Paradigm Pavers does not have any knowledge on how deal with drainage problem, proper grading and levelling. He will ruin your driveway if your driveway has a bit of challenging slope but then if your driveway is flat he skips so many important steps that compromise the quality. If he includes gravel and geotextile fabric in his price, it would be the worse quality and cheapest ones (he wanted to spend $300 gravel and geotextile on my driveway whereas good ones, I paid for and the one good paving companies use cost $1200. I paid for all the materials (gravel, sand, concrete, pavers) as the work was progressing. If Paradigm charges you $8.50 per sqf for reinstalling your pavers and you pay for materials on top, he is going to end up being more expensive than companies charge you $20 per sqf including pavers and quality gravel, quality geo textile, quality everything else as well as a solid guarantee. Now, I have to pay $4000 to rectify his work. In the contract says I pay $200 per extra full and active 8-9 hours day after 3 days fixed price- he said the job was going to be finished in maximum of 4 days, but he half finished installing pavers on $420 sqf in 9 days. He was showing up middle of days and work half a day for 6 days. He claimed $200 for the extra 6 days he worked 2-4 hours at most. Some days he showed on 12 and worked for 3-4 hours, other days he showed at 10 and left his workers without instruction and went away for 5 hours to give estimate to a potential customer. Other days he showed 10-11 and went 3 times to Home Depot for buying small things and left his workers without instruction so they were doing nothing and waiting for him to come back. He has been doing this job for a year only and used to clean up demolished buildings. He does not even own a compactor. He borrowed one from his friend, which it stopped working short after he used it first time. He had to rent a compactor from Home Depot for 3 days. He paid to another company for excavation and paying for all that as well not owning his basic trade tools makes him to do short cuts to make a profit. He really pushes his luck to have his own business. He borrowed my circular saw to cut plywood frame to mould concrete footing all around the driveway, borrowed my push broom, rake, nail, drill, red rag and stake on the first day to mark the excavated area! He was not planning what he was going to do in advance at all. Currently my driveway has got drainage problems on two areas-water puddles on a very large area. Further, all the street water streams into my driveway due to wrong grading and levelling. He had sloped it from street to the driveway and connected street to the driveway. We are living on Oakland hills and get huge showers. There are areas on our driveway missing stones. He did not even compact sand on the border after paving. Left all the dirt on the stairs on the driveway side. He gave me 5 years guarantee but he does not rectifying his mistakes because he got all his money. I tried to settle with him twice and it did not work. I really tried to work with him for my own sake all the way through but it did not work. I have to get another contractor to correct his work and pay them $4000 for correction. I tested the drainage on the day he said the work is so called "completed" and asked him to fix it- he said if I don not give him his final payment ($1260), he will file a Mechanics Lien on my property and me not agreeing with him cost him money! Our contract said that we pay him 10% in advance and the rest at the end. However, he kept asking for money as we progressed and said he does not work if we don't pay.
Julie Ebrahimi
