Our builder won't give receipts for materials

D_e_n_i_s_e

Its a shame that some builders who cut corners, overcharge, produce false reciepts, work on the side claiming income support etc give the real m genuine builders a bad name

what iv learnt from experience is the following:

its all in the paperwork, get a contract signed by them before they commence on any work. https://www.fmb.gov.uk has FREE contracts to download.

also builders recommended by the FMB come with a bond gaurantee, a bit like ebay where a good rep they have maintained they'l want to keep.

check there work done previously with other customers

Good builders as practice where i live place a large A3 size poster on the front windows of the house they are working in, giving a large photograph of the team, company name, contact number, as well as a list of properties they have done work on (customers agreed to have there names on it). so you can inspect BEFORE you get a quote from them. Good practise which should be adopted by most builders.

REAL and Genuine builders will be more than glad to provide reciepts in order to protect there reputation. and will be informative on there pricing.

eg; for me to complete the work to the spec/standard it will be £10,500 inc vat or i'l charge £20 per hour to do the work.

iv also learnt its best to stick with em, to avoid having sockets put into the wrong place! let them know that you're only a phone call away and to make sure they call you if theres anything they are unsure of.

From your story its sad to hear that things are pretty much over between you and your builder, trust is the number one factor of a good relationship with a builder. Your builder when buying things for your kitchen probably all new costing many hundreds of pounds, should at least through the experiece have a little brain cell to tell him to keep the paperwork (for warranty purposes)

Its with regret i say this but i dont trust brit builders anymore, i employed a polish builder (an immigrant) whom quoted me a kitchen extension for £15,000, saying his labour will be £3000. everysingle reciept was accounted for, everything was done to my approval. the work was done to a high spec, the builder was friendly, approchable, came and worked in all weather conditions, once the materials was here he commenced work at 9am and finished at 6pm 4 weeks in total. i paid him not £3000 but £3500. for his working ethic and craftsmanship i deserved he earned that bit extra! why cant we have more builders/electricians/plumbers like him!

Alan_M_2

D_e_n_i_s_e wrote:

Its with regret i say this but i dont trust brit builders anymore, i employed a polish builder (an immigrant) whom quoted me a kitchen extension for £15,000, saying his labour will be £3000. everysingle reciept was accounted for, everything was done to my approval. the work was done to a high spec, the builder was friendly, approchable, came and worked in all weather conditions, once the materials was here he commenced work at 9am and finished at 6pm 4 weeks in total. i paid him not £3000 but £3500. for his working ethic and craftsmanship i deserved he earned that bit extra! why cant we have more builders/electricians/plumbers like him!

It's a shame you don't understand the ramifications of this, and it isn't the fault of the public at large but the governments short sightedness.

I have seen some building work undertaken by immigrant contractors, some of it was at least as good as British construction and some was downright dangerous, so you run the same risks as employing any builder from any nationality, with the following added risks.

Your Polish builder will not be a UK resident, so 6 months after He's finished a major problem occurs where is his guarantee, and if it comes to it how do you make him rectify the problem?

As a non UK resdient, Trading Standards are toothless, so how would you sue him? You can't. simple answer.

Did He comply with British Standards and Building regulations? Does He even know what British Standards and Building regulations are?

I'm not saying any of this will occur, but you need to be aware that it's a possibility.

As for what He charges, that's easier to expalin, He can charge so little because his living costs are so low, they chose to live cheaply in the UK and work for a calculated period of time. They earn as much as they can in that period, any of which if it isn't cash is legally declared and they pay tax (if they're honest), upon returning home to Poland they can reclaim all thier tax up to the personal allowance and leave the country with their tax free income, go back to Poland where the equivalent £450,000 house costs £45,000.

We are allowing people into the country who can work for substantially less money than UK residents becuase their cost of living is so low.

May I ask a few pertinent Questions?

Did you pay VAT? (seeing as the threshold is £58,000 per year turnover he must be registered for a £35,000 job in four weeks).

What insurance did He hold whilst undertking your work?

What guarantee do you have should any problems occur in the future?

Was the building work carried out to building regualtions, inspected by BCO and certified?

I'm not going out of my way to put down what you've done, but these are all material facts which people should be aware of when employing anyone to do any building work, never mind foreign companies.

After all, you wouldn't buy a £15,000 car without any form of guarantee or redress from where you bought it, so would you subject your home to similar risks?

plumb1_2

woodbutcher wrote:

By the way,lay people of this thread.I am a builder and "jack of all trades" but contrary to popular belief i am master of all of them.[/quote]

It's glad you know you limitations woodbutcher:D

OddjobKIA

again and again we see this type of post on here


COMMUNICATION


before throught and after is the key to happy builder experiances

woodbutcher_2

It was said that builders are jack of all trades and masters of none.I am competent at several trades and know of several builders who are the same.Not all builders are unskilled chancers,some of us are good at what we do and care about the job.;)

Deluks

Re: the original post. Howden's are the trade outlet for MFI, why don't you tot up the total cost of your units on the MFI website, compare with what he charged you and see if he's ripped you off? (or at least saved you money) Don't forget to include fitting such as plinths and worktops etc. A Howden's regular can get upto 70% off of base units, and appliances at upto half price from what I've been told (By a chippie with a Howdens account)

What about the other bits? Do the same, ring around for a quote on an RSJ of the same size.

