Pool-deck job timed exactly two days before the pool-opening visit, common scheduling pattern. Customer wanted the deck immaculate before the heavy pool-tech equipment arrived and tracked everything across it. We get ~15 of these in late April every year.
What we did
Six hours, two people:
- Flagstone surface: low-pressure clean with anti-microbial detergent (pulls algae from porous stone without bleaching the colour out)
- Joints: hand-scraped the worst algae, re-applied polymeric sand
- Pool-equipment pad (concrete): degreased the pump-side, pressure-cleaned the rest
- Drain-line trough: cleared it and confirmed the auto-cover discharge would drain properly this season
- Quick rinse of the surrounding glass-rail panels (free, since we were already there)
Pool-deck specifics worth knowing
We never use bleach on coloured flagstone, it strips the pigment, and you only see it weeks later when the colour fades unevenly. Anti-microbial detergent + low pressure does the same job for algae without the side effect. If a power-washing crew quotes you a faster job by using bleach, ask them to put that in writing, most won't.
