Plumber recommendation- J. Caiazzo

I wanted to write about our wonderful experience with Caiazzo Plumbing http://www.jcaiazzoplumbing.com/index.php?p=home

The sewer collapsed on our street in Bed Stuy a few weeks ago with that enormous rain early in the morning, and it flooded everyone’s basement on the block with lots of sewage, totally disgusting. A real nightmare. The City (DEP) hired a sub-contractor to fix the problem, and of course, the DEP sub-contractor started at the end of the block that had no problem. So every time it rained, many people got flooded with sewage for about 2 weeks, repeatedly. It was unreal!

The second (and thankfully LAST, at least we hope) time that we got flooded, when the water started to gush in with no resistance, we called 311 for a very frustrating experience to say the least. They told us, after multiple frantic calls to them, that DEP would show up in 24 hrs. Wow. We then called Caiazzo, who had his guys over fast; they jumped into our basement filled with over one foot of sewage at that time (we had 3 pumps going out to the street, and it still managed to reach 1 foot!!). Caiazzo managed to stop the problem of the “water” coming in very quickly by putting a pressure bag into the waste line that leads to the street. After sewage gushing in for hours, I was so thankful to these guys!

But the problem with the missing DEP sub-contractor for the problem with the main sewer line in the street remained. (the DEP sub-contractor didn’t show up to work for several days because it was raining!!!! grrr)

We were getting no where with 311/911 (911 sent the police?!?!), so the owner of Caiazzo showed up to help, and he was with us for many hours, and charged us a very reasonable fee in the end. I think there were about 4 plumbers here for about 6 hours or so.

And the DEP sub-contractor got multiple violations after the City finally showed up- this was an unreal experience that the City’s negligence has cost us thousands. Why DEP wasn’t there to check on the contractor’s work is beyond me. We have to gather our bills, and submit them to the Comptroller’s office, after all the damage- fridges breaking twice in 2 weeks, water heater, freezer, loosing LOTS of DIY books, tools, parent’s wedding album, boxes of memories, rare records, the list just goes on (all of the personal effects were on shelves!! But the water got SOO high!) And of course, missing LOTS of work to deal with the problem 2 times.

At any rate, I know it is difficult to find good contractors, and I wanted to pass along this recommendation. The plumber that we got at Caiazzo was named Jason (I think that they have many plumbers), I would request him. These guys were amazing, and I definitely recommend them.

(what happened in the end? DEP came to pump out the sewers daily until the DEP sub-contractor fixed with the main sewer line, and Caiazzo put a check valve on our main waste line. PHEW!!!)