Reviews

4/10

I contacted Alex at Devlin about boarding, tape, mud, and finishing our basement mudroom. He was quick to respond, and replies were professional. He was able to schedule the work within a weeks time. He did not make a physical appearance, quoted based on photos and some questions. The issues all came from boarding: 1. There were areas that weren't boarded: when I brought this issue up, I was met with lots of resistance from Alex's end on why that wasn't done, and how the framing wasn't proper, so it couldn't have been done. I ended up just doing that part myself since it didn't need the work he spoke of, and took about 30 minutes of my own time. 2. There were drywall that was just hanging and not secured: there was one area that has the drywall contacting about 2 feet of the foundation. this board wasn't secured via glue or other means. I also brought this issue up at the same time, was again, met with lot of resistance and excuses on why this couldn't have been done. I spend about 45 minutes and secured it myself. 3. All the cutouts of the receptacles were cut way too big: The outlets and switches had been wired prior to the drywall job to verify wiring. The drywallers did not raise any issues, nor did they cut the correctly sized holes for the electrical boxes and pivot the switches and outlets through the drywall during install. Instead, they just cut huge holes around the whole receptacle, leading to ugly messes around each of the outlets and switches (see photos) that cannot be covered with a faceplate. When I brought this issue up, no apologies were given, and I was met with many reasons why they did what they did. They offered to come in to fix it, but I had already painted the walls assuming that the job would have been done properly. I will likely just have to accept oversized faceplates despite their looks to avoid having to wait for his team to come in on a work day to do the patch work, then have to sand and paint the area again. 4. Receptacles were also marked up badly by the drywaller's routers, this was brought up, refer to the excuse from #3. I was told that this is not his fault. Overall, I was not happy with the service provided. Any issue that was brought up was dismissed as "not their problem". I'm not a confrontational type, and do not want to fight to get what I need when I can just patch it up myself. Marty did a great job with mud, tape, and sanding. Alex was great to deal with when nothing goes wrong, when something goes wrong, it's all excuses. If you are looking for a team that can take it from the beginning and run with it themselves to get a job properly done, without excuses, I wouldn't recommend Devlin's.

Approximate cost of services:
$2,650.00
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Company Response

First off, I apologize Peter if you were not happy, but we did everything we could do, and I even offered multiple times to come correct the situations that arose from the prep that wasn't properly done by yourself. Sometimes it's best to let professionals handle things from the start.
I would like to address your concerns here, and explain the situation from another point of view.
All our customers are always treated the same way, we are extremely professional and respectful. I never once met you with resistance, I simply explained the situations, and you didn't like the fact that it was an underlying issue, and expected me to fix this, which I said I would, but you had no patience and immediately said, " It's fine, I guess I'll just fix it myself"
We are drywallers, not electricians or framers. There are things we can do, and there are things we can't. It becomes a legality issue, especially as we are not certified electricians.
All your concerns came about from issues that you didn't address properly before we came to do the Drywalling, and are now blaming it on our workmanship, which is unfair Peter, and I will explain them here again below, so anyone reading this can decide if it was my fault or not.
I'm no judge, so I'll leave this in the readers hands to decide.

1) Boarding not done.
I wish I could post a pic!
This issue was because of a door return not done, which we couldn't do properly because the framing was not all there, and there was plywood also sticking out on the side, so the return would end up being extremely wavy. My guys figured the owner would have to do the return in wood and left it as it couldn't be done at that time. Like no backing for nearly 2 feet on both sides. This plywood sticking out needed to be trimmed with a sawzall to make smooth before we could even attempt to try to screw a return to his backing every 2 feet.
Now my boarders don't come to every job carrying a sawzall, in fact I don't know any drywall crew in my life that ever had one to be honest. They have all there drywall tools, and sometimes maybe to odd guy has a skill saw with them, but not often, but the plywood was too deep for a skill saw, it needed a sawzall.
I explained this to him in a text, as was hard to reach him on the phone, and he immediately replied with this quote, that I just copied and will paste here below.

I’m not going to argue about this. I’ll just do that section myself. And I guess I’ll secure the board on top of the foundation myself as well

Which leads me to the next issue.

2) Drywall that was just hanging and not secured.

There was 1 wall that was not framed properly, he framed it flush to a 2ft high concrete foundation, this was not in the video that he sent me, and he neglected to let me know about this issue, or I would have sent my guys with a tube of PL Premium to glue this on. BUT, it is still not the right way to do things, the wall should have been framed over the concrete. And these two issues he brought to my attention in 1 text message after my boarders were done.
I explained the situation to him, even thou these were underlying issues, I still said I would send the proper materials with my taper, so when he starts taping he could fix these np. Which he then sent the message above that he would just do it himself. FYI, my response to both these issues I just copied from our text conversation and will post here below;

I’m not trying to be argumentative either. Trying to let you know the proper way to fix this.
I will talk to my taper and see what he can do there for you to bandaid the situation.

-But you supplied the drywall, and we had no mud/glue on site to adhere the drywall to the concrete.
If you had brought this situation to my attention at the beginning, I could have made recommendations on how it could have been fixed the proper way before we started.

