House builder taking the mick

irn_bru

I bought a new house in December 2007 and some of my kitchen cupboard doors have developed some bubbling of the laminate on the bottom edge, probably caused by steam.

As I am within my 2 year warranty I asked the builder (a large firm) to come and have a look, which they did and acknowledged the damage. They then sent out the kitchen supplier who submitted a report stating there was clear water damage but it's not covered under the warranty as it is caused by unintentional neglect.

Now I have responded saying that I should reasonably expect to be able to cook and boil a kettle in my kitchen and my kitchen should be able to cope with this. I deem that I have taken all reasonable precautions by using the extract fan whenever I cook. They have since responded simply to say they will be taking no further action.

I think they are wrong in this but your opinions and advice would be appreciated.

rsykes2000

Are the doors that have bubbled laminate over where you normally site the kettle ?

Optimist

If the doors are the ones I am thinking of then I have the same sort of laminate doors. I expect it to be a working kitchen and that means steam/water etc. In fact high pressure steam from the coffee maker sometimes goes down the front which it puts up with admirably.

Get back onto the builder to get it sorted

Hintza

rsykes2000 wrote: »

Are the doors that have bubbled laminate over where you normally site the kettle ?

My thought.

If the kettle sits under it then I think you will struggle. If the cupboard is say the other side of the room then it shouldn't be affected and you should perhaps ask them to look again.

Mankysteve

I would say that as they've had someone out who put it down to unintentional neglect. Now you’re going to have to prove this is not the case.

You are going to have get an independent engineer to assess the damaged decided whether the problem is due to the doors being unfit for purpose or as the original report though neglect. If the report find in your favor then you claim back both the cost of the report and the replacement doors. Get this report to the builder if he then refuses then its a trip to small claims court.

Write a letter stating that you’re going to get an independent report and if that find in your favor then you’ll proceed to court for the new doors and the cost of the report as allowed under the sales of Goods act. Just use it as an idle threat.
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If that doesn’t work personally I would give up and save yourself the effort and just buy some new doors, If the report finds that the damage is though your own neglect then you’ll lose the money you’ve paid for that, you’ll need to find someone willing to do the report and then file court proceeding[/FONT]

ixwood

They're not going to bubble for no reason. Pointing a kettle at or under them is going to wreck most doors I would have thought.