Are there any marine contractors that you've worked with that were especially good and you'd recommend? Were there any you've worked with that you'd recommend people avoid like the plague?
I've got two names for the avoid like the plague.
Kelley Marine Services, out of Wareham, MA
Peter Kennedy Yacht Services, out of Annapolis, MD
Here's why:
Kelley Marine Services:
Well, two years ago, at the end of the season, I was in the hospital and couldn't winterize my boat.... The yard hauled her out for me, and I called up the marine services company that had an office at my marina and asked them to do the following:
- Winterize the 20 HP outboard
- Winterize the freshwater system—two sinks, head, holding tank
- Scribe a new waterline so I could re-paint the hull the following spring
We agreed on a price after discussing what I wanted done. When I went to the boat, after getting out of the hospital, I found that they had done the following:
He had not scribed a new water
line...and when asked about it, I was told that he said he was only going to do that if he was going to be painting the bottom in the spring—not what we had agreed to. He had winterized the freshwater system and engine.
He had also removed the two small AGM starting batteries I have for "winter maintenance", even though I had not requested this.
When I asked where my batteries were, he told me that he had removed them for winter maintenance and that they'd send me a bill for it in the spring. I requested he replace the batteries, since I had not asked him to remove or maintain the batteries... What was really laughable was he had missed the two wet-cell T105 golf cart batteries, which really do require maintenance over the winter.
The following week, when I went back to the marina, I found that he had left the boat unlocked, and the batteries weren't reconnected to the electrical system. When I asked why my batteries weren't reconnected, he said,
"Oh, we must have forgotten to do that, it isn't a big deal and only takes a minute or so." Well, these batteries have a lot of connections, and re-connecting them and strapping the battery boxes down takes about 10 minutes to do properly. Fortunately, this spring, when I came to the marina, I found he had been kicked to the curb. Too many customer complaints.
Peter Kennedy Yacht Services:
See the posts located
here and
here.