HANDS IN EARTH LANDSCAPING

I called Brandy and a few other landscapers. A week or so had passed before Brandy called back, but the overall response from all the landscapers was disappointing, so at least it was someone calling us back. They came and gave us an estimate for a lot of work in the front and back yards. The total for the estimate was just too much for us, so I called and told Brandy we couldn't afford it. She called back that same afternoon and asked what she could do to make it affordable for us. After some discussion, we decided that we would have them clear out our backyard for $300. I specifically asked if they could and would get rid of everything so it didn't just grow back and she told me they'd make sure to pull out all the roots. They came midday on Saturday and worked for a few hours. It got really hot and we said it wasn't a problem for them to come back the next day to finish. They were supposed to get there early the next morning. Because it was raining a little, they held off on coming until about an hour and a half after they said they'd be there. I wish they'd called to tell me that since I had gotten up early to be awake when they got there. Brandy said she wasn't sure whether to call because she didn't want to wake me. They mostly finished the yard that day and put all the weeds into their truck to dispose of them so that we didn't have to. However, the ground was a lot rockier than they expected (it is indeed quite rocky) so they weren't able to pull roots out. They offered to spray weed killer instead. They charged us $45 for the weed killer and quoted another $35 for labor. When I brought up to Brandy that I understood the extra material cost, but felt the labor should still be part of the original job, she dropped the extra labor charge. Brandy was supposed to come back a few days later and spray. It was over a week before she actually came by. I had to call her several times to find out what was going on. She told me that they had a family emergency but she'd come by the next day. She did come by. I expected she'd bring some concentrated weed killer to spray the yard with the hose, but she brought a gallon of the stuff that you spray by hand. What she brought costs about $16 at Lowe's, though we gave them $45. They also were unable to get out the last large weed/vine thing in our yard because it's entwined in a fence and difficult to remove. She said they didn't have the right tools to actually cut the thing down so she soaked it with weed killer. When it dies, it should be easier for us to get out, but I wasn't expecting we'd end up doing it ourselves. By this time I was tired of calling Brandy and checking up on what was happening, so I figured the job is done, though not as well as we'd like, and left it at that.

They were supposed to finish while we were out of town but when we came back hardly anything had been done. There was trash everywhere such as a sweater and a hat. Also they failed to communicate with us on why they didn't finish. They said they had an emergency to get to. I didn't feel comfortable with them and there was difficulty in communicating with what I wanted done and what would have been a satisfactory job. So finally I just paid them even though the job was not finished and hired another company the following week.

Lousy.

She was very professional on the phone. I'd call her on the phone and she'd call back. It's been very, very pleasurable, just the way things are supposed to work but don't usually.

Excellent. Very prompt in returning calls. Talked on Friday, they came on Monday to do the work. Work took about 4 hours. Cleaned everything down to the ground, not just weed whacked, even raked the dirt. Excellent.