ARMOND POOLS

This company, including the owner Jeff, should not be in business. They will take your money, install a pool, then whenever there is a problem, they are either unresponsive, slow (literally years for some things) or point the blame at you. They take zero accountability to their poor actions and their poor service, and when you escilate things to the owner (Jeff), he too comes up with a slew of excuses for his problems. 10+ years as a customer, hundreds of thousands of dollars later, and after dozens of complaints and giving them second, third, fourth, chances, I am finally walking away. And when I tried to reason with them most recently and laid out all of my issues over the years, here came the excuses. Jeff (owner of Armond) continued to make excuses for him and his teams poor actions and take zero accountability. The below are the specific issues I mentioned to Jeff in a personal email to him. These were his responses: POOL MAINTENANCE: When Armond maintained our pool full time (every week), I came home from a trip and my pool was as green as the grass. I called and asked for someone to come out and address it as I was having a party that weekend. I was literally told “oh well, it’ll have to wait until next week when we come out.” I waited Thursday Friday Saturday Sunday Monday Tuesday Wednesday. By Thursday I had given up and I went to Leslie‘s pool service with a pool sample and I got all the chemicals and supplies that I needed to fix the issue. They never apologized, never came out (sooner than normal to address their issue). Nothing. So I called them up and let them know I would be maintaining it for now on. In the winter Armond sent up a a proposal to maintain our pool. I hand wrote a letter offering to give you them another try. No one ever contacted me, no one said a word, no one cared. I’ve been maintaining the pool myself ever since. When I brought this to Jeff’s attention, he never replied to this issue. Our pool is surrounded by imported travertine. When they close the pool, they put 8’ spikes in the cracks of the travertine to “secure” the cover. They have cracked dozens of piles around my pool. I’ve mentioned it- and they take no accountability or blame. Jeff never responded to this issue. Furthermore when they maintained the pool, they poured muriatic acid directly into the pool and have corroded the liner in my pool. I’ve mentioned to Jeff in email that his company caused probably $100K worth of damage. He replied to this issue: “$100,000 to resurface the pool, I could do the job 4 or 5 times for that amount.” Thanks Jeff for addressing my issue. POOL HEATERS We’ve been through four pool heaters in the last three years! The last two I was told because it was a chemistry issue (them blaming me for maintaining the pool). The two prior to that was some other excuse yet they were the ones maintaining the pool. Every time I spoke with Jill and Trever, they were nasty and rude. We should go through a new heater every 8 to 10 years. Not every eight months. Despite them trying to help us to learn why we kept needing a new heater, they would always sell us a new one ($6000 each time) and then we'd never hear from them. And warranty- they don't stand behind any warranty- they’ll find a reason why it wont be covered. Jeff never replied to this specific issue. POOL LIGHTS I ordered two new pool lights from Trever specifically over two years ago. Never heard from him. I called early this winter to inquire the status of them. We paid a 50% deposit for them. He placed the order. We still have no pool lights (10 months later) he has no ETA on when they will arrive, and keeps blaming Covid. Find another light -don’t just sit there and throw up your hands and figure out a solution to YOUR problem instead of sitting back and saying I don’t know. I called another reputable pool company last week- I have two new lights! Because it takes one or two extra steps, no one does any “critical” thinking at Armond. Jeff never responded to this specific issue. SPA The control panel next to our hot tub to control it has not worked in 2 1/2 years. I’ve asked someone to fix it dozens of times. It’s still has not been fixed. Jeff never responded to this specific issue. The “jets” in our spa blow out weaker than a garden hose. When I consulted with another firm, I was informed that Armond never installed the blower (that forces air pressure into the jets). I’ve asked the techs about this and they just shrug their shoulders. Hundreds of thousands later, wasn’t installed right. Jeff’s excuse, without looking at it was, “The jets work on venturi effect and the jet pump is really all you need. A blower can be gilding the lily. “ He’s never seen it, and still, making excuses. Thanks Jeff. COVERED HEATER Most recently we wanted to keep our pool open year-round. Instead of helping us figure out how to do it (Trevor gave us several empty promises that he would come by and talk to us about things). Never showed, never walked around with me, never discussed anything. We put a roof over our pool equipment so that snow doesn’t sit on the equipment in the winter. As soon as we did this, the tech were so upset saying it was a fire hazard. We trusted their judgement and 10 months ago ordered “smoke stacks” per their recommendation. They recently (September) came out to fix a motor that was down and after they fixed it I was threatened by their techs as they were leaving. They said, “You have three options, you remove the roof, we disable to heater, or you sign a waiver that we’re not responsible for anything.” We agreed to sign a waiver as we still, trusted their opinion. One week later, the heater (yet again) stopped working. I called Jill on a Tuesday (after labor day- it didn’t work the whole holiday weekend) and got her voice message. Never heard from her. Called again Thursday and was told they would pass along a message. Jill finally called me and said, ‘We’re not going to work on that heater as it’s a liability.” I was very angry with this response so I pulled up the installation manuel for this. It turns out it can have a cover over it, as long as its vented on three sides and the roof is at least 3’ from the top of the heater. The roof is 7’ from the top of the heater. With several follow up phone calls, especially after threatening legal action, they came out the next day to fix the issue. Instead of realizing their mistake and fixing our heater (again, were 10 year customers) they took no accountability. When I mentioned all of the above to Jeff, his response was, “Hayward does require a 4’ clearance from heater to non-combustible “roof” Thanks Jeff- I was aware of this already. Overall I am so disappointed with this company and encourage anyone to read this review and call ANYONE else. Attached also is a photo of our pool- a pool that they installed, can’t maintain properly and can’t satisfy their high paying customers.

We used Armand Pools to put in a new pool at our home in Bryn Mawr, as they had a reputation for delivering a quality product and they were at least in the competitive range, initially, in price.  They built a great pool for us, and we have used the pool for years and - for almost a decade - used them for service as our service contact - Gus - was always helpful and responsive.  We did notice, over the years, that they were almost always at the very, very high end for any service work outside of normal service calls.  When we added a salt cell system to the pool, they were 2-3 times as much as the other bids (for exactly the same unit) and 6 times what it cost me to buy the unit on the web and install myself.  Despite that, we continued to use them for routine maintenance.  This spring, however, when I got bids to replaster our pool, their bid came in at $19,000 when bids we got from other companies using similar sub-contractors (including, interestingly enough, the one that shot the gunite in our pool) came in at an average of $7,000 - again with the same product specifications.  I understandably went with one of the other bids (not the lowest, but one from a reputable company that was in the range of reasonable) and have been very happy with the work they did.  This is where the story gets interesting... When Armand's owner (Jeff) saw other trucks in our yard doing the plaster work (the sub who had shot our original gunite) but figured they were working for others, he chewed out the sub for doing work for us through another provider.  He then provided to write me a lengthy three page ranting email about how Armand would have been worth it for me to pay them to do the plaster work.  I had to call my Armand sales contact to get Jeff to lay off harassing the subs.  Then - despite 10 years as a customer - all of sudden Armand's service people stopped even returning my calls for normal maintenance stuff, which I was planning on keeping with them.  I called four times with not a single return phone call, despite being a customer for 10 years, always paying on time, and having spent probably nearly $100k with Armand.  If this is how they treat a 10 year customer, I'd hate to see how they choose to treat a new one! I have now found a much, much better pool service company (Arrow Pools) that has been easy to work with, uses the web seamlessly, and has some great service people.  I am very happy with my new choice.  I would recommend caution to all who deal with Armand - at least based on my experience.

These people are not responsive. Their pricing seems quite expensive. We should have filled our pool in and used it as a giant planter.