ALPINE COMPANIES

This company, which is a one man show, is a joke. He is unreliable, unresponsive, lazy, dragged on the project for now 6+ months, and took all of our money without completing the project (left a dumpster sized garbage pile in our backyard that should have been taken away months ago). Now we are hiring someone else to finish out his incomplete work. We also had one of his subcontractors approach us wondering if we paid him for everything because the owner owes him thousands of dollars for our job and a previous job. There were multiple times where he didn't show up for a week or more at a time and always had an excuse - (e.g. his workers had valentines day off, weather, daughter's birthday, wife was sick, had to be a kid's school,etc.). Although the quality of work was great, I would give that credit to his subcontractors and not him since they did the grunt of the work anyways. This guy does not know how to run a business or talk to customers in a respectable and professional way. He can't keep his personal life out of his professional life. STAY AWAY.

I never heard from them.

Poorly. They started tearing out cement before the agreement was provided or signed. Did not do the job that was verbally agreed on. Cement levels were not even. Primary area of driveway needing repair was left untouched. Continued calls have gone unanswered. They also included part of the staining charge which had to be done after curing, on the initial bill stating that they would only charge $300. more when they actually came and did the staining. The one time I did get through to the owner asking that they file the tripping hazard of the uneven sidewalk prior to staining, he said he would come by and look at it but never got back to me, again despite my many messages and detailed e-mail sent. Driveway cracked within the first year and the staining was never done.

We called Alpine a few days after a week of non-stop heavy rain in May and they came out the next day to give us an estimate. When we called them, we thought that repairing the cracks in the foundation wall where the water came into our basement would be sufficient; however, they took a look at the drainage situation in our backyard and proposed a solution of managing that first, via a french drain and concrete work, so the water could no longer even get to the affected wall. They also noticed that our sump pump float was too high and missing a ball in the pipe so the water was not fully exiting and was actually backing up into the side drains. We were grateful that they came up with a comprehensive plan to address everything that was causing the water to come in our basement. It was a big project and Jay and his father, Harold, did a good job explaining the Why's behind all of the steps involved so we felt good about the permanency of the solution. As with all home repairs/remodeling, things took a little longer than anticipated but this was mainly because the weather wasn't cooperating. It was actually good that we got heavy rain after the concrete work and french drain were done and before the epoxy work was completed because it allowed us to see that those two things were keeping water away from the foundation as intended (water did not come into the cracks after that, even though they had not yet been epoxy injected). We love how the concrete work turned out and can't believe we had put up with an ugly, cracked, and sunken patio for so long. But more importantly, we have peace of mind that when it rains heavily our basement will stay dry. We had read the prior reviews before choosing Alpine and initially decided to go with them because they were able to start work right away and we were in a pinch. All of the other companies we called couldn't even come out to look at our problem for at least 5 weeks and we couldn't wait that long. As mentioned before, they came out the very next day - plus they were able to start work a few days after that. We are grateful that we found them and are happy with the work they performed.

Disappointing. Very nice people, but not good with follow-through. I left a message on 5/2, he called back on 5/5. He said wanted to make an appointment for the next day, which was fabulous. But I was out of town and wasn't available then. He didn't have his calendar to make an appointment further out, so he said he would call me back. I said I would check my calendar too. I left him a message on 5/6 listing dates and times I was available. He called back on 5/11 and said 5/13 would work. No one showed up on 5/13, and no one left a message to let me know what happened. I left a message on 5/13 but no one called back or followed up with me. I left a message on 6/3. They called back and we made an appointment for 6/8. He came this time, looked at the repairs I needed, and said he would email the estimate. I never received the email. I called once in June to tell them I hadn't received the estimate, I spoke to a woman, and she said they would send it. I never received it. I called and left a message one more time in late June to say I never received the estimate. No response; I never received an email or a phone call following up. Based on their website, the only thing I can guess is that my job was too small to be of interest. I would rather a company tell me that the only do jobs over $10K, $20K, or whatever (another contractor who provided an estimate indicated it was under $10K) instead of talking to me and then not following through. Customer Service...that's when you have a policy of ALWAYS responding within 24 or 48 hours to all potential customers. Always responding means you sometimes say, "No, we don't do that kind of work" or "We're really swamped right now but I'll get back to you within the next 5 days" or "We won't be able to make it today, can we reschedule." I don't mind when a company responds and tells me they need more time, but no response at all is unacceptable. We ended up making other arrangements for the work we needed.

They said they'd go out to the address I gave them before the end of the week. They asked me if anyone needed to be home and I said no. I realized that instead of them being able to just go out and measure the driveway, someone needed to be at the location to show them additional work we needed estimates for in addition to drainage issues for the driveway. I left phone messages 3 days in a row stating that they should contact me before going out. On Saturday, I got a 3-line email from Harold with a quote for only part of what was needed and that they were booking up quickly so call to schedule right away. I emailed back immediately stating that I had left 3 messages for them to contact me BEFORE going out to do the estimate. I spoke with someone on Saturday after I got the email and he told me he'd come out Sunday to look at the additional areas. When no one showed up by the agreed upon time, I sent an email stating that no one ever showed up. Shortly thereafter, I got an email stating that someone would be out on Sunday (it was Sunday) and they'd be back in the office on Wednesday and would get me a quote for the additional areas looked at... It's Friday and I still haven't heard from them. Not to mention no one ever showed up to look at the additional areas. They missed out on a $10,000 to $11,000 job.

Even though they have a good reputation I was not that excited about the experience overall. They didn't do as good a job as I thought they should. They were also very high priced for the work they did.