PAUL WITSCHEN TREE SERVICE LLC

Rating: Workmanship is an A. Communication and time management is a low C. Overall is a B-.
Short version:
The good: Paul knows trees, and he and his crew do a great job.

The bad: Time management and proactive communication is poor.
The other: They get repeat business because of the quality of the work, so there’s no incentive to improve the poor time

management or to be more proactive in communicating with customers.
Longer version (notice the time line):
Mon, June 2: Initial visit to discuss pruning a big ash tree in the front yard. Paul gave a verbal estimate of $450-500 and said he could do the job in 1-1/2 to 2 weeks. I didn’t think to ask for an e-mail confirmation, and there’s no e-mail address on his Angie’s List posting so I couldn’t generate a confirmation from my end.
Thurs, June 27 (3 weeks later): I called for a status and Betty said I was on the schedule for tomorrow (Friday). Friday night Paul called to say he’d be there the next day (Saturday). Betty called Saturday morning to say Paul was ill and wouldn’t be coming.
Thurs, July 3: I called again and left a message asking about status. I had made commitments based on the time frame Paul had given a month earlier, and if he was unable to complete the job by the middle of the following week, to let me know so I could make other arrangements.
Sat, July 5 (almost 5 weeks from bid date): Betty called in the morning to say Paul would be there sometime that day, and he and his crew arrived about 2 pm. After a further look at the tree, Paul recommended, and I agreed, the tree should be removed. Paul and his crew went to work, dropping the tree exactly where he said it would go and cleaning up the area quickly and efficiently.
Paul said he would return the following week to grind out the stump and dig a hole for a replacement tree. Because of the additional work, the revised price was $700, and I paid him in full.
Fri, July 18 (2 weeks later): I called for a status about when he would do the follow-up work. He came the evening of July 22 (Tuesday) and finished up; it took about 30 minutes start to finish.
Using Paul’s time estimates, the entire project should have been completed by June 27 (3 weeks from bid date), give or take a few days. Instead, it took over 7-1/2 weeks and there was no communication other than to respond to my status queries with some form of “tomorrow.”
My overall feeling was if I hadn’t periodically called for status, I might still be waiting.
Communication was via telephone; the original bid and final price were in person and there was no receipt other than my cancelled check. I’m not saying this is good, bad or otherwise for this type of project; I’m just saying what was.
Final thoughts:

In an emergency situation I’d call Paul, as he and his team do very good work.
For non-emergency situations, I expect an “A” level, experienced contractor to be better able to reasonably estimate when he’ll start a job. With this kind of work, things can change at a job site or Mother Nature can create an emergency that changes things in a matter of minutes. That’s totally understandable, but an “A” level contractor should be proactive about communicating with waiting customers to advise of an unexpected delay, not just “not show up.”
An initial e-mail to confirm project details, a follow-up e-mail in the event of a delay and a re-confirming e-mail the day prior to starting the job all take just a few minutes to send, and would go a long way in reducing frustration on the customer’s end.

unknown

went well, on time and cleaned up well

I would call him for similar work.

Paul was very professional, prompt and courteous. He did an OUTSTANDING job with our 60 foot cedar we removed, as well as trimming and shaping about five other tall trees. Would highly recommend him for any job, big and small.

Paul was very responsive from day one. He showed up when he said he would and completed the job very promptly. They removed all debris as well. Very happy with the services! Good price in my opinion as well.

We were referred to Paul by our regular tree service, Morton's. Paul returned my call within one hour and came by shortly after to give an estimate. The final price was a bit lower than his estimate. He fit us into his schedule because of the hazardous nature of the tree and came with 3 helpers a week later. It took him 90 minutes to take down the tree. Total time, including clean up, was 2.5 hours. They cut the trunk and large branches into logs for firewood, and they cleaned up. I was impressed with how fast he and his guys worked.