JACOBY WATERPROOFING

They arrived on time, accomplished work that was agreed upon in a professional manner. When a problem arose Ken drove back from over an hour away to help his team problem solve. They did a great clean up job, even washing the floor on hands and knees. This was a costly job but they were very reasonable compared to others advixing the same solution

We had issues with previously installed drain tile and sump pump that was installed by this company in 2007 with a 30 year warranty against water leakage. I called them to come fix the problem. I spoke to Ken. He was rude on the phone and finally agreed to come take a look. Scheduled an appointment. My husband took off work and waited for Ken to show, but he did not. Called a few times and finally and had to leave a message to reschedule. Have not heard back. Poor quality workmanship, rude, and do not stand by their work.

Jacoby was the only business available to complete this work in the time frame we had to work with. They completed the job quickly, however, they had to order some specialty parts, and therefore had to return to complete some of the work. As a result of this, there were large holes in the basement floor for approximately a month while we waited for the new parts to be installed, and then they had to come out a third time to fill in the holes in the floor.

When I spoke with the owner he seemed eager and accommodating. Like other posts I would agree that he assigned the work to a young crew that seemed less than concerned with the quality of the work or their behavior while they were in my home. The first day I was home and everything was fine. The second day I had to go back to work. When I returned at the end of the day I had discovered that even though it was a hot day and I had my air on they had been leaving the door open all day long to leave my air running constantly. They also decided to help themselves to the contents in my kitchen. They littered my yard with debris from the work and parked an air compressor on my lawn that managed to kill a large portion of my lawn. Worst of all they did some structural damage while jackhammering and didn't say a word about it or anything to repair it. The owner has been less than communicative since I paid him. The price was reasonable, but I seriously recommend that anyone that needs this kind of work done spend a little extra and go with a company that is willing to go the extra mile and actually cares about their companies reputation after the job is complete. This company seems to be just out for the money and once paid couldn't care less about correcting any failures. I hired them on a recommendation and I wish I would have checked their rating on Angie's List before hiring them. So very disappointed.

We had used this company about 10 to 15 years ago for a similar project and were quite pleased with them. Little did we know that the company had changed hands (relative retired and another one took over), and with it, much of the professionalism and competency. They were very good about scheduling a time to review the work needed to be done, as well as scheduling the job. The problem seemed to be that the owner delegated the work to a very young crew who seemed to lack the necessary skills and level of professionalism of the former workers. The workers filled the holes but then forgot to fill in the major crack we had original concerns about. (We ended up calling them back for this part of the job.) When they finished the job, they left without notifying me. I had to call the company to see if they were done for the day. They left a total mess! Not only did they not clean up after themselves, they also left a mess in our bathroom and hallway. When they put back a sink, they did not to it correctly. Overall, a very poor job! Would never recommend or use this company again.

Ken (Jacoby) was very responsive, promptly giving me a quote, and working with me on the price, which I thought was very fair. I was in a hurry to get it done and he was very accommodating, scheduling the work sooner than any of the other three vendors would do. His crew came in as promised and completed the work as promised. Ken was not here, but his son was here and was the contact. Ken was available by phone and checked in. The work was done as promised, and I have had no problems since then--and we have had a lot of rain!. I did have to call Ken to have him come back and finish a couple things that he had promised to be done but which were not done. He did come back. Overall, I felt a little more care could have been taken during the work itself. They put down sheets over the carpet, but the sheets didn't offer much protection to adult men in boots tromping in and out carrying concrete. We ultimately decided to replace the carpet, which was so tramped down that we weren't sure it was salvageable. I'd recommend anyone doing this type of work and having the workers go over carpet ask them to put down plywood, not just sheets. They also left the whole area pretty gritty, but not terrible. I had a retaining wall with a big crack in it, which Ken said he would fill. When he filled it, he put in ugly sloppy resin or something, which probably did the trick but looks awful. Fortunately, it's in an out-of-the-way place. Overall, I felt the work was appropriate for the price, which was very reasonable. I had asked Ken about the bad evaluation on Angie's List, and he explained that it wasn't what it seemed, and that he had offered to make good. Ken made it clear to me that he would come back if anything else was needed, and I felt that he would make sure the job was done right.

