Reviews

10/10

Ewen did a great job, nothing more need be said. My porch looks great and my neighbours have been complimenting me on it for several months now. I supplied the rough outline of what the porch should look like and Cameron made it happen. He started the day he said he would, he finshed the day he would, and the quote price was the actual price. A contractor with integrity! PS: my next door neighbour was impressed how carefully Cameron worked and kept nosie and dirt to a minimum

Approximate cost of services:
$15,000.00
3 of 3 people found this review helpful.
Was this review helpful?
Company Response

Heather and Fabian provided a picture of what they wanted, and then proceeded in a very timely fashion with regard to the commencement of the contract. A few design tweaks (some suggested, some requested)and a few weeks later, they were VERY happy clients. Thank you for allowing me to improve the curbside appeal of an already impressive home. - Ewen C.

0/10

Ultimaterooms.ca has been our worst experience with a contractor ever and did not meet the commitments they made. The group started out reasonably well satisfactorily completing a basement flooring & bathroom job. We mutually agreed to pause the work at the start of August '07 to allow for new windows to be installed in the basement. I notified Ultimaterooms.ca officially that they could restart on Sept 11, and their response was yes within 7-10 days. I understand that contractors need to balance their workload and hence readily accepted that date. However, in 7 weeks that followed, I was promised multiple times that work would restart (it didn't) and that Domenic or his right hand man would appear on-site to review the situation (he didn't)...not once was I contacted proactively explaining or providing a status update. Every promise post Sept 11th was not met leading me to have to ‘fire’ Ultimaterooms.ca on Nov 2, 2007 Ultimaterooms.ca failed to treat me as a client, failed in delivering the work agreed upon (in explicit written form) and worst of all, despite my repeated contacts and escalation of the situation, failed to react and do what is necessary to recover. Ultimaterooms.ca stills owes me ~$3,000 which I had prepaid but did not receive appropriate/adequate service against. This company can do good work, but at least in my case, overcommitted to too many clients simultaneously. If you hire them, ensure you have an agreement how often Domenic himself will be on-site (not one of his employees, some of which are of dubious skill) and be careful of pre-paying instalments without having inspected and certified that the work is in accordance with your agreement. Finally, it appears this contractor likes to respond to posts and will surely make some excuse or misrepresent the truth of what happened in his favour. I won’t come back to correct what is said - but you have been forewarned by my story.

Approximate cost of services:
$16,000.00
What could this company do to improve their services?
Any advice to offer fellow homeowners facing a similar project?
5 of 6 people found this review helpful.
Was this review helpful?
Company Response

In Response to Heather and Fabian from the Annex

As everyone knows there are many “contractor” horror stories, what many people never hear is the other side, the “client” horror story. This is where I take my hat off to Homestars.com for providing a space for not only our great clients to post fantastic reviews, but we as contractors are provided the space to tell our great stories as well ….and sometimes a bad one. And this is a sweet one!

You are correct Heather & Fabian, I do respond to my reviews, because my relationship with my clients does not end at the final pay check, and when someone has the kindness to say a few words about us, the least I can do is respond.

This project started out on an excellent foot, we were hired to gut and renovate a basement bathroom, which we did with pleasure….and turned out beautiful. While renovating the bathroom the clients asked us to rip up the old floor, level it with self levelling concrete and then supply and install new laminate. Again, done and looks beautiful.

Next, while still working on the flooring, the client mentioned he was thinking he wanted to do the trim install, but how much would we charge him? No problem with the price, and we were enlisted to do the trim work, again beautifully done.

At this point we are charging for extras, getting paid for extras ….but not paid for the completion payment from the original contract (the bathroom) yet it was completed weeks before. When the home owner was asked, they requested to keep the final payment until all of the projects were complete……….this is where we should have stopped, but my trusting nature steered me wrong.

Shortly after finishing the trim the clients requested a quote to repaint the basement, received it; accepted it and we were underway. (And we were still waiting for money)

Once completing the painting, the client informed us that we were to stop work for a week as they were having windows installed. I personally informed the client that we would have trouble squeezing them back in after stopping for a week, as we are on many other projects and all the extra work; although appreciated was already causing delays on other sites, but we would do our best to get back to them on our first opening.

5 WEEKS LATER, after many calls back and forth they finally install the windows. This is all happing during the highest point of the season, and created havoc. We explained to the clients that we were not going to be able to get back into their project for at least 2 weeks, and we were back within 2 ½.

From here, everything went to hell in a handbag! From this point on nothing we did seemed to satisfy the client, and here is where I realized they were attempting to screw us out of monies owed. When I asked for the previous money and was denied, I packed up my crew and refused to return until we were paid the old money from the prior projects which were complete, and beautiful. As the work done from part #2 on was priced as extras from the original contract, there was no reason to old back money on completed projects.

I left many voicemails, emails and even came to the house to settle up, but we know now that we will never see the money owed, and that the client’s full intention was to stick the contractor with the bill.

Again, I thank Homestars.com for supplying a site which allows us to rebuttal, and I hope this helps someone out there not to get played by clients…..there are just as many bad clients as good, maybe there should be a review system for clients as well as companies!

10/10

Jim and his crew are fantastic. The job was to completely grind out and re-morter 2 sides of the house, tuck & point the third, and chem clean my brinks. And what a job - all our neighbors complement us non-stop on how good our house looks now. Best of all, Jim is the best contractor we have had ever. He shows up when says he will, he completes the work on-time, his crew was top-notch polite, and the neighbors were never inconvenienced. Moreover, he gave us frequent updates, informed and consulted on the choices we had to make...AND...he looked after the small details - and that is the difference between good and great!

Approximate cost of services:
$0.00
Was this review helpful?
8.3/10

Flavio helped us get a newly purchased house up to speed - replacing an old faucet, old shower cartridges...the most impt work he did was to ensure that our toilets were properly seated - they hadn't been and our house was rife with sewer stink. Flavio took care of it, and it hasn't been an issue since. Very busy contractor, as all good ones are

Was this review helpful?
8.3/10

Flavio helped us get a newly purchased house up to speed - replacing an old faucet, old shower cartridges...the most impt work he did was to ensure that our toilets were properly seated - they hadn't been and our house was rife with sewer stink. Flavio took care of it, and it hasn't been an issue since. Very busy contractor, as all good ones are

Was this review helpful?
Company Response

Thank you Heather!
Canada Wide Plumbing & Drain Services Inc
http://flavio@canadawideplumbing.com/
647-929-1972

10/10

Dan did exactly what the promised he could do - no oversell. Dan was helpful and worked with us to determine good solutions - like a cost-effective fireplace beautification, how to double the usefulness of a closet. Will look to Dan again for future work

Was this review helpful?
10/10

Requel did fantastic work!! A huge job on a rough-looking house, completed ahead of the agreed-upon schedule. While many painters are good, the difference is the prep work - our walls had numerous issues. Requel did such a great job preparing the walls and the damaged areas that we are exstatic on how good everyhting looks. Great clean-up, very courteous, frequent status updatres, honest and price in line with other contractors (but given the quality of the work, a top value)

Was this review helpful?