When last we talked about this I had not gotten the promised call from the plumber so I called him. Incredibly, he answered the phone but said he couldn't talk and promised to call back.
Here we go again.
But, much to my surprise, he did call back and made an appointment to drop by late that afternoon. An appointment that he kept. After looking around he said he didn't see any problem but then hit me with a wrinkle that I hadn't thought about. Did I want to keep or replace the baseboard heating covers?
Hmm, that was something I hadn't thought of. He simplified it by saying that he would send me two estimates, with and without new covers. He said he would get in touch with the basement folks. That was on October 17th.
The next day I got the estimates and the number almost knocked my eyes out. I hadn't expected a $2,350 bill just for the plumbing. Since it was only $350 less if I didn't replace the covers, I said that we would do new covers.
I heard nothing so I called the Basement Guys on October 22nd and was told I would get a call back. This was deja vu all over again.
I did actually get a call back at about 9:15 AM on November 3rd, but I missed the call. The message said that the plumber was available the following Wednesday and to call back to work out the details.
I called back and the guy wasn't there. I was told that I would get a return call, which I didn't. I called again the next day on November 4th. Again, I was told that I would get a call back. I heard nothing.
Finally, I decided that enough was enough and on November 10th I went looking for another contractor.
I left messages with three places and got a call back from one that day. He made an appointment to look things over that evening. Let's call these folks the New Basement Guys and christen the other folks the Old Basement guys.
He looked around, and gave us a $7,500 quote not including painting the sheetrock, new baseboard trim (which I figures I would get when we got the new carpeting) or the cabinet that the other guys had suggested to cover the sump pump. I thought he told me that the pump would be in the wall but, as we shall see, I was mistaken.
He asked for a $1,500 deposit. So now I was out $7,358 with nothing to show for it so far.
On the same day, November 10th, I called the Old Basement Guys to tell them that I no longer needed their services and that I would appreciate the return of my deposit. I was told that I would get a call back.
I heard nothing on November 11th so I called again on November 12th just to make sure that there was no misunderstanding. I was put on hold for a bit and then told that the owner would call me back.
The owner actually did call me back a few hours later. We chatted for a bit. I made it clear that I thought this was just one of those things and he promised to send me a check for the amount of my deposit. My wife said that she would believe that when the check had cleared and the money was in our account. I agree with her and I'm thinking that I'll never see that $5,858 again without a lot of grief.
In the meantime, the New Basement Guys made an appointment for November 17th, between 8:00 AM and 8:30 AM. Along the way I received two reminder emails. We put tarps over the remaining stuff in the room the night before.
So I dragged my sorry rear end out of bed about 7 AM and sure enough they arrived around 8:15 AM.
Things started off well. They put stuff to cover the floor from the front door to the stairs and to cover the carpet near where they were going to work. They put up tarps to keep the dust from going into the rest of the house. They covered the open area much more completely that I had been thinking to do.
Then they got to work.
There was a lot of drilling and banging as expected but then, I started to hear water sloshing and they asked me where the water turn off valve was. That was bad but the tarps kept me from seeing what was going on. But when two water company trucks showed up I figured that I'd better hobble out the garage and go around to the front door.
They had ruptured the water main leading into the house.
Now, there are messes, there are big messes and then there is this. This just totally took a minor annoyance into a full blown catastrophe. My wife was, understandably, ready to kill. I was trying to figure out where do we go from here? It did not look good.
They tried to make amends. They got all the water out. They brought in radiators to dry things out. They tore up the carpet from the whole room and out of the closet under the stairs. The put the stuff from the closet in the basement.
So were are we?
1. They need to finish the wall.
2. The sump pump hole is big and ugly and is going to be a problem. We are thinking of getting a carpenter to build a cabinet to hide it, which is what the Old Basement Guys said they would do. Obviously I was wrong when I thought he said that it would be hidden in the wall. We're also thinking that a matching cabinet on the other side might be good.
3. We need to come to a price for painting the sheetrock or I can go get a handyman to do it.
4. We need to check if any of the stuff that was down there has been damaged. I don't think so but my wife isn't convinced.
5. We need to go through the stuff from the closet. Dump what we don't need and put the rest back because right now we can't get into the basement.
6. BTW, we still haven't seen a check from the Old Basement Guys. No real surprise there.
Obviously this is <<To Be Continued>>
