Burrows Pools

Burrows Pools refuses to take responsibility for poor workmanship, work delayed, poor communication; uncured gelcoat caused staining and foam smell. Unacceptable work and behaviour!

Michael Longo reported poor workmanship by Burrows Pools pool renovation started May 11. Work delayed, poor communication; uncured gelcoat caused staining and foam smell. Andy Burrows refused responsibility; Michael seeks resolution for unacceptable pool condition. During the summer my wife and I decided to renovate our pool with a little savings that we had built up. The pool still looked amazing in that it was always crystal clear and beautiful to look at. The coping around the edge was beginning to look its 30+ years and some coping stones were damaged. The fibreglass lining was in perfect condition with no leaks, but the gel coat surface needed a new coat, and the fabric mosaics needed replacement. I enquired with various pool renovating companies and received a few quotes without a visit to the actual pool. So far, all the quotes were very similar in scope and price. The only company to visit our house and inspect the pool was Burrows Pools. Andy Burrows the proprietor quoted us during his visit and showed us many examples of his work. It sounded as though this was going to be a relatively small job taking 6 days from start to finish. All the examples of his resurfaced pools were perfect and without any defects in appearance. We decided to go with Burrows due to them being the only company to inspect the pool and the quote was almost identical to three others already received. On 4th May I messaged Andy to ask if he could commence the job on Monday 11th May and if so I would send through the 50% deposit. His response was he would get back to me later in the day. This should have been a first warning as he did not get back to me. On the 6th May I contacted him asking f he forgot about me. He sent a voice message saying he said he would get back to me later…… not later that day. In any case he confirmed that they would start Monday 11th May. I sent through the deposit to which I have never received any acknowledgement. On the Monday expecting them first thing in the morning they arrived after 12am with some materials and began to drain the pool. Tuesday the 12th I expected them to arrive first thing in the morning but by 10am I was contacting them again to find out where they are. They arrived after 11 and immediately started eating lunch rather than working. They perhaps started breaking coping out after 12. They left by 4pm that day. Wednesday 13th May at 10.45 I sent a message to Andy requesting that he keep me in the loop regarding timing as I am kept waiting every day for them to arrive. We were already on Wednesday with half the day gone and nearly no work done since Monday. The workers arrived after 11am and left by 4. I also had words with Andy telephonically and expressed my displeasure at the lack of communication regarding timing. Thursday 14th May the workers arrived after 11 with the excuse that they have to go sourcing materials for the day. They left by 4pm. Friday 15th May they arrived after 10.30 and on this day they worked till 6pm. They had completed the coping which looked good. They then stated that they would be back Tuesday or Wednesday to complete the re gel-coating of the pool. I pointed out that it would already be 8 days and not 6 like stated and it was no where near finished. On Monday the 18th May I messaged Andy asking when I could expect them this week so that I could plan my days. Andy responded Wednesday 20th May. On Wednesday I began waiting for them to arrive as usual from around 8am. At 10.50am I get a call from Andy stating that they would be there the next day. This of course infuriated me as I had done everything to confirm timing and to get him to try communicating with me properly. He seemed not concerned that he was messing me around. I could not believe that he was only calling me halfway through the day that he was supposed to be there to tell me he would be there till the next day. Especially after all the words we had had. He confirmed that he would be there by 10 am on Thursday. Why not earlier I don’t know. Thursday 21st May the workers arrived at around 11 once again and began eating lunch. They completed the material Mosaic application. Friday 22nd May the day they were supposed to complete the application of the gelcoat and therefore the whole job, they arrived again well after 11am. This meant they could not complete the application in one go necessitating a return on Saturday to complete. Saturday 23rd May was the only day they arrived before 10am and finished the application of the rest of the pool’s gelcoat by 1pm. I was informed that I could start filling up the pool the next day. Sunday 24th May started to fill the pool. The correct water level was reached the next morning. During filling we noticed a white gel like substance floating to the surface. Tuesday 26th May I paid Andy the balance of the payment in full, without him having been to inspect the job his team did, even with my concerns. As per Andy’s instructions I tested the water quality for metals, ph and alkalinity and it was confirmed that the borehole water was free from metals, needing ph increase to 7 from 6 which was done. Chlorine was added thereafter per Burrows instructions. The borehole water always had an organic sedimentation element to it which never caused any issues and was easy to remove with the creepy. I expected this to be the case when starting up the creepy on the Wednesday 27th May. You can imagine my consternation and disappointment when the creepy left behind huge areas of dark staining all while spewing out a gel like substance through the return pipe. The surface of the pool turned into a white frothy foam smelling strongly of resin catalyst. It became clear that a certain portion of the pool was coated with gelcoat that was insufficiently catalysed and therefore uncured during the filling process. I informed Andy of what I was seeing, and he told me to let everything settle for a few days. I could really tell that this would not solve the problem and that something terrible had gone wrong. Some areas of the pool were effervescing huge amounts of bubbles into the water smelling of catalyst while other areas were sticky and stained. It was obvious that the uncured gelcoat resulted in organic matter from the borehole sticking to those uncured areas and then the borehole sucked off this uncured mess. There was gel sticking to the sides of the pool, creepy and pool skimming net for days. By the time Andy came to inspect this mess the floating gel had been filtered through the pump and backwashed. The resulting stains were quite significant, and one could easily tell the difference between where the curing was complete and areas where there was no gelcoat but only a rough stain. The dried areas were still emitting huge volumes of bubbles into the water smelling of catalyst which still endured for weeks afterwards. This led me to the conclusion that the catalyst added to the gelcoat was not sufficiently mixed and some areas got excessive amount while others got none. Andy was not concerned with the result of his work. He first tried to blame metals which there were none as tested at builder’s warehouse. Then he said some sort of reaction took place with the borehole water which is preposterous as most of the pool is perfect. He refused to take any responsibility for this terrible gelcoat application and insisted that if they came back to sort it out that they would charge me. I find the treatment of customers to be quite revolting. From the daily late arrival, to eating oily lunch all over my plastic garden furniture, to leaving the sand from the filter all over my garden, to zero communication, to poor workmanship, to no concern whatsoever over the terrible result, to blaming everything but themselves. This experience has been nothing but annoying, enraging, and disappointing. Andy’s solution was to use Hydrogen Peroxide to rid my brand-new gel coated surface of stains at my expense. I found this to be a terrible dereliction of aftersales service. My expectation of a beautifully coated pool had turned into me having to drive around looking for reasonably priced peroxide. (very expensive). The stains diminished a little but obviously those areas have no gelcoat and are a different texture and colour. The result is a pool that looks worse than before Burrows pools came. I would genuinely warn anyone away from using this utterly pathetic company. I have not heard from Andy again. I have messaged him and he has ignored these messages. The pool still foams catalyst on the surface every day when the pump is on 3 weeks later. The stains are unacceptable.