I'll start this review by stating that I don't write many reviews, but in the case of Mendoza Pool & Plaster, I'm going to make a special exception. This review is long, but if you're planning on hiring this unprofessional "company", please take the time to read.
Alfredo and his son, Alfredo Jr. will most likely begin the process by meeting you in person and telling you how they just "really want the customer to be happy" and "communication is the most important part of working together" blah blah blah. This is a load of crap! Alfredo makes appointments and never shows or calls and his son, Alfredo Jr, just tells you what he thinks you want to hear... classic used car salesman who thinks he's smarter than the people he's speaking with, when he's not.
We have three major projects for our home in the Hollywood Hills and Alfredo assured us that we were in good hands. He even said, "If you don't like the work, you don't have to pay"! Ok, sounds good, where should we start?
Out of the three projects, Alfredo convinced us that the first project should be the one we actually wanted to do last since it was the least important to us. His reasoning seemed to make sense to us, as our main project was to completely remodel our driveway, but even though that was our top priority, this smaller project should be done prior so as not to damage our new driveway once completed. Made sense, so we reluctantly agreed. We figured it would also give us an idea of the quality of their work on a smaller scale before we allowed them to demo the front of our home.
First red flag was when they would not agree to a detailed work order, outlining the steps of the job, the cost and the timeline. We did one anyway and Alfredo signed it, but it was definitely NOT followed.
For this first and ONLY project, Alfredo grossly misquoted the job and only after beginning the demolition, when it was too late to turn back, he literally DOUBLED his original quote! As we couldn't just stop in the middle of the project, so we had no choice but to continue PAY DOUBLE for a project we originally weren't even planning to do before our other two projects, which again, he knew were our priorities. Classic dirty move by a dirty contractor.
While working, his crew continually used OUR things without asking, destroying our garden hoses, our plants in our planter boxes and several large items we had sitting in our driveway by burying them in piles of dirt! Ridiculous, no? These items easily could have/should have been moved but weren't!
Remember the used car salesman pitch about communication being so important? Alfredo and his son are the only two in their crew who speak English and neither are EVER on the job site, so if you have questions, make sure you speak Spanish. Even then, however, the crew won't know the answers.
Another example of bad communication... we literally had to revisit details of the job over & over, like what colors we wanted. It was repetitive and tedious. Each time required another "in person" visit, which were really the only times we would see either Alfredo. Both gave inconsistent answers to questions, indicating that they don't really communicate well with each other regarding the work either.
We asked repeatedly for quotes on our other two projects and both said "they're being worked on" but then when we ask again it's as if we've never discussed these things. They led us on, then just disappeared and we never got the quotes, just the runaround!
For the finished project, you would think that Alfredo would be out for a final inspection to make sure everything was completed and the customer was happy, right? Wrong! We haven't heard from Mendoza since a few days before the project was finishing up. As for the timeline, Alfredo said this "small" project would take less than a week, but to be generous we gave them 8 DAYS... they took 6 WEEKS and then vanished, leaving our place a mess with construction debris everywhere. Not to mention a stinky portable toilet in FRONT of our house for weeks.
TRASH!! Yes, his crew leaves empty water bottles, cigarette butts and lunch garbage everywhere. We're still picking up crap on our property weeks after they left. What the hell do we do with all the rebar they left behind??
During this project, they also destroyed our driveway from the tons of dirt they stored there while working, but of course, assured us that the plan was to use that dirt as part of the driveway project, which as I mentioned earlier, was the most important to us. Fast forward to today and we haven't heard from Sr. or Jr. and our DAMAGED driveway is a complete eyesore from the street thanks to Mendoza Pool & Plaster.
In closing, we DO NOT recommend this company for any reason. The funny thing is had they cared enough to do a good job as we were promised, we would have recommended them to everyone here in the Hollywood Hills and beyond. Now we'll just say hire these small-minded hustlers at your own risk! read more