Polymeric Sand getting in pool and all over deck

[Poolonthehill]

Hello brand new to the forums great stuff here!

We had installed a pool and deck last fall here in the Northeast. The race was on to get this job finished and the grout (polymeric sand) was installed on a cold day (under 40) and on a day that had rain in the forecast. Fast forward to spring and summer and now we've got a deck with grout that is coming up and sticking to our feet. The contractor has come back several times and tried to either pressure wash the loose bits of grout out and/or use leaf blowers to clean up the mess but we continue to get sand in the pool and all over our furniture. It's gotten to the point where I need to backwash our sand filter every 2 or 3 days. The manufacturer of the sand sent a rep out to assess the situation and their advice was to seal the deck which we didn't want to do for 2 reasons. 1) We didn't want a wet look with our pavers and 2) we didn't want to have to re-seal every X amount of years.

The patio looks amazing but nobody wants to take ownership and fix this issue and I'm super frustrated. Any advice or similar experiences would be greatly appreciated.

 

[YippeeSkippy]

Aren't there some sealers that are matte and not shiny?

 

[Poolonthehill]

Aren't there some sealers that are matte and not shiny?

The contractor did tell me that there are non shiny sealers but I'm afraid it's going to seal in the pebbles that are all over the pavers as well as some of the dirty spots on the pavers where the sand never fully washed off. Also upon further inspection today I noticed some of the sand is cracking and shifting and under the top hard layer there is sand that never sealed at all.

 

[Ukie]

what brand of polymeric sand did you use?

 

[Poolonthehill]

I believe that it was Alliance gator sand?

 

[Marty D]

I hate using that sand. I'm siting on the 2 1/2 gall sand bucket as I'm writing this. My son told me to use it all around the pool, for the blocks. We now have that sand in the pool, so bad that I told the pool guy to vacuum it out on wast vacuum. I had to fill the pool 2 inches. Never again. I will just spray round up when the weeds come up. That sand does last anyway. My son used it two years on his block and it all gone from rain, snow.