Karl's Excavating

Louis V. Pacilio _{on Google}

Apr 4th, 2024

Scheduled septic tank pumping was delayed because of an emergency at the VA hospital. Our clean out was done the very next day as promised because we were leaving and needed to put the soil back over the tank clean outs before we left. Very accommodating and great service that we have enjoyed over the years.

Dave Powell _{on Google}

Dec 11th, 2023

We hired Karls to redo our steep unpaved driveway, which was extremely damaged by rain washout. They did a wonderful job, and we recently received several days in succession of heavy rain, but due to their thoughtful planning during the rework the driveway still looks like new. I would strongly recommend them for a challenging driveway task.

Ted Christ _{on Google}

Dec 4th, 2023

Terrific company that operates with care and integrity. We recommend them to others and would certainly work with them again.
Brief Description of the Project:
They replaced our waterline from the street to our house, which runs 100 yards and crisscrosses beneath our long driveway. It was an unexpected and expensive project ($20K). They were responsive and helped us manage costs. There were a few problems with the project that they remedied for us without question. The owner came to our house to review and remedy the issues.

Austen Iglehart _{on Google}

May 15th, 2023

Would highly recommend them for all of your excavating needs. They helped level an area for a shed, and everything went smoothly.

Sasha Kopf _{on Google}

Mar 7th, 2023

I would not recommend Karls Excavating.
My husband and I bought a house in Hadley in late 2021. The septic system had failed a Title 5 inspection and needed to be repaired. We agreed with the previous owner that the repairs would be done after we moved. The previous owner, who was paying for the repairs, selected Karls Excavating to do the work, and we ended up having numerous problems dealing with them.
Karls took a saw to anything in our yard that they thought was in their way, without our permission. We were told that in order to access the back yard, Karls would need to cut down some trees, and they told us which ones they would cut. However, on the first day that they came to do work, they cut down a tree that they had not told us they were going to remove. If they really needed to cut it in order to access the back yard, we would have given them permission, but they cut it without even letting us know.
Similarly, there is a wooden retaining wall and attached set of wooden stairs in our back yard near the septic tank. Karls took a saws-all and cut off the bottom step. Not only did they not tell us ahead of time that they would be doing this, but they did a sloppy job of it, leaving a jagged edge where the step met the wall. Again, if they needed to do this in order to access the septic tank, we would have authorized it, but they never gave us a heads-up. Additionally, when we later mentioned that we might just take out all of the stairs, the workers warned us that we might not be able to do that because the stairsone of which they had cut off without permissionwere structurally tied in to the retaining wall.
No one at Karls seems to be in charge of project management or communicating with customers. The only person who seems to have any idea what is going on at Karls is the owner, Steve. But Steve does not communicate effectively with either customers or his own employees. When we would reach out to ask questions, Steve would rarely get back to us, instead delegating that task to one of his employees, who didnt have adequate information to answer our questions. On a couple of occasions, when we mentioned to workers at our house that we had emailed Steve to ask him a question, they rolled their eyes and told us, Good luck with that. Im sure everyone at Karls was sick of us trying to contact them, but we wouldnt have kept contacting them if they had just answered our questions.
There are other problems that I could get into, but this review is long enough as it is. So far, we havent had any issues with our septic system itself, so hopefully the work that Karls did on that was okay. But nothing about my interactions with Karls gives me confidence in the quality of their work.
EDIT: I see that one of the other Google reviews is a 2-star review from Alan Konieczny. I assume that's the same Alan Konieczny who co-owns Karl's Excavating...? I really, really want to know the backstory behind Alan giving his own company 2/5 stars.