One more day...

Some times it feels like manning the barricade I tell ya!

According to the actual brickies (whom I spoke to on Saturday morning) they will be finished on Tuesday the 30th. Of course this was before it absolutely bucketed down with rain most of monday morning, so assuming no work will get done today then maybe just maybe the brick work will be finished on Wednesday....
maybe...

I tend to trust the brickies a bit on this one.. Ventura on the other hand is about as useful to me as a piece of paper and pencil is to a deep sea scuba diver.I sent an email to them on the 23rd of May asking some specific questions and pointing out some specific issues/concerns I had (and still have) with the building process. As of today (the 29th) I still have not heard back from them, and basically that is just pathetic. I know they recieved and have read my email (MS Outlooks read receipt isa wonderful tool!), but thay just cannot be bothered to talk to the customer. I get the distinct impression I am an inconvieniace to them, nothing more.

For example, after I sent the email on the 23rd I mentioned above I sent another on the 25th, which included the email I sent on the 23rd (included as a subtle hint) the body of the email was as follows:

Just, as always, following up on the email I sent on Tuesday. And you may (or may not) want to let Chris know (concrete supervisor) that he should look at finding new slab contractors as nothing has been done to fix the oversights made when they laid the slab on the 16th of March (which I am sure he is well aware of). Of course he may well be on the phone to them every day, but having heard nothing back from Ventura about the situation for at least a month I can only assume (for lack of evidence otherwise) that little is being done about it

The reply I recieved back from my Client Liasion Officer (that title is a laugh to begin with)
is:

I have been in touch with u regarding the slab, maybe not by email but I have verbally spoken to u about it .I have on a number of occasions spoken to Chris about it and yes the company we use isn’t reliable. I will how ever speak to Chris again to see if he has any news
Thank you,
K**** S*******

(the * are my insertions)

If I could point out at this point that the last time I was in any way contacted about the slab either verbally, by email or by carrier pigeon for that matter was on the 5th of May (at around 4:15pm in fact - I record the date, time and content of EVERY contact with Ventura) and it was to tell me that the concrete contractor was coming over that weekend (6th of May) to fix the problem. So while I was incorrect at saying I havent heard anything for a month, I was pretty damn close since it was 3 weeks AND a broken promise, which they never bother to inform me about.

The best line is where "KS" agrees with me that the concrete contractor is indeed unreliable, as if that is meant to make it all better or something?!

I'm going to send them another email today, not asking any questions but just pointing out the lack of feedback, service and help I have so far recieved. By a happy accident I have been given the General Manager's email address and I might CC him on this also, however I am depressingly sure it will change nothing, there seems to be a very imbedded culture of "dont give a crap about the customer" with this company.

Still, I might feel better though!


Take care.

Blowin in the Wind

Well the 19th of May has been and gone and, you guessed it, the brick work has not been completed.

Its now coming up to the 26th of May and in my completely unprofressional opinion it is not going to be finished this week, not unless they employ 4 or 6 builders for the next 2 days.

Still to do before brick work is complete:

1. The top two thirds of the interior wall of bed2 (they have done the wallto about 1 metre high), this is about 9 metres of wall (goes around a corner).
2. 4 metres of the wall that separates the main bedroom from the hall, not started yet.
3. The entire lock up garage.
4. The entire double brick wall tthat is the front of my house (10 metres, plus porch columns).
5. The entire top 2 courses of all the brickwork done so far (it hasnt been completed to plate height yet).

I told my Client Liasion Officer on Tuesday that the date given to me (last Friday - the 19th) was laughable and could almost be considered as bare face lying to a customer and I was not impressed.

Please understand that I am not annoyed about the length of time it is taking to build (well, ok I am a little, but only a little, I know the building market is busy, lack of brickies etc..), I am annoyed and amazed that the builders seem to have no schedule or plan and that they make no attempt to be honest with me. If it is going to take 3 week to finish that is fine, JUST TELL ME THAT HONESTLY! When I asked them for a end date to the brickwork, it wasn't becuae I wanted them to hurry but as I explained to them it was because I have to arrange for my data cabling guy to arrive on site after the brick work is finished and before the roofing guys appear, and he needs advance notice, THAT is why I need a realistic end date.

