Skyline Deck & Construction Inc

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Skyline's designer/field rep Brad came exactly on time to a series of planning meetings with my wife and I, accomodating our schedule and giving very generous time and thought to the project.  He came out during construction to give detailed advice on how to take care of our parts of the project and also lent us a power driver and circular saw to supplement our own tools.  Dave the owner was responsive to a couple of inquiries and Malina the office person went to great lengths to deal with a delay in issuance of the permit by the overloaded city of CDA. She personally went down to City Hall. The two gents who built the deck were diligent and friendly - took time to explain everything and made a couple of adjustments and refinements to construction while underway. They did a great job and we are thrilled with the deck.  I dont know if they are going to continue to let homeowners do some of the work themselves (we laid down the deck boards) but this option saved us a ton of money.  We would hire them regardless of the availability of a "do some of it yourself" option.  

There was a delay in starting construction while builder waited for Kootenai county to issue permit.  We are partly guilty for delay as we did modify plan before permit was approved.  Once work started we were highly impressed by the professionalism, attention to detail, and solid work ethic of the two employees who did most of the work.  (Zack and Marco)  Because project was delayed at beginning, Skyline had scheduling problems and had to pull our workers off to assist another crew.  We also needed to be gone for a week in the middle of the project and this slowed things down.  All in all, our only complaint was crew scheduling delays.  Again, we will accept part of the blame.  We spent a lot of money on this project and feel we got our money's worth in quality craftsmanship and peace of mind for a safer deck.

A representative from Skyline came to the house wherein the job was explained to him and that this was a repair and replacement of the damaged deck as a result of snow load.  They seemed very knowledgeable and articulate.  The discussion was detailed as to what needed to be done and that this was an insurance claim which required their communication with the insurance company.  Once the job was started and the decking removed,  it was discovered that part of the framework was damaged as well.  Work was stopped and they told us the entire deck had to be replaced and a total rebuild was the only way they would do it.   They were adamant that they would not just repair and replace that they only could do a total rebuild.  They did not have experience in talking with insurance companies so the negotiations were handled by me.  Things became so difficult and strained  I finally sent them notice to return the remaining monies of the first payment deducting the cost of the tear off and we would hire someone else. This changed the attitude of the owner a bit.   The deck remained incomplete for about 6 weeks which included 2 doors to the outside that we could not use.   Eventually,  after several discussions they agreed to complete the job that they were hired to do in the first place.  The owner of Skyline has no people skills and is a downright bully. It was extremely difficult to discuss any aspect of this claim with him as he became defensive and angry at just about every conversation we had.   The work crew is very good and they are a group of great guys who know their stuff.   The owner, it would be to his benefit to find someone to handle the client interactions.     After the winter, we noticed that there were some boards that had inadvertently not been screwed down and we called and asked that someone stop by as we didn't have the screws or the tool to accomplish this.  Our concern was that not using the materials specifically for this would compromise any warranty.  The owner, stated this is your deck you can do it yourself.  After a few e-mails to him and a final demand to come and complete the job that would take about maybe 10 minutes he agreed to have someone come out.  It took about 5-6 weeks to get someone to stop by to take care of this.  Again, the owner is difficult to deal with.