Alamance Grading

Description of Work: Todd Fogelman was recommended to me by my trusted plumber. After standing me up twice, he finally showed up. I should have walked away but my plumber said he had known Todd and his father for years and that they did good work. He had the personality of a "hot dog" but my lateral line needed to be repaired. We walked over to where the line was leaking. I asked him to give me an estimate to repair. He told me "It could be $500, it could be $1000, I really can't say until I start to dig and discover what the problem is." OK, then how much do you charge an hour. $75. So he came out the next day. His father was with him in clean pants and a white shirt. Nice guy. Just stood around talking to me and Todd. Todd showed me a crushed pipe that needed to be replaced. He'd be done in a few minutes. Since he had his equipment, I asked if he would have time to smooth out the lateral line field since it was bumpy and we had trouble mowing it. Sure. He could do that. I wrote down when he arrived, left for lunch, returned and left after finished. He arrived at 11 am. He repaired the line and started to smooth out the ground when he said that there were bees bothering him and that he would need to get his bobcat. He left at 12:30 pm, returning at 2:00 with his bobcat and finished at 3:30. He told me he left his invoice at home but thought I owed him $700. I questioned this and he told me he had to charge me $100 x 2 for the equipment. He never mentioned this charge to me when I got his "estimate." I told him I wanted a detailed invoice, which he said he would mail to me. I foolishly paid him before totalling his hours. He worked for a total of 3 hours and charged me $700. My plumber called him or his father several times requesting an invoice and explaining how Todd had overchanged me. I finally got an invoice dated 9/22/2011. The invoice stated these lies: "I spoke with you about the job I quoted you $500 - $1000 and you had accepted it. The estimate I quoted you included a range of equipment to be used and repairing of the septic." He went on to say: "We spent a day doing your job" (ALL DAY? - HE CAME AT 11 am AND LEFT 12:30, CAME BACK AT 2:00 AMD LEFT AT 3:30 pm - "and we can not (sic) work for free. We did not charge you an hourly price with not knowing the length of time we were there." HUH? WHAT DOES THAT MEAN??? "He goes on: We never exceeded the quote we gave you so I see no problems." Well, come Springtime 2012 and the line is leaking in the same place. I had to hired another guy - who was good, honest and I'll recommend - to fix the line properly.