I had called Jacoby Waterproofing(Ken) for a bid on my basement, i had gotten two other bids from other contractors, in which i did chose to go with Jacoby because of the great estimate i was given compared to the other 2, as well i was able to converse well with Ken which made me have a sense of comfort in choosing his business. When they arrived in the morning to do the job, Ken had came to let me know that he wouldn't be around for the day due to having a full schedule of job bids, he did let me know who was in charge tho and who to go to if i had any questions about the work. The workers were very polite and seemed as if they did there best to keep the house as clean as possible in the process of the job. After the job was finshed they cleaned up almost better then what it was before they were there, which was one of the things i was very worried about and Ken let me know ahead of time that they try to leave the job as clean or cleaner then it was when they got there, Which was a huge relief. The job was finished on the second day, the job turned out great and as it hasn't been to long the leaking is completely gone. Im very pleased with the work that was done and the quality of service i received with Jacoby, I would highly recomend them to anyone.

They were beyond excellent. They were so wonderful. They fixed a job which someone had started and done it incorrectly. They redid that job. We were in the process of flooding and it was a mess. I got to know about them through word of mouth. They did a fantastic job as I was told by others. We had one of our sump pump not working and he came and replaced it without having us to buy the sump pump as we had a warranty on that. He made sure everything was fine. He came according to our time during his off time and still did the work and did not charge us anything. He is very down to earth and does an excellent job. He is very reasonable. There are many people here in trouble with flood in the basements and he did not take advantage of that. He gave us quotes before doing the work and charged us the same. He is very good and does a good job. He says what he means and does the same. He was very professional. He was excellent. His price was reasonable.

Original estimate was $500 to excavate down to the bottom of footings and seal area with a rubber membrane. This seemed like a more complete solution than other bidder's proposal, and a third bidder couldn't even come out for 3-4 weeks so that was out. No word from the company for almost a month after bid on Sept. 8th. Two phone calls later, they scheduled the work but not the exact time of showing up, so called me from the driveway while I was in the shower. Would have been nice to have 30 minute heads-up, but minor point. After work was finally scheduled they were prompt about showing up. When the digging started it was quickly discovered that indeed there aren't any footings under the walkout basement steps, just dirt, with a concrete wall on the uphill side of the door (wall facing the rear of the house) and cinder block wall on the other side of the door to the walk-out. In between just a thin concrete sill. So they couldn't go with the original plan because there was nothing to seal up. They contacted some other guys in the company - a total of 4 guys came out and sat in the driveway consulting, including the owner. I thought that was pretty great. However, they are not very skilled in communicating what the actual modification was going to be. The area of the driveway in front of the door has pavers, so of course those would have to be pulled up to excavate and put back. Larry (bidder) told me that afterwards they couldn't be put back for another season or year until the dirt had a chance to settle. So that was the background of the discussion. The alternative plan for this unforeseen lack of footing in the area was to set up a piece of plywood the width of the door, flush with the door, extending 40 inches down, and backfill with concrete, and also extend the concrete door sill forward and pitch it down so the water would not pool in that area. Anyway I came away with the understanding that the concrete would be extended to the thickness of one course of the pavers (maybe 6 inches forward from the door). I thought "fine" and I told them to rebid the project because of course they didn't realize at the time of the bid that it was going to involve much more excavating, etc. I got a call that the job was now going to be $1000, but given that the other bid was $1800 (although that bid included cleaning/leveling of a bunch of other areas of the pavers), I figured it was ok. I came home to find a concrete PAD extending about 2-1/2 feet out from the door, instead of the pavers. So that was a surprise and it was not communicated to me that the concrete would REPLACE the excavated pavers, because they drew a line on the pavers and talked about "one course" of the pavers being removed. It does not look very aesthetically pleasing but I accept that it is probably better than the first idea in terms of actually fixing the water problem. Also they put down the concrete in kind of a sloppy way. I'll have to see how it looks when dry. They came back the next day and caulked the h*** out of the seam, plus the back wall seam with the pavers and along the driveway. I think this is going to fix the water problem which was their main task, so I give them credit for that. For the lack of communication/unprofessionalism when setting up the job, the look of the job, and giving me the wrong impression of what they were actually going to do to fix the problem, I give them a "C" UPDATE: Despite large ugly block of concrete in place of pavers outside the walk-out door, the problem is just as bad as before. This is even more irritating given that they were very concerned about getting a check for the full amount and that I "leave it" for them before even seeing the work. So I stopped payment on the check for the balance. I called Larry on a Sunday when I first noticed that the basement was still leaking in the same manner as before. He said he couldn't come out right away. Still haven't heard back from them, I suppose I will once they find out the can't cash the check. Customer service and communication of exactly what they are going to do (here - where its obvious I spent some money on the d*** pavers) is poor. Even worse that they are blowing me off now that I told them that their fix didn't work. Hard to evaluate the price since now that they poured a big pad of concrete it will cost me even more money to get the job done right.