Frequently Asked Questions

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• Homeowners: We provide estimates free of charge.
• Condo/homeowners association or multi-unit buildings: We may request a modest fee to do a detailed, budgetary inspection, depending on scope and amount of time required to complete such an estimate. This fee can then be credited to the cost of the job if you choose to proceed.
• Home sales/real estate agents: Because these inspections require an extremely aggressive turnaround (less than three days, in most cases), we may request a modest fee. This fee can then be credited to the cost of the job if the buyer or seller proceeds with the proposed work.

We endeavor to get estimates out within a week, however, during our busy times it may take up to two weeks. Please be sure to provide an email address so we may get your estimate to you as soon as we can. 

We do not offer discounts. This is because Joe gives his best price up front. 

• Send us an email with your questions. We will do our best to respond within 12 hours.
• Call us. In most cases, someone in the office can answer your questions. If we can’t, we’ll can get back to you with answers or have Joe call you, if necessary.

• Sign the contract. Please be sure to fill in the total cost of job/s you would like us to complete, if it is not already filled in. Then, sign, print your name, AND fill in the date at the bottom of each page (if applicable) that contains work you wish to proceed with. If there are portions of the contract you do not wish to proceed with, please just cross them out. You may email or mail the signed contract to us.
• Remit deposit. Please send a Zelle payment (jrbtuckpointing@gmail.com), mail a check, or call/email to request a credit card payment link for your deposit amount (1/2 of the total job). Please note: there is a 2.99% credit card surcharge (subject to change). 

We accept:

• Zelle (preferred)— If you pay all your bills electronically, this will be the easiest way for you to remit payment. Please send to: jrbtuckpointing@gmail.com
  NOTE: We are aware that most Zelle accounts have daily limits between $500 and $5,000. It is fine to send your deposit or final payment as multiple Zelle payments over multiple days. 
• Check—We accept personal or business checks, as well as cashier’s or bank checks. Please mail or drop checks off at our office.
• Cash—Please drop off at our office.
• Credit cards—We accept all major credit cards (VISA, Mastercard, American Express, Discover), however, due to increased costs, we will be charging a surcharge of 2.99% for all credit card transactions. We will email you a credit card payment link upon request. We cannot take credit card details over the phone.

If your job is complete, you may wait for your final bill to send payment. It may take up to a week to complete a  final inspection before we send your bill. However, if it’s been more than two weeks since we’ve been at your jobsite, feel free to call the office to get the status of your job/final bill.

Once we receive your signed contract and deposit, you will be placed in our work queue. We will do our best to give you our lead time when we receive your signed contract. Because most of our work is outside and we do not require anyone to be home, typically, we will call you one day before we begin work on your job. If you have a conflict on the date we propose, we will arrange to come out the next available day for both parties. If it is necessary to schedule inside work, we will work with you to coordinate with your schedule.

There are a lot of factors that determine scheduling of jobs:

• Weather—This is the number one factor determining when we’ll get to your job. Our season typically runs April through November, since we cannot work outside when the weather is consistently below freezing or if there is snow on the ground. And while flowers love rain, tuckpointers do not. In some circumstances, we can work in a light rain. But when we have thunderstorms or heavy rains, we call it a day. And those rain days ultimately effect anything on the schedule ahead. 
• Inside work—During the rainy or cold season, we can tackle any inside work. If your schedule is flexible, we will call you on a rain day to get your job in potentially before the original time estimate.
• Crews—We are a relatively small company. Our crews typically consist of 2-4 workers—journeymen and laborers. Depending on your job and our schedule, we may send more than one crew to work on your job. We also have crews that specialize in different tasks (setting up scaffolding, tearing down chimneys, bricklaying, tuckpointing, clean-up, liner installation, etc.). This means that the crew you need may not be available right away; we may send the tear-down crew out a day or two before the bricklayer can get to your job. 
• Size of job—Everyone’s job is unique. If you’ve ever had construction of any kind done on your home, you know that each house comes with its own joys and pains. Our work is not immune to this. Sometimes you open a wall and, although there are no bodies, it’s just as surprising! If we discover there will be significant delays to your job, we do our best to communicate that to you.
• Extenuating circumstances—This is everything from one of our employees calling in sick to your spouse’s birthday party. We try to work around your priorities to the best of our ability.

Each job is unique. In most cases, a job has multiple components, as outlined in your contract. A typical job entails setup, tear-down (if applicable), rebuild (if applicable), grinding and tuckpointing, and return visits for caulking, sealing, and cleaning the work and jobsite. Please ask us about the length of your specific job. 

While it’s always best to do the dirty work (that’s us) first, you can sometimes have the work performed in any order. However, if you intend to have roof work done, we need to go first. Especially if you are replacing your roof or if our work requires you to get a new flashing. If you have planned painting, landscaping, or window cleaning work in the vicinity of our work, it’s best to have us out first. 

• Noise—If you see the word “grind” on your contract, there will be some noise! 
• Dust—When you grind out mortar joints, it creates a lot of dust. While we typically use vacuum grinders to minimize the dust, these cannot reach into corners or other cramped areas. The dust washes away in a moderate rain, however, we do hose off the areas immediate to the work area at the end of each day. 
• Close your windows.
• Inform your neighbors—This keeps everyone happy and avoids Mrs. Krabitz getting mad at both of us! If you see the word “grind” on your contract, there will be some noise and masonry dust. Best to prepare everyone to expect that ahead of time in case they want to close windows or move cars. In some cases, we may also need to access your job from your neighbor’s yard (we will inform you if this is the case), depending on where the work is located on your building and how close your neighbors’ property is to your building. We are happy to provide both you and your neighbor/s with a certificate of insurance.
• Move any outdoor items that may be in the way of the work area or that you would like to protect from masonry dust. We are happy to help move larger items, but recommend you move any furniture, toys, lawn items, etc. to keep them out of harm’s way.
• Landscaping—If you have sensitive landscaping/plants/flowers, please let us know the best time to do your job (early spring, late fall). Alternatively, you may want to relocate these plantings if possible. While we do our best to avoid damage to vegetation, sometimes infringing on that space is unavoidable. Per our contract terms: We are not responsible for shrubs and flowers, but will be as careful as possible. 

• Fireplace opening/s should be covered and the damper closed by customer, if applicable. We recommend taping some plastic (simply cut open a plastic bag or use a garbage bag) over the fireplace opening as a backup precaution. 
• If we are installing a chimney liner, please move any breakable or valuable items in the vicinity and be sure the area/s inside the home where we will be working are clear. We set up a plastic tent around the fireplace area to help shield your home from dust or debris.
• If your contract states that you need to contact a roofer to install a new flashing, you will notice either a tarp or temporary sticky-flashing wrapped around the base of the chimney at the roof level. That is the temporary flashing seal. We recommend you have your roofer out within a week or two to install the new flashing. Do NOT wait more than a month or over the winter. The temporary flashing/seal will NOT last. If you do not have a roofer, we’d be happy to recommend one.

Please move any items you can, especially fragile or expensive items, away from the area where work will be performed. 

This is completely NORMAL. Two things are going on:

1. The mortar must set/cure, which can affect the final appearance. 

2. The final color/appearance is not visible until the work is cleaned. It sounds like magic, but it’s not—it’s science! We’ll be back to clean the work and jobsite before we’re done with your job.