Starting the build with Valeco

Estimated Completion Date 11/09/2017

The new year came and I was looking forward to meeting the site supervisor for our first on-site meeting.

Jan 2017 - So I was pretty surprised when I got a call in mid January to inform me that if i wanted to get extra conduit in (part of our contract) then it would need to be done that day. This was my first contact with the site supervisor and I found out at that point the site had been cut and pipes were been laid. With the slab to be scheduled for the following week (end of Jan). 

There was no first on-site meeting to discuss the project but hey work was underway and it was moving fast.

That weekend I was itching to have a look at what had had been done. And yes a cut block with pipes sticking out was exciting because it was a start. Just as I was about to leave a chap pulled up and told me he was there to scope the site for the water tanks. The guy was not happy that the pipes had already been installed saying he needed to drive onto the block to lower the concrete tanks in place. He asked where they were to be placed and it was explained to him it was the site supervisor who should help him but I pointed him to the placement. It seemed he had a real issue with location now that the pipes were there saying the company should have called him in earlier. He was told again he would need to contact the site supervisor but the tanks were to be located as per the plan. Apparently he felt that no slab could be done until the tanks were in.

Construction performance tally at this point. At this point there were two small marks against the builder.

1. no initial meeting 

2. water tanks should have been arranged prior to fitting pipes

But I was confident that all would work out after all we had plans and any change to those would require a variation.

A few weeks later there was still no slab but I did receive what I considered to be a weird variation. The variation stated that due to site difficulties the tanks would need to be poured on site and that the water tanks could not be covered. So i went and did research on water tanks being poured on site and this actually turned out to be a good thing. They would be stronger. But the niggle was why would the builder state the water tanks could not be covered? These were stand alone tanks at the back of the site, so would not need to be covered. I queried this with the office and was given the explanation they could not be driven on - again weird but I signed. And I was excited after the project planning blip we would get moving again.

18th February 2017 - I visited site. To my horror there was a really big 5 metre deep excavation right in the middle of where my driveway should be. In parts only 2 metres in front of where the garage would end, making getting the car into the garage impossible. And to top it all off the grade 1 fill was dumped where the septic tanks were to be placed. After I stopped shaking I called the sale representative and asked if I could see him that day (it was a Saturday). He was as helpful as ever and fitted me in. After explaining what had happened and showing him the photos he advised me to send an email to the office with the photos and he would bring it up with the owners on Monday.

Construction performance tally at this point

1 mark for - water tanks being poured on-site

3 small marks against - no initial meeting, water tanks arranged in incorrect order and dumped fill where septic tanks was to be placed

2 major marks against - massive 5 meter deep excavation in the middle of driveway and a getting me to sign a variation saying the water tanks could not be covered felt under-hand.

19th February 2017 - sent an email outlining the problem with a copy of the plan manually shaded out to show the extent of the excavation and clearly showing that is was no where near the water tank location in the plan. It could not have been made more obvious.

20th February 2017 - SILENCE

21st February 2017 - feeling quite incredulous that I had not been contacted, I sent a follow up email asking if the extent of the problem was understood. I received a response from our lovely customer service representative say that the site supervisor was going to go out to site and check.

22nd February 2017 - received a call from the site supervisor who said it was close enough and it would be alright. At this point a site meeting was pushed for and whilst I was concerned he did not see this as a problem the plans were clear so surely this could be sorted out.

That week I kept pushing for a site meeting was told I would need to wait until the new ‘water tank guy’ was back at work (hopefully the following week). The meeting was made for 28th Feb with the site supervisor adamant that there was nothing majorly wrong.

27th February 2017 - Asked for a copy of the plans the site supervisor was working too, just in case he was looking at something different. I was sent the correct plans by email. 

28th February 2017 - Finally the day this would start to be all put right. The meeting was unbelievable, 40 minutes were spent with the site supervisor arguing and trying to cover the issue up. He wanted to build the tanks in the hole and forget about the driveway. He seemed to be more interested in covering up his mistake than building our house. After some serious words and insisting that that tanks must be placed as per the plan it was finally agreed with all parties. And the site supervisor would look at solutions for backfill. I sent an email to the office that evening outlining what had been agreed as asked for a timeline and details of the backfill solution.

Beginning of March the water tanks were built on-site - yay we are off again.

8th March 2017 - Still have a big hole and no communication about the backfill solution and the excavation is starting to collapse. Sent another email to the office saying that they need to escalate this issue. 

9th March 2017 - Called the office in desperation and spoke to the customer service rep who assured me that she would get one of the owners to get back to me. Did not hear anything all day so that evening I went onto Product Review for Valeco and asked if anyone else was having any similar issues.

10th March 2017 - The owner, general manager, site supervisor and customer service representative called and it was agreed that there would be an on-site meeting with an engineer. I would like to say I was happy that finally there was some recognition of the problem but to be honest I was so flat because it took so long.

14th March 2017 - Meeting the owner, an engineer and the site supervisor. Finally, 100% recognition of the issue and the meeting went really well. The owner was very committed to putting this right and offered a suitably engineered solution (including piering for the driveway). The owner genuinely came across of wanting to put this right. It was agreed that the concrete tanks would need two weeks to cure before work commenced.