Perhaps I am asking too much...

Nearly Complete

Appearently the brick work will be finished this week, on the 19th of May....

uhuh..

They have the entire interior to START, and about 20m of exterior double brick to complete, so we shall see. But the timetable I have managed to grugingly extract from Ventura (its like pulling teeth from a comatosed elephant, really) states that the bricks will be complete on the 19th, the roof carpenter will start 1 week after that and take 1 and a half week to complete, then I have a 2 week break to organise my cabling contracter to come in and lay the data and tv cabling through the house for the smart wiring (presumably this is when the Ventura electrician is also going to be working) and then the roof sheeting goes on over the roofing frame.

And then to me it seems like we are on the down hill stretch. Maybe, possibly, somehow....

Ventura has also finally contacted my neighbours to organise replacing of the fence.

This is good.

Once in a blue moon..

Oops, its been nearly a month since I posted here to say where the house is up to. If any one was reading this SORRY! Things just keep cropping up.

So on to a quick summary
1) We now have about 3/4 of the external double brick walls built. 2) The only reason I havent changed builders is because it would cost me more then it would cost them 3) We are still holding out for a october completion date.
Problems 1) The soakwells still have not been installed. The guy installing the soakwells recommended to me and the builder that they needed to go in before the house was built due to site access issues, but the building company thought that they knew better. Now they will have to remove and replace 2 fences to get the soakwells in, at their cost.

2) I have a sneaky suspicion that the brick supervisor that I have been assigned is the guy that they give all the 'trouble' clients too (ie the clients that research what is meant to be happening and questions and queries every step of the way). At rhe meeting where we met him all he did was to explain to me how busy they were and that I should not expect my queries and questions to get answered, and that even if nothing looks like it is being done, it is being handled in the back ground. I spent the entire meeting trying to get him to understand that I dont care if I cant see the work being done, just reply to my queries with more then a "we are looking into it" and let me know what is happening and when. He told me he was too busy to do that..... Oh boy, just wait until I get to fill out the customer satisfaction survey at the end of all this....

3) To highlight the above, bout 2 weeks ago I emailed the company a letter because I had a couple of issues with the brick work so far (they had not put a wall vent in where the plan showed there was one, and they had not capped an external window sill with the correct bricks). Minor issues but I emailed him about them any way. 9 days later (NINE!) I emailed him again asking if he recieved my eariler email, he called me up and told me that he had recieved my email and everything was fine, goodbye. Everything may indeed be fine, but it would be nice if he could damn well let me know! or even just reply to my email say he has read it. (I now attach read reciepts to all my email so I can see instantly when he has read it).
On the other hand the actual guys doing the brick work seem very competent. I had my windows measured yesterday for external window shutters to be installed and every window is within 2mm of the stated size on the plan. This is encourgaing.

So all in all things are progressing just about on time, the company seems to be either ignorant or purposely rude, but the brickies are good at their job which is far more important.

By the way, the company is Ventura Homes, if any one is interested (oh I hope they read this!). Would I recommend them.... tough. On the whole I would have to say maybe, and then only just, because:
1) They provide a free service where they sit down and help you customise any of their plans to suit your block/lifestyle
2) Their contractors are good (so far)
3) They are fairly priced in todays ridiculous market (At least they where when I signed on).

But I would only recommend them if you have the time and the stubborness to keep on their tails and bring them to task about everything they do. And I do mean keep on their tail, I would recommend no less then 3 or so contacts a week asking where they are up to. They act like a stubborn pig-head, but talented teenager, they can do the work well but boy do you have to work at them to get it done.

Take care.

I'm on the way.. To misery and happiness today...

Well all the bricks have arrived (3 different types of bricks!) the steel lintels and various other pieces, so now we just need to wait from the brickies to turn up.

On the soakwell side of things I have just about given up with it all together. I finally managed to get Ventura Homes to pass onto me the phone number of the guy installing the soakwells. I nice guy, quite happy to chat about what is going on and how it will all go together, he quite put me at ease in terms of how he was going to solve the laundry courtyard issue (appearently its fairly common and the standard solution is to push a thicker pipe then normal under the footings use that as the stormwater pipe.

