The Post Hole Company

Don't hire this company for more complicated or custom jobs. they do well if the holes are in a simple pattern (straight line). They Don't know how to make things square. I had have them come back to fix the job....this was really hard to do. Getting a hold of them and fixing it wasn't easy. They don't fill the hole with concrete all the way. they dig down to deep on some hole and don't adjust the post. you really have to watch and tell the crew what you need. they need a lot of hand holding. if you don't want to stress out after they leave with the bad work they do, don't hire. read the other reviews they have on here. I'm not the only one saying these things.

They mentioned the price as a low-cost price per hole however they more than quadruple the price mentioning that there is stone that they have to get through. As a general contractor I know there is always stone so be very wary about the cost they give you each hole in fact I comes close to $200 per hole. The work is also poor quite a bit of a mess left behind and they don’t level their posts so if you use their service make sure your posts are straight both bottom and top. Once you call back stating an issue you are literally ignored

Initially contacted and booked the job April 1st. Lots of set backs between now and what would become my final install date which were mostly due to weather, so no ones fault.
I had Initial booking, and communication correspondence with a nice lady by the name of Marlene in early April which went smooth, as did the locate follow ups and the notifications regarding the need to reschedule a couple times that were handled by another lady, not sure her name which also went smooth.

The day the install was to occur is where things unraveled and unraveled quickly. I was one of the last appointments to be booked on the day. I raised concerns about crew fatigue, by laws that do not permit work after 7pm when it was suggested to me that workers can work up to 9pm, and a few other concerns I had. I was responded to with a canceled appointment and ultimately, even though I did suggest that I would prefer not to cancel my appointment. But my concern regarding proper install and finish by being that last appointment of the day after the crew would have completed several other jobs was legitimate as I had experienced worker fatigue on other job sites in the past but this concern seemed to be dismissed. Because of this correspondence I did suggest that I would prefer not to leave a negative review in a follow up email And that I would like to connect with the owner to discuss things further. Ultimately the owner, or someone who appeared to be such, did call me, and immediately had a defensive tone. I was half expecting based previous dealings with contracting companies, that the owner of the company would call me back to have a reasonable discussion and address concerns in had raised in an amicable fashion so we could get things back on track, but unfortunately this did not occur. Instead what I encountered was what appeared to be a disgruntled owner who went off immediately and took issue with the mere fact that I had indicated within one of my emails that I may be inclined to leave a my negative experience review. Once the semi confrontational back and forth between the owner and myself had wrapped up I ended up without a company to install my fence posts, and they lost a customer. But I didn’t get a sense that he was to concerned about this. To the owners credit no curse words were exchanged between he and I which is always good and i believe our call ended with respective begrudged thank you, again another good note.

I can’t speak to the work the crew would have done as I did not have the pleasure of getting to meet and work with them, it’s certainly possible that they have rendered good work irregardless of the time of day, but I will never know.

To the owner that took offence to the tone, or content of my emails, there are better ways to deal with people, it’s easy to loose your cool, I was probably guilty of this myself during our call but had you simply called and instead of being on the offensive addressed my concerns in a proper fashion we would have likely been able to sort something out.

No two experiences are ever alike so should you opt to work with this company I hope you have a better experience then the one I had because based on pictures it looks like this company has the capacity to do good work.

Date of initial contact to book services April 1st
Booked install date May 6th
Date of service termination May 6th

We had postholes dug and posts installed for a large backyard fence. The office and the team were friendly, communication was good, and they were on time, fast and efficient. They even managed to navigate through my garden space and were careful not to damage any plants. Would definitely recommend!

We hired the Post Hole Company just to do holes and install posts for our backyard. Biggest contractor mistake we have ever made. The day ended with the crew ripping out newly cemented fence posts and leaving wet cement in the holes, when we would only pay for completed work.

He’s a bit more detail as to how the day played out.

Initially, it seemed like it was going well – Steven, who I think was the foreman, was pleasant and worked to smooth over any issues with our neighbours. We dug about two thirds the holes and all was good.

Then it started to go sideways. Steven had gone to another site and left Max, the hole digger, in charge. He had started to making “don’t touch my holes” comments to my husband and father in-law, when they were reviewing the work that had been and had began to raise concerns with the post hole locations. My neighbour had asked that their existing fence be left for consistency, so we were trying to navigate existing post holes with a new fence and keeping both fences as close as possible. Max said that we needed to spend an additional $70 per hole to dig by hand and get closer to the fence. We proceeded with this to get the job done.

