Lui Construction

I found Sipliano Lui, and his company, SNS Construction LLC on Thumbtack and hired them to do some work on my backyard. The owner, Sipliano, gave me a quote of $8500 for the following plan - Dig down 4 inches in an 1800 square foot area, remove the sod and soil and take to the dump. - Excavate soil from high areas, remove and take to the dump. - Thoroughly regrade the backyard to an appropriate height and level. - Lay down and pin landscape fabric throughout the entire area - Install 4 inches of gravel over the landscape fabric. When he and his crew came to do the install, they did not dig down four inches, nor remove any sod and soil from my yard. They just brought in a small tractor, moved the sod and soil around, laid down landscape fabric (without securely pinning it), and put about two inches of pea gravel over the top. He and his crew were here for one day (about 9 hours total). There were 6 workers, but half of them went back and forth between my job and another job they had down the street. Once the gravel was installed and I realized that they did not do everything listed in the initial quote, I confronted him about it. He refused to reduce the price and convinced me he did everything correctly. I have since researched the correct way to install pea gravel. If it's done correctly, the maximum professional install price for pea gravel is around $3 per square foot, but that price includes a crushed rock or sand base to help stabilize the gravel. (Edging around the main area of my yard should have also been included in his initial estimate to help contain the gravel.) Otherwise, it's $1 - $2 per square foot. For reference, the square footage he covered in my backyard is around 2,000, which means the price of the job should have been no more than $4,000 based on how it was installed. Sipliano told me he was going to use "Clean" pea gravel, which did not happen and has created more issues. The landscape fabric is now starting to stick up all over my yard. According to his quote, it was supposed to be trimmed, which it was not, and I have yet to find any part of it that was pinned down. They also laid gravel up against my slated fence, so a lot of it is going into my neighbor's yard (which they are not happy about), and they did not put any edging around my deck, so the gravel is migrating underneath it. To make matters worse, they left a large amount of the pea gravel on my driveway, and it's like driving on soft snow. Plus, it's spreading onto my front lawn every time I pull in and out of the driveway. They also did not lay down plywood on my front lawn to protect it from the tractor driving over it, so it was completely torn up. The owner promised he would reseed the front lawn to fix the damage, which also never happened. To top it off, one of his workers was using my metal rake to spread the gravel, and they ended up taking it and still have not brought it back even with numerous messages sent asking for it to be returned. I tried reaching out to Sipliano several times to discuss the issues. It took five text messages and a phone call before he finally responded back, saying he would come by on Aug 23rd to address everything. He didn't show up, nor did I hear from him. I then made a post on my personal FB page asking if anyone could refer me to someone that could help me fix the huge mess and tagged his company. He text me within 15 minutes of that post and sounded agitated, but the next day offered to come over to address the issues. I sent an email to him with his estimate attached and listed everything they did not do that was shown on his estimate, and all of the issues that they caused in both my front and backyard. I asked him to put in writing what he was willing to fix at no extra cost and I would be happy to meet with him once he clarified. He ignored that request and asked again to meet. When I reiterated that I would like in writing what he would fix first, he completely stopped responding. I have since filed a dispute resolution with Thumbtack. They immediately requested a response from him as to what he was willing to do to resolve the issues and come to an agreement. When he ignored their request, they shut his account off from receiving new customer inquiries and gave him three days to address the situation. That also did not work. It is going to cost me dramatically more than $8500 to fix the mess that has been created by this company. What's even more disappointing is I explained to Sipliano when I met him that my business was hit extremely hard by Covid. I own a pet care business, and we started using my yard during the pandemic for puppies to play in a safe, monitored environment. This is why I needed my yard done, to begin with, so to be taken advantage of like this is devastating.