Frankly I feel much more confident with him telling me it will work and everything is good, then with Ventura ignoring me.

However (there is always a however isnt there), however the stormwater guy (we will call him Ron from this point on, because that is his name) said that he was really hoping to be able to install the soakwells before the bricks arrived due to site access issues. He even informed Ventura Homes of this, even though Ventura Homes as continued to tell me that the soakwells need to be installed after the brickwork. They even let Ron order the soakwells to arrive before the bricks so he could do it. And yet that order got delayed, the soakwells are no where in site and all the bricks have arrived. So Ron is not happy, I'm amazed that Ventura does not seem to be able to even organise a simple delivery and Ventura doesn't seem to care (In fact I am becoming convinced that Ventura Homes could not organise an orgy if they were in ancient Rome).

The one bright point in all this is that after talking to Ron for 20mins I found out more about the soakwell issue, including how it will be solved then I ever did after weeks of communication with Ventura.

Ron says that he can install the soakwells after the brick work, its is just not his preferred option as it now requires him to use the laneway down the side of the house and removal of several parts of the boundary fence. This is fine with me as I have to remove the fence anyway cause we are getting a new one installed there, so the more he takes out the better!

On the finanical side I am still refusing to pay Ventura Homes the first invoice we have recieved because they (after FOUR WEEKS) have still failed to come out and fix the problems with the slab. To re-cap, the problems with the slab are fairly minor (set down needs enlarging, bath grave needs grinding out and a few other things) but since I was promised 4 weeks ago that the slab contractor was going to come out and fix them and nothing has happened I am insisting on a written guaranteed date that these will be done by before I pay the money. Sounds fair to me, and I have informed Ventura (politely) of such.

I'll ring them up later today and speak to them about it. I have the money, its sitting in my bank ready to go and I can transfer it immediately, I just want my written guarantee that it will be done (since I am not at all confident it will get done without one).

Moving to stage 2

Well things are progressing somewhat, the toilet, shed, and other building supplies have been delivered to the building site, so now we just await the arrival of the bricks.

We also received the request for the first progress payment earlier this week, and I am just waiting on the few things from the first inspection report to be fixed before I pay it (and I have informed Ventura that this is the case). The things to fix at this point are fairly minor (the bathroom setdown needs to be increased, the ensuite bath grave needs to be dug out, and the concrete slab in the bed 1 area needs to be smoothed down), but I feel that until they are complete then stage 1 isn't complete, and if stage 1 isn't complete then I shouldn't have to pay for that stage.

I'm holding out a vague small hope that the bricks will be delivered today, given previous experience everything on this project seems to be down just before the weekend, and with tomorrow being the first day of the Easter long weekend the odds are good.

Fingers crossed.

Defects sorted. sort of

Well, I received a reply from our builder (Ventura) about the issues that I mentioned in my previous blog. The answer was pretty much what we were expecting, in short all o the minor stuff (like the set down isn’t large enough and the slab needs smoothing down) are going to be fixed and we have no answer on the major item, the soakwells.

The reply we received about the soakwells is that Ventura has passed our plans onto the company responsible for the drainage systems and they will reply soon with a solution. I’ll be generous and give them until Thursday before I start chasing up an answer, which seems fair.

Also this week is the week that the bricks should arrive. When I asked about them on Friday I was told that all the scheduling is done each Monday so she couldn’t tell me if my bricks were going to arrive this week until Monday. Well, to day is Monday And I’m going to send a polite email chasing up the bricks and then of course ring up at around 3pm if I haven’t heard anything.

One cool thing that I found works is the read receipt ability of Outlook (it would seem that Ventura’s email server is running MS Exchange). What that means is that when the recipient of my email opens my email to read it, their email server sends me an email automatically to tell me that the email I sent has been read. It allows me to track down the “I never received your email” comments that have happened a few times (and perhaps were quite genuine), plus it allows me to know when my email was read.

So for the end of this week I am hoping to have
a) All my bricks delivered on site
b) All the minor defects corrected, and
c) A solution to the soakwell issue

Here’s hoping!