Permits

He promised to split the permit so we could finish the garage before we finished the timberframing section. He said he'd change the drawings on a Thursday evening and do the permit the next day. He didn't get the drawings changed until several days later, and was still in process of changing the permits the next Tuesday. He has since told me that the permits have been split.
The first time he submitted the drawings for the permit he said they were done, and I worked out of him that he had submitted them, and they were being examined, and it would be a rubber stamp thing. It turned out they wanted improved and sealed drawings, and it was 6 weeks before the project could continue.
He always insists that nothing is his fault.

Insulation

He promised that "the insulation guy" would be here the next day, a couple weeks back. I haven't been able to talk to him about it since. On Nov 19 I talked to his assistant, who said that he had talked to three insularion businesses and they kept putting him off. I called around and arranged three appointments that afternoon. One has already come, and two more are scheduled for Monday the 24th. I don't have the names of the businesses who kept putting them off.

What does the industry say?

I happened to have a conversation with someone in the building trades today. He knows my GC and expressed sympathy for me. He said explicitly that my GC is a liar. My GC also happens to owe the guy money.

Better business

I discovered today that the GC's website has a great big BBB logo on its home page. I had been thinking about calling the BBB anyway, so I checked the BBB site. The GC is not registered with the BBB! So I squealed on him. I still can't bring myself to take actual action by filing a complaint about his construction practices. But that might change.

A word about the timber framer

He is the only person in this whole deal who hasn't overpromised and underdelivered. He started cutting the timbers on good faith that he would be paid in a timely manner, and that didn't happen, and now his small business is stuck with a pile of timbers that haven't been paid for. I gave the GC the money to pay for them, but got only a verbal promise from him at the time that that's where the money would go. Later I paid more because the timber framer was complaining about not being paid, and he said that would go to the timberframing. That was weeks ago, and the poor fellow hasn't gotten a cent as of this writing. My checks have all celared the bank. I talked with the timber framing guy today. It has gotten to the point where he needs the space in his yard, so he's going to deliver and assemble next week. And deal with the GC some more to try to get his money. He feels that I'm an innocent bystander in this because I paid the money for the timbers to the GC, and that's who he has his contract with.

a bit of history

My irritation isn't recent. Here's an email I sent out in mid-August. I've already stopped using the architect, but that's another story.

We got another bunch of rain in our foundation trenches last night, and the forecast is for more rain this evening until tomorrow (Sat) morning. But next week is forecast to be sunny all week! Yay!

Saturday afternoon I'm going to drain the trenches again, dig out the mud, and blow dry the rest. I'll also assume you folks manage to get the seals, permits, and other aspects of your acts together so we can pour soon. Mario, I can still provide info on the small batch cement supplier's name if you don't have it, and if you still think it'll speed things up to start on the garage before we pour the foundation. I'd like to see actual movement on Monday morning.

I'd really like to see more action and fewer reasons why this isn't moving ahead. I'm upset with the delay, but I'm interested in solutions, not blame, and no one believes any of the delays are their fault anyway, so let's don't go into why we have delays. Let's go into what we're doing to eliminate them. Make me glad to be shelling out this money--you have a sales job to do, and I'l telling you what to sell: progress, action.

Send me a daily (M–F) emailed update, even if it's short. That's progress report, not inaction report. Tell me what you have done, do not tell me why nothing is happening.

 I got maybe two emails. 

about the workers

My experience with the workers has been uniformly good. The do good-quality work, are polite, and don't waste time. They even sweep up at the end of the day, even though I told them it wasn't necessary. I have no complaints about the work crew.

First post

At the beginning of the project I asked the GC about effort, specifically about being on site every day. He assured me in the presence of my wife that someone would be there every day.

As a general rule, my GC tells me what I want to hear, but he doesn't follow through. He has made many promises that he hasn't kept. For instance, he even used the word "promise" when he promised to bring me a financial statement. He finally showed a day or two late, and the statement was clearly thrown together.

He bragged once that he has a reputation for answering his phone calls, not putting people off when he doesn't want to talk to them. He hasn't answered any of my daily calls for over a week, and he frequently hasn't answered in the past.