Woman Is Frustrated With Builder Who Is Months Overdue Finishing Her Landscaping And Swimming Pool Project, But Her Husband Thinks She Overstepped By Sending An Angry Email
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Imagine hiring a construction company do install a swimming pool in your backyard and do quite a bit of landscaping. What would you do if it was months past the deadline, but the project was nowhere near complete?
In this story, one couple is in this exact situation, and the wife is very frustrated. She finally sent an email to the landscaper and pool guy, but the pool guy seems pretty annoyed at her.
Was she wrong for sending the email, or is the construction company the real problem here?
Let’s read the whole story to decide.
AITA for calling out my pool builder after months of delays and poor communication?
I hit my breaking point with our pool builder yesterday.
For context, we have a $250K contract with this company for both a pool and landscaping.
We’ve worked with both owners—one handles the pool (call him Paul), the other the landscaping (call him Luke).
This sounds incredibly frustrating.
For months, communication has been awful with Paul, and deadlines keep getting pushed with little to no explanation.
Yesterday, I texted Paul. After waiting for a reply, I emailed both him and the other owner, calling them out for the delays and lack of communication.
Instead of addressing my concerns, Paul got angry. Full meltdown. No apology or updates.
She’s wondering if she messed up.
Then, this morning, he showed up at our house to look at the backyard. He didn’t tell us he was coming, and he didn’t try to talk to us while he was here. Just showed up, looked around, and left.
Now I’m wondering if I overstepped.
My husband thinks I should have waited until the pool was done before pushing back, but I feel like I was just holding them accountable.
Here’s the email she sent…
[ My email: We are beyond frustrated with the endless delays and lack of oversight on our pool construction. We signed our contract in July with an expected completion date of January. It is now approaching the end of March, and not only is our pool still unfinished, but there seems to be little urgency to complete it.
Communication with Paul, has been consistently poor. He is rarely on-site, leaving us to play project manager—tracking progress, catching mistakes, and relaying information that should have been his responsibility. Mistakes, such as the incorrectly installed step pads in December, were ignored until they required a complete redo, causing unnecessary delays. This could have been avoided had issues been addressed the first time instead of being brushed off.
We chose (this Company) because we expected a high level of quality and attention to detail, yet that has been far from our experience. To make matters worse, we recommended (this Company) to our neighbor, which we now regret given their equally frustrating experience.
Frankly, it is unacceptable that our pool was supposed to be completed months ago, and now we are facing a significantly delayed timeline for use. We want an estimated completion date and a detailed day-by-day schedule outlining how we will get there. We do not have much confidence in vague weekly updates at this point. How else do you plan to remedy this situation? Please provide a prompt response with a clear plan. ]
Here’s Paul’s response.
[Paul’s 1st Response: Just saw your email. Wow. I’m unsure if there is some confusion with (the company), as that was certainly viewed as intention to “get me in trouble”. Luke is my partner and oversees landscaping, he is not my boss.
Ill be sure to provide a thorough and detailed breakdown of exactly how this project has unfolded from the day we started digging, to now, including the multi-month delay we faced from the beginning to redo your septic system. Which I also helped you pay for, for absolutely no reason other than to help. Thanks. ]
They are paying a lot of money for this landscaping and pool work to be done in their backyard. I’d be frustrated too! They were supposed to have the work done months ago, and it’s still nowhere near finished.
Did she overstep? Let’s see how Reddit responded.
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This person thinks there’s more to the story.
Another person thinks she did what she had to do.
It might be time to call a lawyer.
If you enjoyed this story, check out this post about a landlord who has a problem with a car-dealer tenant bringing home a different car every night.
This person thinks her feelings are understandable.
That is a very expensive project. I’d be worried about it too, especially when it should’ve been done months ago. A little communication about why there are delays might put her mind at ease. Instead of being reassuring, the pool installer sounds defensive. She needs a lawyer on standby.
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