What to do about bad workmanship?

11 years ago

Hello,

Last year we had our bathroom refitted and were given the name of an installer by the plumbers merchant who supplied all the fittings and tiles. He claimed to be extremely good at what he did and we, to our very great cost, believed him.

Right from day one there were problems; we even considered sacking him on day one. I won't go into details here but we were not happy at the time and we have become even more dissatisfied since. We certainly weren't going to ask him to do the other bathroom.

So, knowing we still had to refit the other bathroom, we spent more time finding reputable tradesmen and decided to bite the bullet and rip out our "new" bathroom too. What the current tradesman have found has been astonishing and alarming. Incompetence doesn't even start to describe the situation. Plus I now suspect the first person deliberately did a poor job once we started to query what he was doing.

We can't face any sort of legal action to recover our costs from him but we do question what rights we might have had if we had followed our instincts and sacked him at the earliest opportunity.

It has made us extremely wary of having other work done. We are currently seeking planning permission for more extensive work to be done; what steps can we take to make sure we don't get our fingers burnt again?

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Comments (4)

Najeebah
11 years ago
the only thing, in my experience, that ensures standards are met and no shortcuts are taken, is not handing over full payment upfront. you can pay a maximum of 80%
you should have a written agreement that the balance will only be paid after inspection and satisfaction.
Some people will refuse because of 'policy' or some such, but if you comply you will be taking on all the risk, so don't.
alant1000
11 years ago
I use checkatrade for everything now and have never once had a problem. Some people would argue that some of the reviews might be from the traders friends etc, but when you have tilers, plumbers etc with 80 or 100+ good reviews, it's safe territory.

Any trader who slates checkatrade or who tries to play down the benefits of independent reviews, I avoid like the plague.

As long as you can get at least some good recent reviews, it should give you some comfort. Most importantly check if they are going to subcontract out your job - you'll likely get the boss turn up who then might contract out to some rookies. Just ask if this will be the case and if the boss will be on hand to monitor the work if this is the case.
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minnie101
11 years ago
I assume you're having building work done in which case look for someone who is a member of the a Federation of Master Builders (FMB). If using other trades check they're registered with appropriate body. Any member of the FMB will have passed certain criteria to join and various checks are carried out. They also need to abide to a Code of Practice and a Dispute Resolution and Complaint Procedure which includes independent adjudication by a member of the Royal Institute of Chartered Surveyors (RICS). Any members would have had a job in progress checked. They should also offer warranties on work and are eligible to join the government endorsed Trustmark scheme for tradespeople. I'd also agree a payment plan and it's also worth having a detailed schedule of work so there is absolutely no confusion about what the builder is meant to do for his money. I don't know how extensive the work is but it may need to go through Building Control or if you were really worried you could build into the contract that any work would be verified by an independent surveyor
PRO
User
10 years ago
last modified: 10 years ago
WOW!!! 80% as a DEPOSIT!! That is utterly ludicrous. I would consider 20% high. If a builder or any other contractor for that matter demands money up front, the answer has to be no.

Staged payments perhaps, so you can pay for discreet parts of the job as they are completed and the builder is not risking too much capital up front - remember, to a contractor, my own bbusiness included, you are a potential non-payer until you have paid so it cuts both ways.

Unless your financial situation forces you to scrape the bottom of the price barrel, you are far better of with contractors who run their businesses well enough to finance their activities until invoice time, even if those invoices are drawn up at pre-agreed completion of stages rather than at total completion.

Whilst Alant1000 may run 1000 metres at this, membership of a responsible trade organisation with genuine capability and compliance checks of its members is in my view a far better sign of competence and integrity than all of the online outfits which charge fees to tradesman for their (the sites') dubious services put together.

Recent independent reviews, and I believe the Houzz team try to ensure the ones that get on here are genuine, are quite another matter. Alant1000 and I can agree wholeheartedly on that one.

What to do about bad workmanship?

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Najeebah

alant1000

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