When the crew got to the last hole, they said they could not dig the hole any closer to the fence leaving about a foot between my neighbour’s existing fence and our new post hole. This would not only look odd, but make the fence crooked.

Because they said they could not get it any closer, my father in-law stepped in saying he would deal with it later to make the fence straight. Max obviously had a bit of an attitude, and was not keen on this idea for whatever reason. At this point, Max demand that we pay for all the full cost for all the holes, even the ones they had not set. We were fine to pay for what they had done to date, but there was no way we were paying for work before they had completed it, especially with the conflict that was arising on site.

My husband then asked to speak to the owner on the phone to discuss the concerns. We were never told that payment was required upfront and it seemed a bit odd that we were not asked for a deposit then suddenly be told half way through the job that they needed payment in full. Max arranged a phone call with the person we were told was the owner stated that “he has to side with his site guy on this”, and stated they needed payment for the whole job. You can’t actually call the company with customer issues via their phone number – you can only deal with someone who quotes/schedules the work or leave a voicemail for customer care.

When we refused to pay the full amount of the work, Max started swearing at us and then it GOT SIGNIFICANTLY WORSE! The contractor started instructing staff to remove posts from holes that had fresh concrete thinking they would force us into payment for the entire job. They threw fence posts that we had purchased on the ground with wet cement and left wet cement in the holes thinking that we would have no choice but to pay them – basically blackmailing us. We ending up paying for the holes that were dug, and told them to get off our property and leave. We then brought in our handy man/family members to clean up the substantial mess – 10 post holes filled with wet concrete, fence posts that were covered with wet concrete. My guess is every crew is on a commission to upsell and they didn’t like it when we said we could do it ourselves.

We also discovered that one of our shovels went missing after the crew left site.

Needless to say, I would NEVER RECOMMEND THIS COMPANY TO ANYONE.

Professional looking team wearing company T's, very courteous and pleasant, they arrived on time and efficiently dug and set the posts. They even cleaned off some concrete splash on one post, after I said to not worry about it. Highly recommend TPHC!

FIND ANOTHER COMPANY
I used these guys last year for 8 holes and liked what they did. This year I had 32 holes and a disaster. Starts off with rescheduling for week because, too hot, then too windy, then machine broken, then guys don't want to work, then brought the wrong bit. And when we pressed to at least have a firm date we were offer the option to find someone else. Once the work happened it was OK, except for posts in the wrong location for a custom gate, concrete splash on the metal posts, posts not in line. Called about the one post in the wrong location on a Wednesday, was unable to get a date a time when it would be fixed. On the following Monday I received calls they want to come and fix it, but when I told them I had the gate modified and mentioned the issues with the workmanship, the response I got was to never contact them again. I suspect that like most customers that are unhappy they just move on. I almost did the same. NOTE It was not just that there was a problem with the work, it was how this company behaved when this did not go to plan or when there was an issue.

After installing my fence backwards, they came back to fix it and promised to close in my deck and add a bracket to fix the gate, made 15 calls and every time they promised to come back tomorrow, they never came back and my biggest mistake was paying them for empty promises.

The Post Hole Company exceeded my expectations right from the start. The job was scheduled promptly and executed professionally. I highly recommend The Post Hole Company as their expertise made a difficult job of removing post foundations damaged by a storm look like a simple task.

In need of a quick turnaround I searched google to find this company. First call was answered promptly and my needs were addressed and suggestions were given. Marlene handled the phone calls and emails with upmost clarity and swiftness. Best part of the service was getting email updates with timing and schedule changes for when to expect the crew onsite. Most people don't understand weather, traffic and hold ups can change the expected arrival times....Marlene kept on top of this all day.
Crew arrived on time.
The Crew consists of well polished individuals led by Andy. In uniform and you an tell everyone knows their part of the job. Andy also managed and directed the crews to run effeciently and streamlined the process. Well maintained equipment was used.
The crew even helped out with squaring off some posts that weren't marked with no hesitation when asked too.

Job was finished promptly and within the timing originally discussed.

Will hire again without hesitation.

Thanks to Andy and his team
Marlene was a pleasure to speak with a managed the schedule and details.
A+