there while he hurled a verbal lashing at us both...I finally walked away and terminated the conversation since he was just becoming so hostile I was fearing he was going to strike one of us...this brings me to today... I called Jeff this morning thinking he had the evening to calm down and we could approach the situation as rational adults...I was wrong again. Through the verbal war with him, I was at least able to ascertain that he DID NOT do the work per the contract, in fact only ONE side of the chimney actually was "taken down" and the ties into the wall were also not installed... To cut this long story shorter...once we agreed that he would do the work as promised he called back and demanded full payment before doing the work "right"...What crazy person would agree to that under these circumstances? So now...our job is a complete mess, he took the lift we paid for, he damaged our lawn with the lift, broke the exterior lighting system, broke a newer concrete pad that was in excellent shape, took out the supports for our deck and did not replace them and is now threatening US with Liens and a lawsuit...You make your own opinion...