AZ Design & Engineering Inc

When our (nightmare) contractor's crew cut pre-fab roof trusses as a way of shoe-horning them into the construction, the inspector flagged the issue, but let it pass contingent on receiving sign-off from the engineer. Unbeknownst to us, the contractor had failed to pay the engineer for work performed, so this last bit of work never got done. We only learned about it when it stymied our final inspection over a year later, by which time the contractor had abandoned the project and the engineer proved unreachable by phone and unresponsive to email. First, the bad: Once you get an engineer on a project, it's extremely expensive to switch as a new engineer would have to reproduce *all* of the project's stamped drawings. Getting responses from AZ Design was like pulling teeth...if pulling teeth ever took weeks and weeks. The good: When I finally was able to get a response and establish a fresh relationship with Abraham, communication improved significantly. While I still had to be proactive in getting status updates, the end result was completely satisfactory. And even though I suspect Abraham might have lost some money on part of our overall project, he was gracious in knocking off a line item from the final invoice when I pointed out that we hadn't been told that a visit to his office would be charged by the hour. In addition, Abraham and his employees were punctual for on-site visits, professional in their demeanor, and helpful in dealing with the City of Berkeley Permit Service Center. Overall, we're very thankful to Abraham for getting us over this last hurdle. It'll be a relief to finally close out this 3-year-old building permit!