I understand that builders will add some markup on materials, for all those screws, cable, fixings and replacement drill bits/blades etc.
But some use this as an excuse to really take the pee. So be sure to get a seperate breakdown (with original receipts) for all materials when a job is priced, and also agree in advance a fair markup rate, say 10-15% for example, so they will be less inclined to hide receipts because they don't wanna explain why they charged £100 for a £90 sink (or £60 for a £40 sheet of ply :eek: )

Tom_Jones

Urmmmmmm if you read a later post she sacked the bloke a few days ago, and judging but the work that he did, I can't understand why he wasn't sacked much earlier, he was deffo a jobber on the dole at a guess.

As someone posted earlier use the right tradesman for the right job.

Wig

Alan M,

It is certainly 'normal' for tradesmen to mark up materials they buy, inc motor mechanics too. You think it is acceptable. I don't. IMO there should be no such thing as a 'trade discount' tradesmen should base their profits on their hourly rate for labour and nothing else. If for no other reason than it would make life a lot less complicated for all concerned. The only discounts should be for bulk buys on a single transaction, i.e. a box of 50 screws is going to cost more per screw than a box of 1000 screws.

You compared this to Tesco's making a profit. Tesco's is a retailer as you well know, and totally different to a tradesman. When you go to the till at Tesco you don't get charged seperately for the hourly rate of the staff in the store depending how long you have been in there shoping (and divided by the no. of customers in the store at the time). You know you are buying a product from a retailer and within the price is the profit margin for the retailer.

A taxi driver charges his rate per mile, he doesn't add on his fuel costs, he may get his fuel at a discount, but he doesn't charge the customer the 20% discount he got on his fuel or on his tyres or brakes etc.

I am joe public, and unlike djohn have never had a trade account at TP, but even I can get a trade discount at TP, I just ask for it and it is given. I got about 50% off a couple of acrow props doing just this. And I just phoned up a local timberyard 25mm standard ply (not rough, not marine) with a far eastern hardwood construction 32 +VAT standard quote, I made it quite clear I was not a tradesman.

I can also get a trade discount at Vauxhall dealers, just by saying I am a taxi driver, I can also apply for a tradeclub card account at vauxhalls and get even more money off fairly easily.

So IMO the whole tradition of discounts to trade should stop. Why should they get a discount? Why not price everything the same price to all customers. It would make everyones life easier, from the guy phoning for a quote, to the guy giving a quote trying to work out if his customer phoning him is "in the trade" or not, to the end customer who would know the tradesman is charging for labour and there are no hidden profits included.

Alan_M_2

The idea of a trade discount is for bulk purchase, part of my business used to be bathroom installation, I bought all my suites and fittings from one shop, but only ever one bathroom at a time, the very same way you would buy. But I used to spend in excess of £50,000 per year in that shop, therefore I buy at a cheaper rate than you do, but I never bought in bulk.

This is simple business, the shop want to keep me as a customer and the incentive is that I make a margin of profit selling products on their behalf.

Look at it from the shops point of view, are they more interested in your once in a life time custom or do they want my 20 + orders a year, year in year out and why do you feel you are entitled to buy at tha same rate as a customer (albeit a tradesman) that spends 20 times what you do every year?

Your idealist outlook really just shows you have no comprehension of how basic businesses operate and make a profit and your post really is utter nonsence.

Wig

it's not a nonsense, it is (I agree) as you put it idealist, ideally everyone would be charged the same, ideally you should be able to charge your customers openly for a job and not have hide profits within materials.

Keeping you as a customer is a nonsense because you as a tradesman can get the same discount at the next shop and the next and the next, and if you can't there is something wrong with your negotiating skills.

Why? (do I think it should be acceptable) because a product should have one price with discounts for bulk orders being acceptable. Why should a shop look upon every joe public that walks in as an automatic lottery winning ticket, i.e. they know they are going to charge full price not the discount they give to 80%+ of their usual customers (tradesmen).

Why do you say I have no comprehension of how businesses work? I have outlined exactly the way businesses work, all I have said is that I disagree with it from a moral standpoint. Because I disagree with you you decide I speak "utter nonsense" and have "no comprehension" Where is my lack of comprehension exactly? hmmm? No one allowed to disagree with you hmmm?

What about the customer you charge £60 (you never said if that was inc VAT or +VAT) for the plywood that costs anyone with an ounce of sense £32 +VAT Is that customer allowed to disagree with you hmmm?