Good work - inconsistent communication/customer service
We hired M&R Roofing in May 2015 to replace both our flat roof and shingled roof and replace an eaves trough. After getting estimates from 8 companies, we decided to go with M&R as they provided a very detailed estimate and were very cost efficient. Unfortunately their customer service was not consistent throughout the project with issues around communication, managing expectations and scheduling. We were advised upfront that they were very busy and that our project would be scheduled when possible which we accepted. When the job was scheduled, we were given less than a day notice of the start date of our project but we accepted that given weather uncertainty and staffing issues that were explained to us. The flat roof work was not completed on the first day due to unforeseen extensive wood rot which delayed the work but it was then difficult to confirm a time for completion of the flat roof as I was originally told the next day and then it kept on being put off. I had to make contact with the company several times to ask when this work would be completed as they weren’t proactive in providing this information. After a discussion with the owner, I requested better communication around scheduling for the remainder of the project so that I could plan my time accordingly. After completion of the job I proactively requested an invoice but was not given one until one month later and was then advised that as “the work had been done quite some time ago” payment will be required ASAP. I requested photos to see the completed work and although these photos were eventually provided, I was told that this was not standard (even though I had asked for photos before the job commenced and there was no indication that this was unusual or that this would be an issue). When the job was completed and paid for, I was informed that a part of the job had been missed and needed to be completed. The outstanding work was completed but again I had to follow up to confirm that the work had been done as I wasn’t advised. From the photos that we have seen and from what I can see of the roof from the ground, we are happy with the completed work and we were happy with the way the workers conducted themselves while they were on the premises. It’s just unfortunate that the lack of communication and generally poor customer service caused a lot of unnecessary frustration which negatively overshadowed the entire project.
- Approximate cost of services:
- $9,000.00
- Company Response
Thank you for your review, Norette. From late spring to the early fall of 2015, we experienced a significant growth in request for our services. We aim to attend to all requests in the same manner of physical roof top inspection followed by thorough proposals addressing the client’s specific needs and providing valuable pricing as you had mentioned. This is a time consuming consultation process which we do not want to compromise as we believe it provides much value to the client given the knowledge and education we seek to provide on roofing aspects with great transparency. The most important aspect of any trade work is the quality of the materials and installation supported by integrity to address arising issues. I believe we delivered on both the work quality expectation as you noted and the consultation process. However, we failed some clients during peak season on the administrative front, especially on projects that had multiple aspects such as your project with flat roof, slope roof and unexpected fascia wood work and cladding that requires the scheduling of separate crews and back to back scheduling is not always possible. I did review our schedule and we did deliver all the work in the month of May however, communication should have been better. The administrative overload we experience even resulted in late invoicing as you has mentioned. At M&R Roofing we do not want to compromise our roofing work or processes by haphazardly hiring staff that may not be ready to provide the service our clients expect and represent our company values. Unfortunately, the human resources training process is a timely one but, through last year we were able to develop additional staff. Regarding the communication, managing expectations and scheduling which suffered on your project, we apologize for the frustrations. This is an administrative area which we had plans to address and were slowly adopting the correct software we believed would automate many of these aspects as the software became available. Since, the beginning of 2016 we are utilizing the cloud to create personalized documents storage portals for each prospective client. Photos from the roof inspection, work in progress and job completion photos are now provided as standard practice. We have also initiated a new customer relationship module and are tuning project management softwares to notify clients of different milestones of their project pipeline. This is still a work in progress which our current customers are benefiting from. We will always seek to improve our processes and respond to learning from our experiences and clients.