A Speedy Solutions

Firstly, here’s my bottom line statement about this company and you can read on if you like:
«As difficult and extremely expensive as this whole tank removal ordeal is to go through for the homeowner, I believe this company is an excellent choice for the job.»
We had a buried oil tank (UST or Underground Storage Tank) removed by this company from our property in New Westminster in July and August of 2014.
After consulting with a few other Oil Tank Removal companies, we chose «A Speedy Solutions», based on their previous work within New West where we live, but also after speaking with their people on site in the initial consultation and speaking to other people who have had this done.
We signed a contract to have them remove the oil tank and have an independant inspector do the soil test. You are presented with the option of doing a 3 point or a 5 point test, each with 2 samples for the lab.
I would personally recommend doing the proper 5 point test, as that is the one that meets the BC Ministry of the Environment soil test guidelines and when the site is clean, it results in a «Certificate of Independant Remediation», which declares the property clean, removes your property from the provincial list of contaminated sites and you will definitely want that certificate if you are ever going to sell the property. We recently sold our house and that was the first thing the realtor wanted. You can not lie about your knowledge of a buried tank when you sell and if you do, you could be sued for the cost of removal and remediation.
Doing the 3 point test may not find contamination, but may also leave you open to having a prospective property buyer demand a proper full test and if contamination is found, the remediation would need to be fully completed to get that certificate.
They scheduled the work and started it as scheduled. They had the tank out in the same day and arranged for the soil test that day.
As a result of the soil tests, it was determined that our tank had leaked and the option for soil remediation was presented to us.
We signed a second contract for the soil remediation and the work was scheduled. This company shows you all the reciepts for the costs they incur while doing the work and does not mark up the costs of the environmental engineer. They are very forthcoming with their incurred costs.
In our case, the contamination went quite deep and 3 different excavators had to be brought in to dig deep enough to remove the contaminated soil.
When they thought the site was clean enough to call for another soil test, we had the option to escalate the results and were told that the results would be back within 24 to 48 hours, whereas the usual time is 5 to 7 days.
We chose to escalate the results and the cost of each sample test is doubled for doing so, but if the lab is busy enough, it can sometimes only shave a day or two off the time for getting the results back.
They will do the best they can to make a clean job of it, but this is difficult work with very heavy machinery and sometimes driveways and sidewalks are casualties of the job. They can do the repair work at additional cost, but be prepared to have those discussions during the work.
This type of work is often extremley expensive and can be financially heartbreaking for the homeowner, however, the crew we had was always positive on the job and showed me that they were sympathetic to the costs associated with such a job. They worked very hard and as efficiently as possible, despite the difficulty of the work. I watched them almost every step of the way and frankly, they were great.
It is important to keep in perspective that these workers are not the cause of the cost of doing these tank removals and despite our job costing tens of thousands of dollars, we believe we chose the best company for the job.