BRIAN THOMAS CONSULTING INC.

Brian Thomas did remodeling on our house in Fallbrook on various occasions from 2018-2020. Very honest, reliable, and pricing was competitive. Always kept us updated on issues that arose due to unlicensed work by the prior owner. I wish we were able to find someone we could trust where we live now, but haven't had such luck yet.

I hired Brian Thomas from February 2020 through March of 2020 and here are the reasons why I do not recommend using this company: 1. The contract I signed with them was for one year, 12 months, of SWPPP inspections, for which they quoted me $13,390. After less than 2 months worth of work, when I had to end the contract, they had already billed me $14,422.61. 2. Part of those charges included a $1,119.34 charge for “material markup”. They had stated that the materials they were going to provide, for erosion control, were going to be supplied at cost. When asked about this “markup” charge they stated “we charge a 15% mark up on materials”, because “ordering your materials puts a potential burden on the company”. So that is what this company means when they say “at cost”. 3. When Brian Thomas first came to my site to start the work he stated that he was there on his own dime “to help”. On his final bill he included two charges totaling $595 for such visits. When asked about these charges their response was: “[Brian] did not state that he was consulting free of charge” and “if you hadn’t removed us from the project after just a month of being on it, Brian may have been willing to remove those charges”. So that is what this company mean when they say “we are here to help on our own dime”. 4. When asked about the $5,000 worth of inspections they performed in just over a month their response was to send some documents so that I could “educate yourself on what is required per your SWPPP”. The company I was using to perform such inspections, and who I re-hired after I terminated Brian Thomas’ contract, charges me $1,000 to perform the same inspections. In other words Brian Thomas charged me 5 times more than an average company does. Brian Thomas will use their “knowledge” of the requirements for these inspections to charge you as much as they possibly can even though the State does not require that many inspections. 5. My relationship with Brian Thomas started to fall apart when they started to push additional services on me. I’ve had a grading company doing most of the work for my grading project for over a year (and I am about 2/3 done with the project). First Brian Thomas suggested they had a crew of people that could install BMPs, something my grading company was already doing, and then they even suggested that I should fire the grading company I was using (because they were incompetent). Having the same company that performs inspections also perform the work needed to pass those inspections is a conflict of interest: you are essentially creating work for yourself. But that is how Brian Thomas works. 6. When managing a grading project there are 2 main inspections you need to perform: a SWPPP inspection and a grading inspection. Brian Thomas can only perform one of them: the SWPPP inspection. If you are planning on doing a grading project I recommend getting a company that can perform both inspections, like the one I am using, and not a company that can only perform one of them, like Brian Thomas. This was my experience with Brian Thomas. If you chose to use them for your project may you have a better experience.