-and from what I can see the framing isn’t done properly.

As mentioned, we will try to do what we can to address this situation, I don’t want you to be upset, but it’s like asking the plumber to finish the electrical.

Gluing drywall to concrete isn’t the proper way to do a job, the wall should have been fir out to clear it.
But as mentioned we will do what we can to address this, but keep in mind we are trying to bandaid a problem that needed addressing before we started. We do quality work, we never do things that aren’t right.
You may have further problems installing baseboards and door trim now because there is no wood backing to install it to at the bottom of the wall. Hopefully everything will be ok, but this situation if it should arise after us, is not our fault, we will attempt to fix this problem so we can finish it for you as your asking.
I hate to have upset customers. We will do what we can, but this situation is not how it should be properly done. But to your request we will make the attempt to patch this.
Let me know your thoughts after you read what I’m discussing here.
Thank you Peter

I then got this;

I’m not going to argue about this. I’ll just do that section myself. And I guess I’ll secure the board on top of the foundation myself as well

3)Holes apparently cut way to big.

file:///var/mobile/Library/SMS/Attachments/ca/10/59FE0F71-B31D-49A8-B323-1F5A6ADD85C5/IMG_1160.heic

Again, I really wish I could post a pic, here is a link if you can see it, because the so called way to big, is actually a minor little blemish, that isn't even a hole, it's a little under sanded because we had to mud around a few box's, because ya, some were cut to big, but that was because he installed all his electrical plugs and switches before we came to drywall. If you didn't know, I'll explain here, you see, a electrical box is mounted 1/2" sticking out of the wall so the drywaller can cut his drywall around it, but if you have a plug or switch installed before hand, those metal ears are only a 1/16th inch smaller that the plug cover, and our rotor that cuts the drywall is 1/8" thick, so there is literally no way we can cut out the box without over cutting. These ears are specifically designed to sit on the drywall to hold it steady, they are meant to install after the drywall, so the drywall can help hold them in place. They are definitely not designed to be installed before the Drywalling stage, which is why these holes where cut a little bigger, but my taper did do a good job trying to fill these, which shouldn't have happened to begin with. But never the less, the minor deficiencies that were left after my taper was just that, very minor, and typically a professional painter would have touch them up with a little mud after as well, but Peter did everything him self including the painting, which is fine, I also offered to come for any touch ups that were needed, np, I always do, ask anyone who has ever worked with me before, I always ask and offer to come back for any touch ups. I don't think that Peter has done much of this kind of thing before or he would have touched up those few concerns before he was done painting, or took me up on my offer for touch ups, I don't think he noticed anything until he went to put the cover plates on.

4). Electrical plugs were marked up.

Again, same reason, these plugs should have not been installed prior to drywall. If your going to install plugs and switches before Drywalling, please understand it's not the right way to do things, we need to be able to cut a nice hole around the box so we don't need to mud every box, and your plugs will look good when finished. Yes, there was a few scratch marks on a plug or two, that's construction, especially when you install them before drywall. After the fact, when I explained why this happened, he said, well why wouldn't you remove them first, lol, I was thinking the same thing, but we are not certified electricians, we are not aloud to touch any electrical work at all, and not only that, my guys wouldn't feel comfortable doing this.
Only 2 situations here.
1- Don't install plugs and switches before drywall,
Or
2- if you do, expect to replace a few when we have to rotor out box's with them in place. First off you are making our lives way more difficult than it needs to be by having to try to cut around them, then afterwards, now I have to pay my guys extra to fix these cuts that are to big, then I get complaints about our workmanship, all because you couldn't wait till after drywall to install your plugs.
I always do my best to please our customers, even if it wasn't my fault, I'll go that extra mile, no problem, even in this situation, I did offer to fix these things that weren't my fault, I said I could fix them for you, but Peter had no patience, and did them himself, which is fine too, but then at the end of the day, he comes here and says our workmanship was bad.
I don't know, you the reader can decide, but I feel Peter wasn't to fair working with us, I was nothing short of professional, willing to fix issues that were not our fault, willing to come back after the fact to touch ups issues around the plugs, again we had to struggle with first off, because you had to install them before drywall, and then figure that I'm being difficult to deal with, or being resistant.
I was far from being resistant, I simply explained the situation and then offered to come fix the situation, but that wasn't good enough, you were going to fix it and show me.
Well again Peter, I apologize if the project didn't go according to your expectations, but if you don't do something all the time, or are not professional at something, you should expect a few situations to arise.
We did our best, and offered you all our services to fix your issues free of additional charges, but you did not accept them.
When something doesn't go right I'm all excuses he said, lol, I'm explaining the situation so you understand why we are at this point, we did everything right on our end Peter, it's the prep work that you should have done properly but didn't, and your getting frustrated at me because of it.
Not fair Peter!
I really don't know what I could have done better to make this experience better for you.
But I'll go to school on it, I'll think about it, to try to prevent this same situation next time.
Have a great day