Ericson’s Remodeling & Drain Cleaning

When we bought our home four years ago, we knew we were going to have to put a decent amount of money into it to update and remodel it. We spent a huge chunk of money into the initial investment of remodeling by taking money out of our 401K. Now that this initial loan is paid off, we started to focus on the next phase of bigger expenses, which includes remodeling of two bathrooms and finishing a spare room. We called our electrician, who has done work in our home since we bought it and asked for a recommendation for someone to do our bathrooms. Our electrician is also a general contractor so he agreed to do the project.
The first two days of the project started with the demo of the upstairs bath. No problems there and in fact, it took less time than I imagined it would take. The following day, Eric from Ericson’s Remodeling and Drain Cleaning showed up to begin the plumbing. Now, keep in mind that this was an existing bathroom for over 50 years and the layout of the fixtures was essentially not changing.
Within minutes of being there, Eric seemed bewildered and I felt uncomfortable with his puzzlement. But our GC showed up, the two of them talked and it seemed that all was good at that point. However, each day seemed to bring more «issues» for Eric. The plumbing seemed to be becoming complicated and extensive. There were pipes leaking, difficulty routing the pipes where they needed to be, a new exhaust pipe needed to be run through our roof, etc. Finally, a week later the work was complete. Or so we thought.
Although the side of the truck for Ericson’s shows the NJ license number, Eric, himself was not a licensed plumber. Here comes the good part. Because Eric isn’t licensed, a licensed plumber has to come in behind him to inspect the work and literally sign off on the plumbing as if that licensed plumber did the work himself before the city inspector can come to say it is acceptable and that the walls can be closed up and the project can be completed. We’ve had two licensed plumbers come into our home in the past two weeks and neither of them is willing to sign off on the plumbing. Why? Because it’s shoddy!
For every connection that is made in plumbing, you have to be able to see the purple primer on the PVC. Of the dozen or so connections in our bathroom nearly half of them don’t have primer showing. That alone will fail the inspection. Huge holes were created in our floor joists to accommodate the vent pipe that Eric installed. Come to find out, the pitch of the vent pipe is not up to code. Now, more/​larger holes will need to be created in order for that pitch to be corrected. In doing that, we’re weakening the joists and the support of the entire bathroom. The drain for the sink is also off pitch… well, that’s not true… it’s off level because there isn’t supposed to be the pitch that Eric left us with.
Because of the «extra work» Eric did, he charged us an additional $ 850. I paid it to him the day he left and it wasn’t until he was long gone that we found out how crappy his work really was.
This project started the second week of September and we were told that BOTH bathrooms would be completed in two weeks. Because of Eric’s screw-​ups, work has been at a complete standstill for over five weeks. Nothing has been done.
Thankfully, this past week a plumber agreed to come in and finish the job and we should have our bathroom back in less than two weeks.
I would never recommend using Ericson’s Remodeling and Drain Cleaning.